The start of the Civil War brought about a revival in piousness in the people, and many wished for their state to reflect it. Among them was Rev. M. R. Watkinson, Minister of the Gospel from Ridleyville, who addressed a letter to Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase proposing a new design for a coin. Among the changes, he proposed “beneath this eye the American flag, bearing in its field stars equal to the number of the States united; in the folds of the bars the words GOD, LIBERTY, LAW”. Chase liked the idea to engage the Director of the Mint at Philadelphia to create a new motto based on the suggestion, with the eventual result being “In God We Trust”.

On this day, October 1, in 1957, the motto appeared on paper currency, for the first time since its appearance on coins in the 1870s. One-dollar silver certificates featured the phrase, which was adopted as the country motto in the previous year.

One-dollar, five-dollar, ten-dollar, and twenty-dollar denominations began to bear the motto in 1964, and the fifty and one-hundred dollar Federal Reserve notes first had it in 1966. The usage of the motto on coins was more or less continual — the five-cent coin took it out in 1883, only to face vocal protests against the move, and restoration in 1938 — along with a federal mandate to always use it on every coin going forward.