In September and October 1963, companion bills were introduced in the Senate and House of Representatives that called for a half dollar "in commemoration of the two hundredth anniversary of the Touro Synagogue." Three bills were introduced in the House for the coin, one was introduced in the Senate. The coins were to be struck for the benefit of the Touro Synagogue at Newport, Rhode Island.
The first Jewish community developed in Newport, RI during the mid-1600s when Jewish immigrants from Europe, via islands in the Caribbean, began arriving in Newport to enjoy the colony's religious freedom. Over time, the Jewish community/congregation grew large enough to warrant the construction of a synagogue. Work on the synagogue began in 1759 and was dedicated on the first night of Hannukah on December 2, 1763.
Touro Synagogue, Newport, Rhode Island
(Image Credit: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division. Public Domain.)The Touro Synagogue has a rich history and remains an active house of worship to the present day. In 1946, the synagogue was designated a National Historic Site. It offers tours of its beautiful 18th century building and surrounding grounds. To learn more about it, I recommend visiting the Touro Synagogue's web site:
https://tourosynagogue.org/The four bills called for 25,000 coins to be struck, without any specification regarding the number of Mint facilities that could be used. All coins, regardless of when struck, were to be dated "1963" - no expiration of coining authority date was specified in the bill's language.
As had been done in only a handful of commemorative coin bills before, the bills included specific design language for the coin: "George Washington shall appear on one side of such pieces with his immortal words "To Bigotry No Sanction" inscribed under such profile, and on the reverse side of such pieces there shall appear a likeness of the Touro Synagogue."
The bills are somewhat of a puzzle. With a maximum mintage of 25,000 coins it is very unlikely they were intended to be circulating commemorative pieces, but, without the explicit naming of a sponsor, without a discussion of coin ordering parameters and no language/provision concerning how the coins were to be struck without cost the US Government, a circulation scenario is within the realm of possibility - though an unlikely one.
Unfortunately, none of the bills was reported by the Committee on Banking and Currency. included in a Hearing or discussed on the floor of the Senate or House, so further insights beyond what is described in the bills themselves is lacking. IMO, the bills are poorly/incompletely worded calls for special commemorative coins that were to be sold to collectors at a premium.
In addition to the language issues of the bills, I believe another strike against them was the fact that they were clearly religious in nature and were an obvious violation of separation of church and state requirements/provisions of the US Government. Frankly, I'm surprised they were even introduced, but I guess Senator Claiborne de Borda Pell (D-RI) - along with his Senate co-sponsors John Orlando Pastore (D-RI), Jacob Koppel Javits (R-NY) and Kenneth Barnard Keating (R-NY) - and Representatives Samuel Nathaniel Firedel (D-MD), John Edward Fogarty (D-RI) and Fernand Joseph St. Germain (D-RI) believed they had a shot.
Though the US Mint was not authorized to strike a coin for the Synagogue, it was celebrated a few years later (1971) via bronze and sterling silver medals struck by the Franklin Mint as part of a 120-medal series sponsored by the Judaic Heritage Society. The medal featured a depiction of the synagogue on one side and an except from George Washington's letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, RI containing the phrase "To Bigotry No Sanction" on the other. So, a design that followed the one outlined in the coin bills, though not precisely.
Posted 07/19/2022 08:02 am
