CURIOSITIES OF AMERICAN COINAGE. 



601 





^5 gold piece. Pike's Peak gold. Clark, 

 Gruber & Co., Denver, 1861. 



to 1 " in value when first coined, was the original dollar of the Consti- 

 tution. This is, however, erroneous. The 412|-grain silver dollar 

 was not authorized until forty-five years later. The original silver 

 dollar weighed 416 grains, and the ratio of silver to gold was 15 to 1, 

 not 16 to 1. 



Several modifications in weight and fineness of both gold and 

 silver coins were made during the first few years, prior to the act 



of January 18, 1837, which great- 



ly simplified the coinage by adopt- 

 ing the French decimal system, in- 

 cluding a uniform " fineness," or 

 proportion of 9 parts of gold to 1 

 part of copper for the gold coins, 

 and the same proportion of silver 

 and copper for the silver coins; the 

 weights of the gold and silver 

 coins were, at the same time, readjusted so as to make the ratio "16 

 to 1 " between silver and gold.* 



The total issue of silver dollars coined under the acts of 1792 



and 1837 until 1873, when the coinage was dropped, amounted to 



$8,031,238. When the Bland act was passed, in 1878, the silver 



in the silver dollar weighing 412^ grains was worth 89.1 cents; 



to-day the silver in the same dollar is worth about 42.5 cents. In the 



first four months after the Bland bill was passed 8,573,500 Bland 



dollars were coined, or more than the entire issue of the old silver 



dollars in eighty years. In the same year also the Mint coined 



, ^ , .. _ - 11,378,610 "trade dollars," which 



^ ^BSK^ i ^^^H^k weighed 7-| grains more than the Bland 



H^jg g^\ ■SiOSm^ dollars, but were not " legal tenders," f 



^BQwHDv ^^S^B B. ^^^7 though issued by the United 



^BB^^^ ^ ^^ ^^ States Mint, were refused by the United 



States Government in payment for 

 postage stamps, taxes, or for other dues, 

 while the Bland dollar, of lesser intrin- 

 sic value, was a legal tender, and good for payment of all debts. The 

 total issue of trade dollars between 1873 and 1879 was 35,965,924, 



$2.50 gold piece. Clark, Gruber & 

 Co., Denver, 1861. 



* The original silver dollar, authorized under the act of April 2, 1792, contained 892.4 

 parts of pure silver in 1,000 parts of metal and weighed 41(5 grains. The act of January 

 18, 1837, changed the proportion of silver to 900 parts in 1,000 and the weight to 41J^ 

 grains ; the amount of pure silver thus remahied unchanged. 



f The act of February 12, 1873, made the trade dollar a "legal tender in sums not 

 exceeding five dollars ; this legal-tender quality was withdrawn by the joint resolution 

 approved July 22, 1876, and the coinage was limited to such amount as the Secretary of 

 the Treasury should consider suffi-.-ient to meet the export demands." — United States Treas- 

 ury Department^ Circular No. 1^. 



