Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 March 1880 — Mutilation of Coin. [ARTICLE]

Mutilation of Coin.

The most careless of persons cau scarcely fail to perceive the great increase in the number of defaced and mutilated silver coins during the past few months. So rapidly has the evil grown that at the present time, in the opinion of a financial expert, quite onethird of the silver coin that has been in circulation for any considerable period of time bears some evidence of mutilation. It is believed by the Government officers to whose attention the subject has been called, that a class of unprinM cipled persons—small tradesmen and others—are systematically • in the habit of cutting small pieces out of the coins of larger denomination, and selling the fragments thus obtained by weight to manufacturing jewelers. Before the practice had grown to its present proportions, it was noticed that those engaged in it seemed to confine their operations to boring small holes in the quarters and fifty-cent pieces; but of late they have grown more bold, and now an immense nu nber of coins of those denominations are in circulation from which silver has been removed in the form of a “ W” or triangle, the cutting have evidently been performed by a punch or machine. The Government officers have had great difficulty in trying to find out the depredators, and thus far have been unsuccessful. Meanwhile the despoiling of the currency shows no signs of decrease. The law on the subject is to be foundjn Section 5.459 of the Revised Statutes of the United States, which reads as follows: “Every person who fraudulently, by any act, ways or means, defaces, mutilates, impairs, diminishes, falsifies, scales or lightens the gold and silver coins which have been or which may hereafter be coined at the mints of the United States, or any foreign gold and silver coin which are by law made current or are in actual use and circulation as money within the United States, shall be impnsohed not more than two years and fined not more than $2,000.” “ This law,” said 'Assistant United States District Attorney William P. Fiero to a Herald reporter yesterday, “should be changed. The word * fraudulent' in the statute has been the means of defeating the punishment of the malefactors. The law should be so changed as to make the offense a finable one. Then detection would be easy, and the infliction of the ’ penalty swift and certain. This would speedily-put an end to the business. It has been a common practice for many well meaning persons to punch a hole in a gold or silver coin End then wear the latter as a watch-charm, necklace, armiet, or even as an ornament on a dog-collar. In course of time these coins Are detached and pass into circulation. Were the offense one punishable by fine the practice would cease. 1 nave been anxious to get a case where a tradesman or other person has been in the habit of defacing coin. If the fact could be established, I have no doubt conviction would follow. With the law as it stands there seems very little prospect of putting a'complete stop to the evil complained of.”-—N. Y. Herald.