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![handle is hein.usccsset/usconset32906 and id is 1 raw text is:
54TH CONGRESS, HOUSE OF REPRESENTAWE&- Z RT
1st Session.
PUNISHMENT FOR MUTILATING UNITHE STAJTES DOIXSR
ETC.
FEBRUARY 29, 1896.-Referred to the House Calendar and ordered to be printed.
Mr. CHARLEs W. STONE, from the Committee on Coinage, Weights,
and Measures, submitted the following
REPORT:
[To accompany H. R. 5732.]
The Committee on Coinage, Weights, and Measures, to whom was
referred the bill (H. R. 5732) to amend section 5459 of the Revised
Statutes, prescribing the punishment for mutilating United States
coins and for uttering or passing or atttempting to utter or pass such
mutilated coins, having considered the same, respectfully recommend
that it do pass.
Section 5459 of the Revised Statutes provides for the punishment of
the offense of fraudulently mutilating or lightening the gold or silver
coins of the United States, but by some oversight or for some other
unaccountable reason no provision is made for the punishment of the
knowingly and fraudulently uttering or passing or attempting to utter
or pass such mutilated or lightened coins. To supply this defect in the
existing law is the primary purpose of the present bill, but in restating
the section it has been deemed advisable to make it correspond in
phraseology, as near as may be, with the other sections relating to
counterfeiting coin of the United States, and it has also been deemed
advisable to make the maximum limit of imprisonment imposed as
punishment correspond more nearly with the maximum punishment
provided by law for other species of counterfeiting the national coin
and uttering such counterfeited coin. The defect in the existing law and
the necessity for the proposed legislation are pointed out by the Chief
of the Secret Service Bureau of the Treasury Department in his annual
report for 1894, an extract from which is appended hereto.
[From the report of the Chief of the Secret Service Division of the United States Treasury Depart-
ment for the year ended June 30, 1894.]
On February 1, 1894, I found the banking interests deeply concerned over the
great number of light-weight gold coins in circulation.
These coins had been impaired by a new and ingenious method, namely: The
milled or corrugated rim of the coin had been removed, decreasing its value about 5
per cent; new milling was then put on, and the coin, to all appearances, made per-
fect. I immediately put agents to work, with the result that all of the guilty
persons are now serving terms in State prisons. One man was arrested in Sioux
City, Iowa, on March. 19, 1894, and, after trial, was sentenced to imprisonrent for
eighteen months; another and his wife were subsequently arrested in Baltimore,
Md., and sentenced to four years and six months, respectively, under section 5459,
Revised Statutes. In both instances a lathe and complete set of tools were captured.
Since these arrests were made coins lightened in the manner above described have
ceased to appear.
H. Rep. 3- 1](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.usccsset/usconset32906&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)