I noticed Jim's thread, and it made me think of this question, and I found the anwer to be an interesting piece of history, and thought I would share (source is the Breen encyclopedia). Apparantly in order to handle precious metals, there was a 10,000 dollar surety bond needed. Back then, no one had that kind of money that wanted the position, so George Washington had to lower the bonds to a much lesser amount. After it was lowered, they were able to start producing silver coins in 1794.
This practice was common in other countries as well. In fact, people used to purchase outright the right to strike coins and run the mint. The government would often provide the bullion, the minter would strike and issue the coins and he would keep a percentage of the profits. This was the way it was done for centuries. So when the US Mint was first started up, the idea was continued - soon to be discontinued of course.
It wasn't just a matter of wanting the position though. At least for the position of assayer the person needed to have specific knowledge and skills. It wasn't so much selecting from applicants a it was trying to find the person who could fill the requirements. Even after the bonds were reduced to $5000 the assyer and coiner still could not come up with the money. Finally Director Rittenhouse paid the bond for one of them, Assayer Cox I believe. The coiners bond I believe was posted by Thomas Jefferson. This is the reason why I maintain thatthe 1792 half disme is not the first US coin but rather a pattern. Since it was a silver piece it could not be a legally issued coin under the laws in effect at the time. If it couldn't legally be issued how could it be a coin? But a pattern COULD be distributed to congressmen or influential people.
Conder101,I believe that the 1792 1/2 Disme (a French-sounding word that is where the word 'Dime' comes from) is the first American coin,as there was an Act of the U.S. Congress that was passed in 1792 & assented to by President George Washington that established the U.S. Mint. Aidan.
Yes there was the act of 1792 that established the Mint and set the specifications for the coins including the half disme. But it also established the required bonds and forbids the issuance of silver or gold coins until those bonds are satified. Those bonds were not made until 1794. So by law no silver coins could be made before that time. If silver 1792 half dismes could not legally be issued, I don't see how the 1792 half disme could be the first US coin. At best it could be a pattern. It can't be a legal coin.
Conder101,perhaps Congress passed an amending Act to retrospectively declare the coins of 1792 & 1793 to be legal tender as well as those issued from 1794 onwards. Aidan.
Frank,I don't think so.It would have been the coins in circulation in around 1794 that would have been covered by any amending legislation. Aidan.
I have compilations of all of the laws passed relating to US coinage from 1792 to 1894 and there is no legislation retroactively referring to the 1792 half disme. The 1793 large cent was not legal tender until 1864. The 1793 half cent wasn't legal tender until 1965. Now the coinage act of 1965 could possibly be seen as making the 1792 half disme legal tender, but it would have to have been a legal coin first! Since it could not have been legally issued, it wasn't a coin and therefore the Act of 1965 wouldn't apply to it either. Just as the Act does not apply to any of the other pattern coin issues. They are not legal tender either.
I understand your point Conder, but perhaps it was the wording of a clause which permitted it - The bonds were only required of those 3 employees - they were not required of the engraver, nor were they required of the workmen described in section 2 of the same chapter. So if the engraver made the dies, and the workmen struck the coins, it seems to me that the coins would have been legal without the bonds having been posted. And this could have been done under the authority and at the direction of the Director of the Mint and the Secretary himself. Or, it could be said they worked around it by meeting the clause - " to the satisfaction of the Secretary of the Treasury,". Now I'll admit, that may be weak. But it does seem like they could have used either method to meet the intent of the law, if not the letter to allow the new nation to begin striking coinage which they were in dire need of at the time. I'm not trying to argue the point really, more trying to provide a different perspective of how they perhaps worked around a difficult problem at the time. By the way, we no longer need books to look this up, just an understanding of how the Library of Congress's web site works. Anyone can read it all for themselves by starting - Right Here
Yes it's weak. They would still need the assayer for assaying the silver and creating the alloy mix, and the coiner would still be responsible for the actions of the workmen so I would think that the bonds would still be needed. And if this was good enough to get around the bond problem, why would the mint not have stayed in operation striking small silver coins? If they could do it for the 1792 half disme, why did they then have to wait until 1794 and the bonds were paid before they struck any other silver? Possibly they got in trouble for striking the 1792 half dismes illegally? No I think the half dismes were simply a political expediency. Washington had promised the start of the mint in his last state of the union address. After seven months it looked like they still weren't going to make it so they struck off the half dismes as a personal favor to the president and then they struck nothing else for the rest of the year. Yet at Washington's next state of the union address five months later he trots out the "small coinage of half dismes because of the want of small coinage" to show he kept his promise from the previous year even though nothing else had been struck since the small coinage done for him personally. Politics pure and simple.
