9781422287477

13 The Paper Money Riot

The violence didn’t last long. The ringleaders were soon arrested, and on March 31 Governor Gordon issued the Riot Act. This was a law that gave the governor permission to arrest and put to death people accused of starting riots. That helped quiet things down in the streets of Philadelphia and convinced the rioters to go back to their country villages. With the paper money agitators back home in the countryside, the assembly finally took up the issue of the Paper Money Act. On May 1, 1729, the Provincial Assembly adopted a law giving Governor Gordon authority to issue £30,000 in new currency. And from the new currency, the assembly appropriated £2,000 to build a State House in Philadelphia. A new country would one day be born in that State House—47 years later, American leaders selected the State House in Philadelphia as the place where they would draft and debate the Declaration of Independence. As for the building, it would come to be known as Independence Hall.

Text-Dependent Questions Who was Andrew Hamilton? What was his position in Pennsylvania’s colonial government? Research Project Shortages of money were a problem throughout all of the British colonies of North America. Visit this website maintained by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, http://www.philadelphiafed.org/education/teachers/resources/money-in-colonial- times, to find out more about the problems involving coinage and paper money in Colonial America.