1908-D $20 Saint Gaudens Double Eagle, No Motto PCGS MS63 (CAC)

Here’s an early issue of the famous and beautiful Striding Liberty double eagle that was designed by sculptor-medalist Augustus Saint-Gaudens—with inspiration from and in collaboration with Theodore Roosevelt. It was only during 1907 and part of 1908 that the Saint was minted without the Motto ‘In God We Trust.’ That was because President Roosevelt believed that it was blasphemous to place the name of God upon coins, which paid for ‘sinful’ goods and services. However, Congress disagreed and had the Motto placed upon the coin during 1908. PCGS has graded 1,680 as MS63 with 1,999 finer. In CAC, there are 23 in MS63 with 91 finer.

Augustus Saint-Gaudens, the sculptor-medalist who crafted the design of this classic work, at work in his studio.

Numismatic scholar and art critic Cornelius Vermeule writes, "The [Saint-Gaudens] double eagle is perhaps the most majestic coin ever to bear our national imprint." Discussing both Saint-Gaudens' $10 eagle along with his $20 double eagle, Vermeule writes, "Both coins seem as modern a century after they were conceived as any issues, American or otherwise, produced in the past generation, and compared with what has been tolerated heretofore in the United States, both burst as artistic skyrockets in the horizons of our academic creativity."