1. In 1785 and again in 1792 Congress established the decimal “dollar” as the basic monetary unit of the United States. New York State officially switched to the dollar in 1797, and the Common Council of New York City seems to have followed suit shortly thereafter. Merchants and shopkeepers, however, continued to use pounds, shillings, and pence alongside “federal money” well into the nineteenth century, at an exchange rate of eight shillings per dollar (thus city shoppers were accustomed to seeing the price of a book, for example, expressed as either 3/ or 37^½ cents.) Foreign coins remained legal tender in the United States until 1857.