The modern era of non-circulating US commemorative coins began with the 1982 George Washington 250th Anniversary of Birth Half Dollar. As of the writing of this post, that was roughly 43 years ago!
Over this 43-year run, the modern series has had issues in every year except two - 1985 and 2023.
Did Congress forget to propose new commemorative coins for these years? No.
In February 1984, and again in January 1985, a bill was introduced in the House of Representatives that called for a commemorative half dollar to mark the 75th Anniversary of the founding of the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts in the United States. As the Boy Scouts of America was founded in 1910, 1985 was its 75th Anniversary year - the perfect time for a commemorative coin!
The Girl Scouts of the United States of America, however, was founded in 1912, which made its 75th Anniversary year 1987. In an apparent compromise, each of the bills called for coins to be issued in 1986, splitting the difference between the two groups' anniversary years.
Neither bill was authorized/approved, however, so a potential backlash over the coin's "1986" date never had the chance to rear its ugly head. As no other bills for potential 1985-dated commemorative coins were introduced, a gap year was created.
You can read more about the Scouts coin bill here:
What If? 1986 Scouts Anniversary.
The lack of commemorative coins in 2023 was more of a shocker (at least for me) vs. 1985. The modern US commemorative coin series was much more mature in 2023 than it was in its early days of 1985, and, considering the competition for one of the two available coin slots each year, skipping a year seems improbable.
There were a good number of nationally significant historical anniversaries in 2023 that would have been appropriate to mark with a commemorative coin: the 250th Anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, the 200th Anniversary of the
Monroe Doctrine, the 75th Anniversary of the Marshall Plan, the 75th Anniversary of the Berlin Airlift, the 50th Anniversary of Skylab and many, many others.
Multiple proposals for 2023 coins were introduced in Congress, but none were authorized and approved. I've written about two of them:
What If? 2023 Granite Mountain Hotshots and
What If? 2023 Lincoln Memorial Centennial.
As a result of Congress' lack of authorization of any 2023-issue coin bills, 2023 became an unexpected gap year.
Will the series have another gap year in the future? Anything is possible! Stay tuned!
Posted 07/09/2025 10:49 am
