Signed by President George Washington, the Coinage Act of 1792 established the United States Mint in Philadelphia and defined the nation's currency in decimal terms, with the dollar as the base unit divided into cents. The act specified gold, silver, and copper coin denominations, laying the monetary foundation for the young republic's independence from British and Spanish currency systems.
Before 1792, Americans conducted business with a bewildering mix of currencies: British pounds, Spanish silver dollars, French livres, and various state-issued paper notes of wildly fluctuating value. The Coinage Act, passed by Congress on April 2, aimed to end this chaos by creating a truly national currency, one of the earliest and most consequential acts of the new federal government under the Constitution.
Alexander Hamilton, as Treasury Secretary, had pushed hard for a decimal system, a novel simplification at a time when Britain still used the confusing pounds-shillings-pence structure. The act established the dollar as the standard unit, divided into 100 cents, and authorized coins including the gold eagle, silver dollar, and copper cent, with precise weights and precious metal content specified by law.
The Philadelphia Mint, sited near Independence Hall, began striking coins later that year, with copper cents entering circulation in 1793. The first Mint director was scientist David Rittenhouse. This decimal system, so ordinary today, was a genuine innovation that later inspired other nations, and the Mint itself remains in continuous operation, now producing billions of coins annually across facilities in multiple cities.