The Pittman Act: The Meltdown That Gave Us the Peace Dollar

In 1918, the United States melted roughly 270 million of its own silver dollars on purpose. It sounds like vandalism. It was actually a wartime rescue — and it is the reason the Peace dollar exists.

Why America Melted Its Silver Dollars

By 1918, World War I had put silver under enormous strain. In India, where British paper currency was meant to be redeemable in silver, Germany spread rumors that Britain did not have the silver to redeem it. The rumors — plus hoarding — drove silver prices up and threatened Britain's financial footing and its war effort.

The United States stepped in. On April 23, 1918, the Pittman Act became law. It authorized the Treasury to "melt or break up and to sell as bullion not in excess of three hundred and fifty million standard silver dollars," at a price "not less than $1 per ounce of silver." Most of the silver went to Britain.

270 Million Morgan Dollars

The 350 million figure was a ceiling, not the total. In 1918 and 1919, about 270 million silver dollars (270,232,722) were actually melted — overwhelmingly Morgan dollars, the silver dollar of the era. Of those, 259,121,554 were sold to Britain as bullion and the rest went into subsidiary silver coinage.

A Morgan silver dollar, the design that filled Treasury vaults in 1918. Hundreds of millions were melted for their silver.

The Catch: Every Dollar Had to Be Replaced

Here is the part most people miss. The Pittman Act did not just authorize melting — it required re-coinage. The Mint had to "coin an aggregate number of standard silver dollars equal to the aggregate number...melted." Every silver dollar destroyed had to be struck again.

1921: The Morgan Returns, Then the Peace Dollar

The Morgan dollar had not been struck since 1904. The re-coinage requirement brought it back in 1921, after a 17-year gap.

The 1921 Morgan dollar — the design returned after a 17-year gap, purely to satisfy the Pittman Act's re-coinage requirement.

But the moment also opened a door. Later in 1921, a brand-new design — the Peace dollar, created to mark peace after the war — replaced the Morgan. The remaining re-coinage was carried out in the new design, running through 1928.

The 1921 Peace dollar in high relief — a new design born in the middle of the Pittman Act re-coinage.

The Takeaway

A wartime decision to destroy 270 million silver dollars is, paradoxically, why we have the Peace dollar at all. The Act's re-coinage mandate revived the Morgan for one last year and then handed the stage to a design made to mark the end of a war.

Browse the complete Morgan dollar and Peace dollar series on NumisDex.

Primary source: the Pittman Act of 1918 (U.S. Statutes at Large, Ch. 63).