Currency Act | Great Britain [1764] | Britannica

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Quick Summary

The Currency Act of 1764 was a British law that prohibited the American colonies from issuing their own paper money as legal tender. This measure was enacted as part of a broader effort by the British government, under George Grenville, to raise revenue and regulate colonial trade following the Seven Years' War.1

The colonies had relied on printing paper money to address a shortage of hard currency, partly due to an unfavorable balance of trade with Britain. The Currency Act aimed to stabilize the currency and protect creditors, but it severely reduced the circulating medium during a difficult post-war period and underscored British control over colonial economic matters. This act, along with others like the Sugar Act, contributed to growing tensions between Great Britain and its American colonies, eventually playing a role in the lead-up to the American Revolution.12

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2 Britannica Sources

1. American colonies - Grenville taxes of 1764
2. United States - The tax controversy

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effect on American colonial history

• In United States: The tax controversy

  …economic prospects by passing a Currency Act (1764) to withdraw paper currencies, many of them surviving from the war period, from circulation. This was not done to restrict economic growth so much as to take out currency that was thought to be unsound, but it did severely reduce the circulating…

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• In salutary neglect

  The Currency Act of 1764 extended these limitations to all the colonies. Also in 1764, Prime Minister George Grenville issued the Sugar Act to raise revenue and attempt to end the smuggling of sugar and molasses from the French and Dutch West Indies. A year later…

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