Creating Maryland’s Paper Money Economy, 1720– 1740: The Confluence of Political Constituencies, Economic Forces, Transatlantic Markets, and Law

The British North American colonies were the first western economies to rely on colonyspecific legislature-issued paper money as a medium of exchange for domestic transactions. The creation of paper money regimes arose piecemeal among the colonies, making each story unique. Maryland’s story is the most complex among the colonies, since the emission of paper money resulted from an attempt to control and manipulate the tobacco market. The paper discusses how market forces, legal maneuverings, and the power of various constituencies combined to shape Maryland’s particular paper money system, assesses its successes and failures, and identifies the winners and losers among Maryland’s political classes as a result of this paper money experiment.