Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XVI.djvu/166

146 The annual receipts and expenditures of the government for 20 years, with the chief sources and objects, have been as follows, the fiscal year ending June 30:

The receipts and expenditures of the post office department are not included in the above statement. They are given from 1790 to 1874 in the article, vol. xiii., p. 754. The receipts for the year ending June 30, 1875, were $26,791,360, of which $24,490,942 were for stamps, stamped envelopes, and postal cards. The expenditures were $33,611,309, of which $18,779,201 were for transportation of the mails, $10,464,746 for compensation of postmasters and clerks, $1,877,210 for compensation of letter carriers, and $724,186 for postage stamps. (For particulars concerning internal revenue, see, vol. xv., p. 589.) The total production of gold from 1848 to 1874, inclusive, was $1,282,927,092; of silver, $217,051,114. The coinage of the mints from 1793 to Jan. 1, 1876, was: of gold, $920,070,958; of silver, $169,669,963; of minor coinage, $12,717,198. Of this amount, $471,433,936 of gold, $116,153,632 of silver, and all of the minor, were coined at Philadelphia; and $390,427,157

of gold, and $19,175,425 of silver, coined at San Francisco. (See, , and .)—A law for the establishment of a national banking system was passed by congress in February, 1863, and was superseded by the national bank act of June 3, 1864. (See, vol. ii., p. 281.) The act of June 20, 1874, authorized the retirement of the circulation of national banks, and the surrender of bonds held as security therefor, upon the deposit of legal-tender notes in the treasury for the amount of the circulation thus retired. It also repealed the provision requiring a reserve on circulation, and provided for a system of redemption of national bank notes in the treasury department. The act of Jan. 14, 1875, provides for the unlimited issue of circulating notes to national banks, subject to the provisions of existing laws, and the reduction of the legal-tender notes at the rate of 80 per cent. upon the amount of additional bank notes issued, until the legal-tender notes shall be reduced to $300,000,000. The following table exhibits