What Is A Dollar?

DOLLAR, money. A silver coin of the United States of value of one hundred cents, or tenth part of an eagle. 2. It weighs four hundred and twelve and a half grains. Of one thousand parts, nine hundred are of pure silver and one hundred of alloy. Act Of January 18, 1837, §§. 8 & 9, 4 Sharsw. Cont. of Story's L.U.S. 2523, 4; Wright, R. 162. 31 U.S.C.A. § 371.

3. In all computations at the custom-house, the specie dollar of Sweden and Norway shall be estimated at one hundred and six cents. The specie dollar of Denmark, at one hundred and five cents. Act of May 22, 1846.

It says: "A silver coin of the United States!" PERIOD! It's simply amazing there's no mention of paper certificates or Federal Reserve Bank Corporation Notes (Federal Reserve Notes)!

United States Constitution for the United States of America
Article I, Section 8.
Clause [1]  The Congress shall have Power To:
Clause [5]  To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;

It's very strange, I've failed to see where it says anything about printing money! Where did the authority come from to print money? Usurped! (Verb, past/past participle of usurp; to claim or take over in a high-handed manner).

U.S. Code
-CITE-
31 USC Sec. 5112 01/06/97
-EXPCITE-
TITLE 31 - MONEY AND FINANCE
SUBTITLE IV - MONEY
CHAPTER 51 - COINS AND CURRENCY
SUBCHAPTER II - GENERAL AUTHORITY
-HEAD-
Sec. 5112. Denominations, specifications, and design of coins
-STATUTE-
(a) The Secretary of the Treasury may mint and issue only the following coins:
(e) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary shall mint and issue, in quantities sufficient to meet public demand, coins which -
(1) are 40.6 millimeters in diameter and weigh 31.103 grams;
(2) contain .999 fine silver;
(3) have a design -
(A) symbolic of Liberty on the obverse side; and
(B) of an eagle on the reverse side;
(4) have inscriptions of the year of minting or issuance, and the words ''Liberty'', ''In God We Trust'', ''United States of America'', ''1 Oz. Fine Silver'', ''E Pluribus Unum'', and ''One Dollar''; and
(5) have reeded edges.

The dollar is the main currency unit of the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Liberia, and several former British colonies. As part of a decimal currency system, it consists of 100 cents.

The U.S. dollar, adopted in 1792, was based on a Spanish coin that had circulated in the colonies before the American Revolution. The first U.S. dollars were issued in silver and gold. Gold $10, $5, and $2.50 coins were issued from 1795 to 1933 (The privately owned Federal Reserve Banks foreclosed on U.S. Treasury on March 9th, 1933). From the middle of the 19th century, gold coins valued at $1, $3, $5, $10, and $20 were also minted; after 1934, however, all gold coins were taken out of circulation. A silver dollar was issued at various times from 1794 until 1935. Minting of the silver dollar was resumed in 1971, with the issuing of the Dwight Eisenhower dollar. (This dollar for circulation contains no silver; specially minted--and higher priced--numismatic dollars contain 40% silver.) In 1979 a smaller dollar coin, bearing the head of Susan B. Anthony, was issued; the public found it confusingly similar in size with the 25cents coin, and the small dollar quickly fell into disuse. Paper dollars were first issued in America in 1775 and have appeared in amounts of $1, $2, $5, $10, $20, $50, $100, $500, $1,000, and $10,000. In 1969 issuance of currency in denominations larger than $100 was discontinued.

Canada adopted the dollar and monetary decimal system in 1878, Australia in 1966, and New Zealand in 1967.

After World War II the U.S. dollar became the principal reserve currency in international exchange. The (privately owned) central banks in most trading countries began to use dollars as a reserve asset in the same way that they had traditionally used gold. The international monetary system, as institutionalized in the International Monetary Fund (which is a part of the communistic United Nations (U.N.)), was based on the strength of the dollar and on the readiness of U.S. authorities to exchange dollars for gold at a rate of $35 to one ounce (see exchange rate). By the 1970s, however, conditions had changed (by whose and what authority?). The United States was no longer the only strong economic power, and the dollar was beginning to suffer some of the same ills that had afflicted other currencies in the past. In August 1971 the United States stopped exchanging dollars for gold, and soon afterward other countries stopped exchanging their currencies for dollars at fixed rates.

The value of the dollar against other currencies came to depend on several factors: the size of the deficit in the U.S. balance of payments, the financial policies of other countries, and the confidence of foreigners in U.S. economic management. The influence of these factors caused the value of the dollar to decline during the 1970s in relation to other major currencies. Subsequently, along with a decline in U.S. inflation and an increase in U.S. interest rates fueled by huge budget deficits, the dollar surged, depressing U.S. exports. Beginning in 1985 the major European and U.S. trading partners (privately owned companies) cooperated to moderate swings in the dollar's exchange value. Between 1985 and 1994, however, the dollar's value in relation to the Deutsche mark and Japanese yen declined by more than half.

Bibliography: Aubrey, H. G., The Dollar in World Affairs (1964; repr. 1982); Masson, P. R., and Taylor, M. P., eds., Policy Issues in the Operation of Currency Markets (1993).

Continental Currency Dollar - 1776
Large picture of both sides, takes some time to load.

America's First Silver Dollar

The United States Mint

The Yellow Pages of the Banking Industry

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