Why Did Silver Coinage End in the United States? “If we had not done so, we would have risked chronic coin shortages in the very near future.” President Lyndon Johnson commented before Congress just prior to his signing the Coinage Act of 1965, the law which fundamentally changed the composition of America’s coinage. The new Act set the stage for the complete abandonment of the use of silver for U.S. legal tender coins – the custom which Americans had been used to since the original Coinage Act of 1792, signed by President Washington. Thereafter, with the temporary exception of the Kennedy half-dollars, all U.S. legal tender coins would be composed of a mixture of copper and nickel, also known as cupronickel, thus ending a one-hundred and seventy-three year tradition of silver coinage.
Johnson stated:
Our uses of silver are growing as our population and our economy grows. The hard fact is that silver consumption is now more than double new silver production each year. So, in the face of this worldwide shortage of silver, and our rapidly growing need for coins, the only really prudent course was to reduce our dependence upon silver for making our coins. [1]
The comments made by President Johnson before Congress assembled on that historic day implied that the reasoning for making the change was the increasing scarcity of silver as a result of increasing industrial usage of silver and stagnant mining output. This was an incomplete picture. President Johnson did not discuss this matter in terms of the effects of inflation on silver prices. [Cont.]
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Poster Comment:
Goes to show what misleading orators like Adam Jefferson Kirby know about Constitutionality with respect to our money and governance: worse than nothing. Silver coins as legal tender here is not merely a "custom" and "tradition". It's a State order of the Constitution.
Have been unable to find the full text of the Unconstitutional Coinage Act of 1965 yet. Apparently, it further impaired -- and without an Amendment -- the Founder's directive to the States that they make noting but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts. My impression of the situation technically is this:
Except for gold coins, their lawful money options were thereby to be reduced and restricted thereafter to foreign silver coins (globalization of our money supplies) and/or only those US coins minted of real silver prior to 1965 which were still around in circulation. Accepting or using mock-silver US coins minted after 1965 would be a lose-lose-lose boondoggle for the States: in violation of the Constitution if they do -- strongarmed by the color of law Federales if they don't -- financially disadvantaged if they refuse to resort to the mockery of the newfangled de-silvered junk when they can't access enough US gold coinage or pre-1965 US silver coins instead and also don't want to participate as globalist importers for foreign money substitutes.
As far as I can determine at this point, that egregious and loony Act might be defunct now as it seems to have only extended through 1996. More background and info on the subject in the next postings.