LEGAL TENDER. In its broadest sense, an oiler or attempt to perform a contract in ac cordance with the appropriate legal require ments. When thus used, the term includes an oiler to perform by doing something, as well as an offer to perform by paying something. In the former ease a legal tender. that is. an offer to perform the contract at the agreed time and place. as in the case of a sale and delivery of a chattel, discharges the person making the delivery from all contract liability, although the other party declines the tender. In the same way a legal tender of the amount due on a mortgage m a pledge, even though it be rejected by the credi tor, will operate to discharge the property from the lien of the mortgage or pledge.
A tender of payment, however, dries not dis charge the debtor. Its effect is to save the ten ..
dcrer from paying interest thereafter, and from the costs of a suit for the debt. In order that a tender of payment be legal, it must he a proffer of money actually produced and accessible to the creditor, or the production must be waived by him; the exact amount due must be offered or a sum tendered from which the creditor eau take the exact amount without making change, and it must be unconditional.
The term is also used to denote the kind of money that is legally tenderable in the payment of debts. This is regulated with considerable mi nuteness by modern statutes. In Great Britain
Itank of Lngland notes are a legal tender for any sum altos e t3, Gold coins of the Royal Mint, unless diminished in weight below the statutory standard, are a legal tender for a payment of any amount: it. •iher coins for an amount not exceeding forty shillings; its bronze coins for an amount not exceeding one shilling. The Crolln, with the advice of the Privy Council, may by proelamation declare forei:zn or colonial coins legal tender. In this country, under the Federal Constitution and statutes, the Na•ious gold coins of the National Mint, the notes of the nited States, ordinarily ealled greenbacks, and a specified class of United States Treasury notes are a legal tender for debts of any amount. Sil ver dollars are a legal tender "for all debts. ex cept where otherwise expressly stipulated in the contract:" while the other silver coins (the half-dollar, quarter-dollar, and dime) are a legal tender for an amount not exceeding ten dollars. Minor coins (the five-cent piece and the cent) are tenderahle for an amount not exceeding twenty-live cents. Consult; 3 and 4 William eh. § 6; The Coinage Act, 1870, 33 and 34 Viet., el). 10; United States Constitution, Art. I, § 10; United States Revised Statutes, §§ 3584 3590, as amended; also the authorities referred to under CONTRACT.