What was the Crime of 73?

The Crime of 1873 refers to dropping silver dollars from official coinage by act of Congress in that year, setting the stage for the adoption of the gold standard in the U.S.

Why was the Coinage Act of 1873 also known as the Crime of 73?

Coinage Act enacted by the US Congress in 1873 and embraced the gold standard and de-monetized silver. Western mining interests and others who wanted silver in circulation years later labeled this measure the “Crime of ’73”. Gold became the only metallic standard in the United States.

How did the Crime of 73 affect farmers?

The inability to “cash in” silver bullion had the greatest impact upon miners, farmers and those who had debts to pay. The Act caused silver prices to fall even more than they previously had (due to oversupply), resulting in an increase in gold prices.

What was the Crime of 73 Why did this anger farmers?

Congress had discontinued the minting of silver coins in 1873 in an act that came to be known as the “Crime of ’73.” Professor of government Elizabeth Sanders includes the demonetization of silver as one of a few significant policies of the period that led many working people, especially farmers, to believe that a “ …

What was the Coinage Act of 1873 and why did it create controversy quizlet?

The coinage act reduce the amount of money in circulation because the money supply was limited by the amount of gold held by the government. It created controversy because it gave big lenders a backing by the government.

Why was silver demonetized by the Coinage Act of 1873?

According to historian Allen Weinstein, “Silver’s demonetization, according to the traditional account, came as an unplanned if fortunate by-product of a complex and largely technical revision of the mint laws in the Coinage Act of 1873.”.

Why was the bimetallic standard a crime of 1873?

CRIME OF 1873. The leaders of the movement defended the bimetallic standard and charged that the demonetization of silver was the result of a conspiracy entered into by British and American financial interests to secure in a surreptitious manner the adoption of the gold standard in the United States.

How did the demonetization of silver affect the working class?

Silver had been demonetized. Political cartoon from Judge magazine, June 29, 1895. Digitized by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. The inability to “cash in” silver bullion had the greatest impact upon miners, farmers and those who had debts to pay. The working class now had no feasible means to do so.

When did Milton Friedman write the crime of 1873?

Summary of a presentation given the 16 April 1997 by François Micheloud at the seminar of professor Charles Wyplosz at HEI in Geneva. This presentation is centered around a paper Milton Friedman published in 1990 (The Crime of 1873, namely, in the JPE) about the silver agitation in the USA during the last quarter of the 19thcentury.