Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 July 1883 — Light-weight Colas. [ARTICLE]

Light-weight Colas.

It is well known that coins lose year by year a certain part of their intrinsic value by abrasion in the ordinary and legitimate wear and tear of trade. The process is more rapid when the coins are new, because then the edges are sharp, bnt it is steady and continuous if the coins remain in circulation. Careful estimates indicate, for example, that an English sovereign loses, on the average, one grain in twenty years. Just at present the English bankers are a good deal disturbed over this matter, because more than half of the gold in circulation in Great Britain is under full weight. In their transactions with the Bank of England the latter receives only by weight what - other banks and bankers receive by tale,the consequence being that most of the loss represented by the margin between the two values falls upon the banks. Several plans have been suggested for remedying the difficulty, and substituting full-weight for light-weight coins. In 1842 and 1870, when the same trouble was experienced —though on neither occasion was it so serious as now —the Bank of England was empowered by a royal proclamation to take all the light gold brought to it, the price in 1842 being £3 17s 104 d per ounce, which is Ijd per ounce more than the usual price for bar gold, and 4d more than is generally given for light gold coin. But the loss on the light gold sent in was a good deal more than 4d, and was probably nearer 8d per ounce. In 1870 the price Allowed was l|d less, and the amount sent in was trifling. The problem is a very difficult one. The loss must fall either upon the community, the banks, or the unlucky last holders of lightweight pieces. It has been suggested that the Government should make an allowance of one. grain in every sovereign of 20 years old and of half a grain in a half-sovereign of 10 years old, and so on in proportion to age—this being the known rate at which the two coins become reduced in weight. Another proposition is that the Government, through* the Bank of England, should privately notify every bank of its readiness before a certain date and within certain limitations of full-weight for light-weight coins. But it is doubtful whether such a degree of secrecy could be preserved as would prevent a considerable disturbance of the currency by the flooding of the banks with light coins, to say nothing of the danger of extending the practice of “sweating” coins by the use of acids and the battery. There are, indeed, serious difficulties in the way of any remedy that can be suggested.