SPECIE CIRCULAR

(July 11, 1836), in U.S. history, an executive order issued by President Andrew Jackson requiring that payment for the purchase of public lands be made exclusively in gold or silver. In an effort to curb excessive land speculation and to quash the enormous growth of paper money in circulation, Jackson directed the Treasury Department, pet banks, and other receivers of public money to accept only specie as payment for government-owned land after Aug. 15, 1836. But actual settlers and bona fide residents of the state in which they purchased land were permitted to use paper money until December 15 on lots up to 320 acres. The Specie Circular, by seriously curtailing the use of paper money, was highly deflationary and at least in part produced the ensuing credit crunch and the economic crisis called the Panic of 1837. On May 21, 1838, a joint resolution of Congress repealed the Specie Circular.