A Nice Group Of US Scott 183 And 206 Used Illegally

All used illegally as revenues by the First National Bank in Bennington, VT.

Interesting items. Shortage of revenue stamps or did the bank not know any better? Is it unusual that postage stamps would be used as revenues during this period? Also why would "pay to the order of" be crossed out in several examples?

Most likely the former, although the signatory is the same on all of the checks so it is possible that they didn't know any better.




Using U.S. postage stamps for revenue purposes was illegal, unlike in many other countries. They are uncommon, but not rare. A common cover with either of these stamps would be a buck or two, whereas these particular documents are each $20-40 on average.

Older documents from the Civil War era with illegal usages can vary greatly in value, from $20-50 for a common 2-cent BlackJack or 3-cent George Washington used as revenue, all the way up into the $300-500 range, depending on the document and the stamp (or stamps) used. Things like the 1869 pictorials, grilled stamps, combination usages, etc. can make for scarce and more expensive documents.




That one I can't answer.

The bank did not put the stamps on, the taxpayer did, and the bank would not care since they were not responsible for the money. Plus no one in the government was likely to see these anyway unless they were needed for some kind of legal matter in court.
The "pay to self" had the pay to the order crossed out, the others were probably written and cashed immediately, although there might be some other unknown reason for it. It did not change the tax at all. .
Actually the two most interesting things about this group are one, the space of time involved here, several months; and two, the last check written on June 30, 1883 should be after the tax on checks was repealed. If I remember correctly that tax and several others involving stamps ended with the new tax law that went into effect on March 3, 1883, which also changed the rates for tobacco products which resulted in several provisional taxpaids among other things.

I was wondering if the final date digit on the last check might possibly have been miswritten, ie. it was actually June 30, 1882? The first check in that group is June 10, 1882, so this would fit the date range... moreso than June 30, 1883.

It's a 3, compare it to the checks that end in 2. Since they were written by the same person.........

Re: the end date of the tax and who would have applied the stamps, Ron Lesher posted the following on another board in response to this lot:

I am unfamiliar with 19th century tax code, so forgive any obvious questions. Why wouldn't the bank be responsible for the application of tax labels? Wasn't the bank responsible for keeping a ledger of all transactions - which was what the basis for tax liability? Was it common practice for customers to provide and frank their own tax stamps? Who franked the stamps if not the bank?

So for over a year Mr. Dewey (the agent?) bought postage stamps instead of the correct revenue stamps? I would have thought that an understanding of the tax procedures would be well understood by someone in this position?
don

To me it is obvious. 'Pay to means' pay only to the named payee. 'To the order of' means whom ever the Payee directs the bank to pay to.