page_title: Revenue stamps of the United States
section_title: Second issue
hierarchical_section_title: Revenue stamps of the United States / History of revenue stamp usage / Second issue
caption_attribution_description: English: Image of Washington U.S. Revenue stamp, $3 50, (Scott # R126)
context_page_description: The first revenue stamps in the United States were used briefly during colonial times, among the most notable usage involved the Stamp Act. Long after independence, the first revenue stamps printed by the United States government were issued in the midst of the American Civil War, prompted by the urgent need to raise revenue to pay for the great costs it incurred. After the war ended however, revenue stamps and the taxes they represented still continued. Revenue stamps served to pay tax duties on items that came under two main categories, Proprietary and Documentary. Proprietary stamps paid tax duties on goods like alcohol and tobacco, and were also used for various services, while Documentary stamps paid duties on legal documents, mortgage deeds, stocks and a fair number of other legal dealings. Proprietary and Documentary stamps often bore these respective designations, while in several of the issues they shared the same designs, sometimes with minor variations. Beginning in 1862 the first revenue stamps were issued, and would continue to be used for another hundred years and more.
context_section_description: The second issue of revenue stamps were Documentary stamps and issued in 1871. After the Internal Revenue received many reports of the fraudulent re-use of revenue stamps, typically with cancellation ink washed or otherwise removed from the face of the stamp,  a letter of  May 31, 1867 from government officials in Wall Street was sent to Internal Revenue commissioner E.A. Rollins expressing the concern that "The U.S. government loses thousands of dollars daily by stamps being used a second time." The ordinary stamps in use at this time did not receive the cancellation ink very well, unless it was heavily applied. The letter advised that all stamps be printed in a pale yellow color. This particular suggestion however was not taken up by Butler & Carpenter, but instead, after a period of experimentation, they responded to the problem by producing stamps of a lighter shade and on a paper that more readily absorbed cancellation ink. The Internal revenue was frequently sending stamps suspected of having cancellation ink washed to the engravers and printers for inspection to determine if they had been tampered with.
  The new paper was finally employed in stamp production in early 1869 and by 1871 a second series of stamps were issued, printed on a special patented "chameleon" paper containing silk fibers which can be seen in the paper with the naked eye. Still produced by Butler & Carpenter of Philadelphia, the entire second series, with the exception of the 200-dollar issue, were printed in the same bi-color combination, with the portrait of Washington printed in black and with the frame work in blue with various ornate and elaborate designs, popular during that period.
  "Persian rug" stamps
  The highest values in the second issue of revenue stamps are 200-dollar (left) and the 500-dollar (right) stamps and are commonly referred to by collectors as the Small and Large Persian rug revenue stamps respectively, which are considered by many to be among the most colorful and elaborately engraved stamps in all of philately. Both the 200 and 500-dollar stamps were printed in very limited quantities. The 200-dollar small Persian Rug had a printing of 446 copies, with approximately 125 known surviving examples. The stamps were printed one to a 'sheet', with margins on all four sides with inscriptions on the two side margins. The only surviving full sheet of the small Persian rug, was used to pay tax duties on the will of Erastus Corning, Sr. in 1872. The 500-dollar large Persian rug is indeed larger, measuring ​2 ¹⁄₈ by 4 inches with only 204 stamps of this denomination ever issued. Because of their relatively large sizes and the subsequent large number of perforations on each stamp, and the fact that they were used on documents which were typically folded across the stamps, most examples exist with some sort of flaw(s) about the stamp paper. Printed by the Carpenter Printing company of Philadelphia, a 5,000-dollar design was also proposed and a trial color essay was printed, but it was never issued for revenue use so there only exists a die proof.
caption: Washington revenue, $3.50
  1871 issue
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