Seated Liberty Arrows Half Dollars 1873-1874 Coin Guide
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Seated Liberty Arrows Half Dollars 1873-1874
Probably the most debated, revised and least understood coinage bill
the United States Congress ever passed was the Mint Act of February 12,
1873. Introduced in an effort to reform and codify the U.S. coinage
system, this piece of legislation would be later denounced as the
"Crime of '73."
Partly because of this pivotal law, 1873 saw the United States Mint
issue 54 basic varieties of coins in 17 different denominations, the most
diverse output of any single year in the nation's history. Among these
were coins from three different mints, coins with an "open" 3 in
the date and others with a "closed" 3, and silver coins,
including half dollars, with and without arrows beside the date.
Far from being criminal in the eyes of collectors, this outpouring of
varieties has long been viewed as both a bonanza and a challenge. Some
collectors, notably the late Harry X Boosel of Chicago, have made the
coinage of 1873 the focal point of their numismatic pursuits. Almost all
are intrigued by the size and scope of this one-year set, one which makes
its modern counterparts seem puny by comparison.
Actually, hardly anyone looked upon the Mint Act of 1873 as a
"crime" at the time it was passed. That term didn't arise until
several years later, when silver-mining interests and their powerful
friends in Washington, disgruntled by a decline in silver coins'
production levels, reassessed the law with 20/20 hindsight and blamed it
for all their troubles, mainly because it had abolished silver dollars.
By the late 1860s, the United States coinage system was a crazy quilt
of denominations and types. The Mint was producing two different kinds of
three-cent pieces, two different five-cent coins and two kinds of dollars
(one in silver, one in gold). Some coins had clearly become redundant.
This conclusion, plus other observed inefficiencies, led to the
appointment of John Jay Knox to oversee a review of the mints and the
coinage system. Knox, a man of unquestioned integrity, soon concluded that
the basic monetary law of 1837, as amended piecemeal in the 1850s and
'60s, was no longer adequate to serve the nation's needs. He urged that
U.S. coinage laws be streamlined and strengthened, and he drafted a
proposal for accomplishing this.
In dropping silver dollars from the Mint's production lineup, the
Coinage Act of 1873 seemed to be simply acknowledging that the large,
bulky coins were seeing little use in the nation's commerce. Initially,
the silver interests didn't put up much resistance, because the law
provided an alternate outlet for their bullion with the newly authorized
trade dollar. As the decade wore on, however, it grew painfully apparent
that the trade dollar wouldn't succeed in its designated role as a bullion
coin in the Far East. To complicate matters further, huge supplies of
earlier U.S. silver coins, hoarded during the war, returned to circulation
from their hiding places abroad, forcing the Mint to curtail production of
new ones. This drastic reduction in coinage coincided with a dramatic
increase in silver-mining activity, notably at Nevada's Comstock Lode.
This squeezing the silver interests and causing them to scream, belatedly
but loudly, that a "crime" had been committed at their expense.
That, in turn, led to a resumption of standard silver dollar coinage in
1878.
Because of the 1873 legislation, the half dollar briefly became the
largest U.S. silver coin issued for circulation (the trade dollar being
intended exclusively for use overseas). It was no mere pretender to this
throne, for fifty cents represented a substantial sum of money in that
era: Seven out of ten industrial workers earned no more than ten cents an
hour at the time.
For more than three decades the half dollar had carried the Seated
Liberty design, a motif it shared with the silver dollar, quarter dollar,
dime and half dime. This design was fashioned by well-known portraitist
Thomas Sully and executed by Mint engraver Christian Gobrecht. It first
appeared on the half dollar in 1839, replacing the Capped Bust design. The
familiar Seated Liberty image remained there through 1891, giving way the
following year to Charles Barber's Liberty Head design.
The obverse features a seated figure of Liberty with her right hand
resting upon a shield and her left hand grasping a pole topped by a
Liberty cap. Thirteen stars surround her, seven to the left and six to the
right, with the date below. The reverse depicts a naturalistic eagle with
a shield upon its breast, encircled by the inscription UNITED STATES OF
AMERICA and the statement of value, HALF DOL. From 1866 through the end of
the series, a banner above the eagle bears the motto IN GOD WE TRUST,
which had made its coinage debut during the Civil War.
As part of the coinage overhaul undertaken in 1873, the weights of the
half dollar, quarter and dime were increased slightly to simplify their
legal weight as measured in grams. This was part of Congress' modest
attempt to introduce the metric system into the nation's coinage,
following the standard used by European countries. In the case of the half
dollar, the weight was boosted from 12.44 grams to 12.50. Undoubtedly,
this made metric calculations somewhat easier, but its impact was
negligible. It did bring about a minuscule increase in the amount of
silver used in U.S. coins, though obviously not enough to satisfy the
miners and their friends.
By the time the legislation took effect, the Mint had already produced
significant numbers of 1873 silver coins at the old weight levels. It
needed a way to readily identify the new coins, since it would be
furnishing these at a slightly different exchange rate to depositors who
brought in silver bullion. Officials decided to place distinctive
arrowheads alongside the date on the new, slightly heavier coins. The Mint
had used the same device in 1853 to denote a slight reduction in weight.
This time, the arrows appeared for only two years and were dropped at the
start of 1875.
Slightly over five million halves of this design were struck in 1873
and 1874 at the mints in Philadelphia (no mintmark), San Francisco (S) and
Carson City (CC). Mintmarks appear on the reverse below the eagle. Proofs
were made in both years: 550 in 1873 and 700 in 1874. Both Carson City
issues are quite rare in all grades and especially so in mint-state, while
the San Francisco coins are a little less so. Type collectors most often
find the Philadelphia issues in high grade. When grading this design, wear
will first show on Liberty's head, breast and knees and on the eagle's
head, neck and wing-tops.
Despite its compactness, with only six date-and-mint combinations, this
sub-series is generally collected by type, with collectors pursuing just
one high-grade specimen. In that context, though, it's enormously popular,
due in no small part to its linkage with a "crime" that really
wasn't.
SPECIFICATIONS:
Diameter: 30.6 millimeters Weight: 12.5 grams Composition: .900 silver,
.100 copper Edge: Reeded Net Weight: .36169 ounce pure silver
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Bowers, Q. David, United States Dimes,
Quarters and Half Dollars, Bowers & Merena Galleries, Wolfeboro, NH,
1986. Breen, Walter, Walter Breen's Complete Encyclopedia of U.S. and
Colonial Coins, F.C.I. Press/Doubleday, New York, 1988. Carothers, Neil,
Fractional Money, A History of Small Coins and Fractional Paper Currency
of the United States, John Wiley & Sons, London, 1930. Taxay, Don, The
U.S. Mint and Coinage, Arco Publishing Co., New York, 1966. Wiley, Randy
& Bugert, Bill, The Complete Guide to Liberty Seated Half Dollars,
DLRC Press, Virginia Beach, VA, 1993 Yeoman, R.S., A Guide Book of United
States Coins, 47th Edition, Western Publishing Co., Racine, WI, 1993.
Coin Information Provided Courtesy NGC.
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