Wonder how error collectors reacted to this decree from the Mint Director? 1 1

[RWB]

Excerpt

Dec. 3 1954

On several occasions recently misstruck coins have been referred to this office or to field offices by persons who have obtained them in various ways. For the guidance of the field offices in handling these matters, I wish to state that pieces which have been misstruck, that is, coins struck on the wrong blanks or on blanks that are too large or too small to meet the standards, are subject to recovery by the Government as property of the United States, title to which has never left the Government, and when submitted to us, cannot be returned. These are not coins authorized by the Congress and no coins other than those are specifically so authorized may be lawfully issued.

W. H. Brett, Director

Edited March 19, 2022 by RWB
Hate "spell check"

[Lem E]

[GoldFinger1969]

"....properly of the United States" ?  

Edited March 19, 2022 by GoldFinger1969

[MorganMan]

LOL, ask the Switt family how that turns out for you!

[tj96]

Dear Mr. W. H. Brett,

In what various ways have people actually obtained your misstruck coins? Can you be specific? Was it through lack of your security, walking out of the mint with your mint employees or just poor quality control?  

You stated: They are subject to recovery by the Government as property of the United States.  My answer to that: 

A note to the geniuses who submitted them back to the mint!:     

BTW: Coins aren't struck on blanks, they're stuck on planchets.

R.I.P. Bill!

Edited March 19, 2022 by tj96

[tj96]

An additional thought.  Back in the 1950's and 60's, the gov't considered error coins illegal to own because they "claimed" that they were never issued as coinage. At some point their position changed. Since error coins were released in bags along with legit coins, then the gov't DID in fact issue them as coinage. The problem these days are the errors that obviously were intentionally made and carried out of the mint, i.e. stolen. These are illegal to own but the gov't doesn't seem to have any interest in confiscating them, at least not right now, and probably never will.

[bsshog40]

I guess I'll have to start throwing my error coins into my 5 gal. change jug so they can't find them.  Lol

[Conder101]

If I remember correctly they had a similar opinion back around the turn of the 20th century when they were of the opinion that any coins that did not conform to the specifications in the coinage act of 1873 were illegal and subject to government confiscation.

[RWB]

Yep. Much of this witch hunting began with Director Kimball.