U.S. Department of the Treasury
Paper money issued directly by the federal government of the United States, backed by its reserves and its sovereign debt — including the celebrated gold and silver certificates.
History of United States Treasury Notes
United States Treasury Notes represent a crucial evolution in the country’s monetary and financial history, acting as a bridge between public debt and circulating paper money. First issued in periods of extreme fiscal need —such as the War of 1812, the Texas War, and the Mexican–American War— these instruments originated not as ordinary money, but as interest-bearing short-term promissory notes, issued to finance the government when gold and silver reserves were scarce. The decisive turning point came during the Civil War with the issue of the Treasury Notes of 1861 (known as Demand Notes) and the later Legal Tender Notes of 1862, through which the federal government assumed full control of paper-money issue to finance the Union war effort, permanently displacing chaotic private state banking. Decades later, the Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890 gave rise to the celebrated Treasury Notes of 1890 (or Coin Notes), issued specifically to purchase silver bullion and designed with intricate high-security engravings that today are regarded as true works of numismatic art. With the consolidation of the Federal Reserve System in 1913, the term Treasury Note ceased to apply to everyday circulating paper money and came to define exclusively the financial assets of today’s sovereign-debt market (medium-term Treasury notes), closing a chapter in which government debt was used directly to pay for goods in everyday commerce.
