FEBRUARY 28
1878•Bland-Allison Act Revives the Silver Dollar
2013•Girl Scouts Centennial Silver Dollar
The Bland-Allison Act Brings Back the Silver Dollar and Launches the Morgan Era
On February 28, 1878, Congress overrode President Rutherford B. Hayes's veto and enacted the Bland-Allison Act, requiring the U.S. Treasury to purchase between $2 million and $4 million worth of silver each month and coin it into standard silver dollars. The law reversed the halt in standard silver-dollar coinage created by the Coinage Act of 1873 and produced an immediate numismatic consequence: enormous quantities of the new Morgan dollar. Few pieces of monetary legislation have left a larger physical legacy in American coin collecting.
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The Morgan dollar exists in vast numbers because Congress wanted silver coined.
Not merely thousands of dollars.
Not merely hundreds of thousands.
Millions upon millions.
The political battle behind those coins culminated on February 28, 1878.
That day, Congress overrode a presidential veto and made the Bland-Allison Act law.
America's great Morgan dollar era had begun.
The Silver Dollar Had Nearly Disappeared
Before 1873, the United States legally maintained both gold and silver coinage under a bimetallic monetary system.
The standard silver dollar traced its federal origins to the Coinage Act of 1792.
But for long periods, the market value of silver made the dollar uneconomical to produce for ordinary circulation.
Relatively few standard silver dollars were struck compared with smaller denominations.
Congress fundamentally revised U.S. coinage law in 1873.
The legislation reorganized the Mint and changed the authorized coinage system.
Among its consequences was the elimination of the old standard 412.5-grain silver dollar from the list of coins authorized for ordinary production.
The new Trade dollar served a different purpose, particularly in overseas commerce.
At the time, eliminating the standard dollar did not provoke the political explosion that would come later.
As silver prices declined during the 1870s, critics reinterpreted the 1873 law.
Silver advocates denounced the demonetization of the standard silver dollar as the “Crime of '73.”
They argued that silver had been unfairly pushed out of the monetary system.
The phrase became one of the great political slogans of nineteenth-century American monetary history.
Whether the law had been secretly engineered became a bitter partisan question.
Why Silver Prices Fell
Several forces increased the supply of silver on world markets.
Major western mining discoveries expanded American production.
At the same time, Germany moved away from silver monetary standards after unification, releasing additional silver into international markets.
The metal's market value declined relative to gold.
That changed the economics of coinage dramatically.
When silver bullion had been worth more than its official coinage value, owners had little reason to turn it into standard dollars.
Once silver became cheaper, the situation reversed.
If the government would convert silver into legal-tender dollars at a favorable statutory relationship to gold, silver producers gained a powerful market.
Western mining interests therefore became major supporters of renewed silver coinage.
Silver politics extended far beyond mine owners.
Farmers and debtors often favored expansion of the money supply.
They believed more money in circulation could ease deflationary pressure and make debts less burdensome in real terms.
Creditors and advocates of hard money tended to prefer a stronger link to gold.
The silver question therefore became a battle over economic interests as well as coinage.
Representative Richard P. Bland of Missouri became one of Congress's leading silver advocates.
He was so closely identified with the cause that he earned the nickname “Silver Dick.”
Bland supported free coinage of silver—a system under which individuals could bring silver bullion to the Mint and have it coined into dollars.
His original proposal went farther than the law Congress ultimately enacted.
Senator William B. Allison of Iowa played the key role in shaping the compromise that emerged from the Senate.
Instead of unlimited free coinage, the government itself would purchase a specified amount of silver each month.
The Treasury would then coin that bullion into standard silver dollars.
This compromise became the Bland-Allison Act.
Not Free Silver
This distinction is essential.
The Bland-Allison Act did not establish unlimited free coinage of silver.
Silver advocates had sought something broader.
The final law required the Treasury to buy a limited monthly quantity of bullion.
It was therefore a compromise between silver expansionists and opponents of full silver remonetization.
The law directed the Secretary of the Treasury to purchase silver bullion at market price in an amount costing not less than $2 million and not more than $4 million each month.
The bullion was to be coined into silver dollars of the traditional standard.
That mandate guaranteed a continuing stream of silver into the Mint.
The production implications were enormous.
The authorized dollar contained 412.5 grains of standard silver.
At 90 percent fineness, that equaled 371.25 grains of pure silver.
The specifications revived the traditional standard silver dollar that had disappeared from ordinary authorization in 1873.
But the new coins would carry an entirely new design.
President Rutherford B. Hayes opposed the legislation.
He believed forcing the government to coin silver dollars worth less in bullion than their nominal value would weaken monetary integrity.
Hayes vetoed the bill.
Normally, a presidential veto would end legislation unless Congress could assemble a two-thirds majority in both chambers.
Silver supporters had the votes.
On February 28, 1878, the House and Senate overrode Hayes's veto.
The bill became law without the president's approval.
The override demonstrated the extraordinary political strength of the silver movement.
The Treasury now had a legal obligation to buy silver and turn it into dollars every month.
The Mint needed a coin design quickly.
English-born engraver George T. Morgan had joined the U.S. Mint in 1876.
He had been recruited partly because Mint Director Henry Linderman wanted fresh artistic talent.
Morgan worked under Chief Engraver William Barber.
Before Congress restored the silver dollar, Morgan had already been developing designs suitable for a large silver coin.
The timing proved ideal.
Anna Willess Williams and Liberty
Morgan used Philadelphia teacher Anna Willess Williams as a model while developing his Liberty head.
The resulting portrait faces left.
Liberty wears a cap and agricultural ornamentation, including cotton and wheat.
The design blended classical symbolism with distinctly American elements.
It became one of the most recognizable portraits in U.S. coinage.
The reverse features an eagle with wings raised.
A wreath surrounds the lower portion of the design.
IN GOD WE TRUST appears above the eagle.
The statutory inscriptions and denomination complete the composition.
The coin was large, heavy and unmistakably silver.
Production began at the Philadelphia Mint in March 1878, only days after enactment of Bland-Allison.
The first coins revealed a design problem involving the eagle's tail feathers.
Early reverse dies showed eight tail feathers.
Morgan subsequently changed the design to seven.
That rapid revision created some of the most famous varieties of the first year.
The earliest 1878 Morgan dollars have an eagle with eight tail feathers.
Collectors identify these as 8TF coins.
The design was soon revised.
Because the eight-feather reverse represents the earliest production configuration, it holds special historical appeal.
The revised eagle has seven tail feathers.
Additional hub and die changes during 1878 created several recognizable reverse combinations.
Collectors study these varieties in detail.
A law passed in Washington therefore produced almost immediate die-variety consequences at the Mint.
Bland-Allison had enormous importance for the Carson City Mint.
Located near the great Nevada silver-mining region, Carson City was ideally positioned to strike silver dollars.
Morgan dollars bearing the CC mintmark became a defining product of the facility.
Today, Carson City Morgans are among the most popular coins in American collecting.
San Francisco also produced large numbers of Morgan dollars.
The New Orleans Mint, which had been closed since the Civil War, reopened for coinage in 1879 and became another major Morgan-dollar producer.
Later, Denver would strike Morgan dollars in 1921.
The Bland-Allison mandate ultimately gave the series a remarkable geographic reach across federal mints.
The Treasury Usually Bought the Minimum
The law allowed monthly purchases between $2 million and $4 million.
Treasury officials generally favored the lower end of the required range.
Even at the minimum, however, the volume of silver was enormous.
Month after month, the government bought bullion.
Month after month, mints converted it into dollars.
There was a practical problem.
The government could mandate production.
It could not force people to carry heavy silver dollars in everyday commerce.
Demand varied by region.
Paper currency was often more convenient.
As a result, huge numbers of newly struck Morgan dollars accumulated in Treasury and Mint vaults.
This storage pattern had consequences no one in 1878 could have predicted.
Many Morgan dollars spent decades sitting in bags rather than circulating.
That is why large numbers survived in Mint State condition.
When Treasury hoards were dispersed generations later, collectors encountered brilliant nineteenth-century silver dollars that had barely moved since leaving the press.
Bland-Allison indirectly created the great Morgan-dollar hoards of the twentieth century.
In the 1970s, the General Services Administration sold large quantities of previously stored Carson City Morgan dollars to the public.
Many remained in special government holders.
Those GSA coins are now a major collecting category.
Their survival traces directly back to a nineteenth-century monetary policy that required more silver dollars than commerce actually absorbed.
Not every stored Morgan dollar survived.
The Pittman Act of 1918 authorized the melting of hundreds of millions of silver dollars.
More than 270 million were ultimately melted under the program.
Much of the silver was sold abroad, particularly to support British needs connected with India during World War I.
Millions of Morgan dollars disappeared into melting furnaces.
The Pittman Act required replacement of melted silver dollars using domestically purchased silver.
That obligation brought the Morgan dollar back in 1921 after a long production gap.
Philadelphia, Denver and San Francisco struck enormous quantities.
Later in 1921, the Peace dollar design replaced Morgan's.
Thus a law from 1878 continued influencing coin production more than four decades later.
Bland-Allison Was Replaced in 1890
The Bland-Allison system did not last forever.
In 1890, Congress enacted the Sherman Silver Purchase Act.
The new law greatly expanded government silver purchases but used Treasury notes as part of the mechanism.
It reflected the continued political power of silver interests.
The monetary struggle was far from over.
The Sherman Act became entangled in the financial crisis of 1893.
President Grover Cleveland pushed successfully for repeal of its silver-purchase provisions.
But silver remained a dominant national political issue.
The debate culminated dramatically in the presidential election of 1896.
Democratic presidential nominee William Jennings Bryan became the most famous champion of free silver.
His “Cross of Gold” speech attacked the gold standard and called for a broader monetary system favorable to silver.
Republican William McKinley defeated him.
The nation moved increasingly toward the gold standard.
The Bland-Allison Act belongs near the center of this decades-long monetary conflict.
To a modern collector, a Morgan dollar may seem primarily like a beautiful historic coin.
In the nineteenth century, it was also a political object.
Its very existence reflected arguments over:
inflation and deflation,
creditors and debtors,
western mining interests,
the gold standard,
and the proper role of government in monetary policy.
Every Morgan dollar is a physical artifact of that debate.
One reason opponents objected to Bland-Allison was that the bullion in a silver dollar could be worth less than one dollar at market prices.
The government's legal-tender designation gave the coin monetary value beyond its raw silver content.
Supporters saw this as legitimate monetary policy.
Critics saw it as an inflationary subsidy to silver producers.
The disagreement went to the heart of what money should be.
A collector can learn Morgan-dollar dates and mintmarks without knowing Bland-Allison.
But the series makes far more sense once the law is understood.
Why were so many dollars struck?
Why did so many remain in bags?
Why did Carson City produce them?
Why did the government accumulate huge stockpiles?
The answers begin with federal silver policy.
A Legislative Act Creates a Collecting Giant
The Morgan dollar is now one of the largest specialty fields in American numismatics.
Collectors pursue complete date-and-mint sets.
They study VAM die varieties.
They collect toned coins, prooflike surfaces, Carson City issues, GSA holders and famous hoard pedigrees.
Entire books, clubs and markets revolve around the series.
None of that history would look the same without February 28, 1878.
The Bland-Allison Act was replaced.
The great silver political battles faded.
The United States formally embraced the gold standard.
Silver dollars eventually disappeared from ordinary circulation.
But Morgan's design survived in vaults and collections.
It became more famous as a collectible than it had ever been as everyday money.
In 2021, the United States Mint revived the Morgan dollar as a modern collector coin for the centennial of the transition from Morgan to Peace dollars.
Congress authorized new Morgan and Peace dollars.
The program continued beyond the anniversary year.
A design born from the silver politics of Reconstruction-era America had returned more than 140 years later.
February 28 is not merely the anniversary of an old financial statute.
It is effectively the legislative birthday of the Morgan-dollar production era.
The Act forced the Treasury into the silver market.
The purchased bullion had to become standard dollars.
George T. Morgan's design supplied the vessel.
The result was one of the largest and most enduring bodies of collectible American coinage.
President Hayes tried to stop the bill.
Congress overrode him.
The Treasury bought silver.
The Mint struck dollars.
Vaults filled with bags.
Decades later, collectors opened those bags and discovered a numismatic phenomenon.
On February 28, 1878, Congress overrode President Rutherford B. Hayes's veto and enacted the Bland-Allison Act, requiring massive monthly government purchases of silver and renewed standard silver-dollar coinage—the legislation that directly launched the Morgan dollar era.
Own a Piece of the History
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