While the gold standard was regularly violated, specially during the Bretton Woods era, the different ties of the dollar to gold had some restraining effect on the government. Since the last tie with gold was broken in the 70's, monetary inflation on the USA has gone to some levels that had never been seen before.
Check out the chart/graph here of USD value since the start of the country.
http://evoorhees.blogspot.com/2009/07/record-of-federal-reserve.html150 years without The Fed and with an (imperfect) gold standard = zero devaluation in the dollar (appreciation, actually)
100 years since The Fed's creation and without a gold standard = more than 95% devaluation in the dollar
And one reason the Fed was created was to "stabilize the value of the dollar." I wonder why they don't teach this in public schools?
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