Posted on 08/21/2010 7:17:45 AM PDT by Colonel Kangaroo
Today, the U.S. Treasury released a $1 coin commemorating former President James Buchanan. And people aren't happy about it.
To understand why, some background is helpful. In 2007, thanks to a bill promoted by then-Senator John Sununu of New Hampshire, the Treasury began minting $1 coins with the likenesses of former Presidents, starting with George Washington.
The coins -- which have been appearing ever since, featuring a new President every three months -- are meant to improve use and circulation of America's dollar coins, which are often seen as an awkward misfit among currency, neither fish nor fowl.
Sununu's initiative drew inspiration from the 50 State Quarters Program, which launched in 1999. The runaway success of that effort, according to his legislation, "shows that a design on a U.S. circulating coin that is regularly changed... radically increases demand for the coin, rapidly pulling it through the economy."
The bill also suggested that a program wherein Presidents are featured on a succession of $1 coins, and First Spouses commemorated on gold $10 coins, could help correct a state of affairs where "many people cannot name all of the Presidents, and fewer can name the spouses, nor can many people accurately place each President in the proper time period of American history."
So the bill passed, and the Washington dollar coin appeared not long after. It was followed by Adams, Jefferson, et al., with the First Spouse coins minted alongside.
Now we're up to Buchanan, the fifteenth President, who took office in 1857 and turned things over to Abraham Lincoln in 1861, and whose coin (produced at the Philadelphia and Denver Mints and purchasable through the U.S. Mint website) has occasioned the aforementioned grousing. Here's where some feel the coin program is falling short:
1. The coins aren't circulating.
Many Americans have never gotten into the habit of using $1 coins, and as a result, over a billion commemorative Presidential coins are sitting around in a stockpile at the Federal Reserve. As BBC News reports, if these coins were stacked up and laid on their side, they'd stretch for 1,367 miles, or the distance from Chicago to New Mexico.
2. They don't seem to be educating people, either.
In February 2008, a year after the first presidential coins were minted, The New York Times reported that a survey had found large numbers of American teens to be woefully ignorant of their country's history. It was far from the first time Americans had gotten a dismal grade in history, suggesting that Sununu's commemorative-coin campaign isn't having much of an effect in that arena, either.
3. James Buchanan was kind of a crappy president.
In fairness, this is a grievance with a specific president, not the presidential coins program as a whole. Still, it seems to come up in all the coverage of the new coin: Buchanan wasn't very good at his job.
That's the consensus of historians, anyway, who have traditionally censured Buchanan for his failure to prevent the Civil War. Last year, a C-SPAN survey of historians granted Buchanan the dubious distinction of worst president ever.
Still, all of this isn't reason enough to declare the commemorative-coins program a total failure. If more coin collectors start avidly pursuing the presidential coins, it could have the effect of pushing down the national debt, thanks to the way the value of the coins fluctuates with their availability. And if the dollar coins were to catch on and replace paper $1 bills entirely, it could save the country between $500 and $700 million each year in printing costs.
Plus, if things stay on track, 2012 will see the release of the Chester A. Arthur dollar coin -- marking the first time that long non-commemorated president's face has ever appeared on any nation's currency. And who are we to deprive him of that?
I see you have been to Thailand also...
No more stupid than I feel 150 years late going down to Yankee socialism without a fight, for now anyway.
He may be a loser IYO, but beats going down in history as an arsonist extraordinaire.
There was always a sorry crowd in the Deep South who looked down on people who did their own work. The nation is better off that they lost their rebellion. It is a chilling thought that such people might still have real power had they not been beaten down by Lincoln and his liberators.
Lincoln is almost as much to be blamed for Yankee socialism as Jeff Davis is to be blamed for Cynthia McKinney and Dixie socialism.
An estimated 10% of the southerners who fought in the civil war were loyal Americans who fought for the Union. They did so despite the vicious reprisals against their property and families. Every confederate state was represented in the Union army.
The so-called Copperheads were some of the biggest cowards alive during the war of southern rebellion. It only took the sight of a Union soldier marching in formation to set these fifth columnists scurrying for their holes. Sound familiar?
Clement Vallandigham was a leader worthy of such a movement. He was almost as brave as all the secession politicians who ran out of the country when their rebellion went belly up.
Buchanan was a ball-less wonder who was AFRAID to actually act like a leader.
It figures the lost causers would worship a DEMOCRAT.
A fair number of their descendants were undoubtedly Unionists, but not all. Despite what you might think, the men who came "over the mountain" from present day East Tennessee were a minority of those who fought for the American side at Kings Mountain. Except where noted below, I tabulated the head counts reported in the book, "The Overmountain Men," by Pat Alderman.
Roughly 480 men came from present day Tennessee. 400 came from Virginia. 350 from Wilkes and Surry Counties, North Carolina. Perhaps 160 from Burke County, North Carolina (Wikipedia estimate). That totals 1390. They were also joined later by 60 men from Lincoln County, North Carolina and about 70 from South Carolina. That made a grand total of approximately 1520 men on the American side. I don’t know that all of those men made it to the battle.
One of my two Kings Mountain ancestors came from Wilkes County, NC. The other came from South Carolina south of Greenville. My South Carolina ancestor was one of those who thought his shot had killed the British Commander, Major Ferguson. Ferguson was hit about seven times (from memory). There were at least four brothers of my ancestors also in the battle on the American side. As far as I've been able to learn, the descendants of my two ancestors all fought for the South. I’ve not researched the descendants of their brothers.
You spoke of hotheads. I guess the descendants of my ancestors didn’t have much in common with the Union hotheads who started burning railroad bridges in East Tennessee to hinder the Confederates, thereby bringing the wrath of the local East Tennessee Confederates down on them.
BRAVO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The Northern Copperhead can be found throughout Southern Ohio. I can remember as a kid fishing in southern Illinois and they'd be all over the lakes. So it's not surprising that a Southern Ohio team would adopt them as a symbol. And based on their that, the only thing they have with Ohio rebel sympathizers is the inspiration for their logo.
You're putting up a fight???
A loser is still a loser. I guess at the end of the day, his father found fighting for independence more motivating than his son found fighting for slavery to be.
When Nashville got its NFL team (the Titans) there was a group wanting to name them the Copperheads.
I guess reading comprehension is not your forté.
It’s early. Well, when you start fighting be sure and tell us all. I’d hate to miss it.
It’s a double entendre, or the biggest fubar in team naming!
Why? I'd bet if you quizzed the whole organization and every member of the team that only a handful would be able to define copperhead as you're doing it.
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