![]() The mess created by loose stamps quickly deflated the elation generated by the misconception of the new law. Were thin (destroyed easily with handling) and the glue on their backs encouraged them to stick to hands, wallets, and anything else with which theyĬame in contact. The stamps were ill-suited for this task. ![]() The public took this to mean that postage stamps could be officially used as currency. On July 17, 1862, Congress stepped into the fray and passed a law which stated that postage stamps could pay debts of less than $5 to the Individuals accepted postage stamps in trade.Private companies issued “Civil War Tokens.”.Business issued promissary notes for change.Individual states cut their small denomination bills into pieces to make portions of a dollar.The populace tried many different unofficial methods to alleviate the coin shortage: The coin shortage could be life-threatening for a society where one cent bought a newspaper, the average salary was twelve to fifteen dollars a week, and a private in the army earned To add to the problem of the coin shortage, the lowest denomination of U.S. By July of 1862, coins were worth 20% more then paper During the middle of 1862, $25 million in coinage disappeared from circulation. They repeated this process numerous times, making significant profits and helped to create a severe coin Paper dollars for gold at discount prices. The financial issues resulting from coin hoardingīecame worse when financiers found they could use paper money to buy silver coins, sell the silver coins to foreign markets for gold, and then buy Paper equivalent and were subsequently not spent on goods that could be bought with paper. Only faith in theĬentral Government gave the bills any value and the Civil War put significant strain on any faith that had existed. At the time, paper money was not backed by gold or silver. In 1862, day-to-day commerce became strained by a shortage of coins.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |