Posted on 12/13/2010 4:53:12 PM PST by DeaconBenjamin
Silver certificates were a standard currency in our country for nearly 100 years. From their inception in 1878 until their final printing in 1963, silver certificates were designed to be backed by the value of actual silver. With silver on the rise in the 1960s the actual value of a silver dollar was becoming more than the face value of a one dollar note, forcing the U.S. to quit printing them. Redemption for the silver certificates continued until June 24, 1968. After that time the certificate maintained its value as a Federal Reserve note, but was no longer redeemable for a silver dollar.
With silver reaching the $30 mark this week, a stark contrast between the value of silver and the value of the dollar can be seen. The true value of a silver certificate is its face value, but most are worth a slight premium to collectors. Most silver certificates still known to exist trade from $1.25 to $2 each. Of course there are varieties and issues that are worth much more, but most fall into this category.
With silver at $30, the value of a silver dollar has shot up to at least $23 based on its silver content. Of course some have even more value to a collector based on rarity or condition. Most silver dollars trade for between $23-$30 for the common dates and grades. There are always a host of reasons that silver dollars can be worth much more than $30, but most do not make the higher category due to availability and demand.
Looking at the value difference between the silver certificate and the silver coin can be eye opening. If a person had $1,000 in 1968 and kept them in silver certificates the value today would most likely be around $1,500. But, if that same person had redeemed their certificates for coins the value in today's dollars would be around $23,000.
In 1968 many collectors kept their silver certificates in hopes of the collector value going up, but after 40 years it has been shown that the wiser choice was to keep the actual silver over the certificates themselves. If you have older silver certificates you can always have them checked to see if they are better varieties or issues, but the value of each will depend on that fact itself. Trading your old paper money in for metals will not net you as much now as it would have a generation ago, but it may just be a wise move for the generation you pass it down to.
I have a series 1928 2 dollar bill (partially torn). When issued it was worth 1/10 ounce of gold. Now it is worth 1/700 ounce of gold.
I have a 1935 silver certificate dollar. I got it with some change at the grocery store.
Just for the newbies here who havem’t seen it, I post this for the umpteenth time.
I point out again that when we hear that gold (or silver) is so much an ounce, we are being given a ratio — almost always the case with the media friends of paper money — precisely opposite of how it SHOULD be expressed.
At the moment, gold is NOT, for example, $1,400. an ounce, rather, the “dollar” has been reduced to a value of 1/1,400th of an ounce of gold. If the “dollar” is inflated to 1/6,300th of an ounce of gold, folks would get a more meaningful picture of what the politicians and the Fed have done to the currency.
Another interesting stat is that before the vote-buying politicians and masters of the universe at the Fed pulled us off a precious metals standard back in the day, the dollar was equal to 1/35th of an ounce of gold. And it has been calculated that the “dollar” of today is equivalent to less than 1 cent when measured against the dollar of 1913 or so BEFORE the Fed and the beloved INCOME TAX.
Sadly, it will ever be thus and it seems we must relearn those painful lessons every few generations.
In case some of you hadn’t noticed, class is now in session.
(Above comments added 11-2009)
Submitted for your consideration while standing by for FURIOUS FLAMES from the FRIENDS OF PAPER MONEY!
(I wrote this a number of years ago when things were NOT going well with the economy. Trust me: They WILL get ugly once again as man — or certain men — cannot resist playing God. We continue to violate the universal, immutable laws of economics at our great peril.)
History proves that EVERY house of cards eventually comes down. And the higher the card house, the harder the fall when it finally comes. And when it does, the more freedoms we will voluntarily surrender to “restore order.” It was the Founders’ concern about this historically valid problem which prompted their attempt — now ignored — to keep American “money” sound and honest.)
And I certainly recognize that NO system of commodity backed paper “money” is foolproof (and we now seem to be led by some of history’s biggest fools) how’s the current UNBACKED system working out for you?
Dick Bachert 1998
***************
2009 UPDATE:
I have noted with interest that I have lately been getting far, far fewer flames from the paper money lovers out there. And when, over 2 years ago, I began ranting about the incredibly stupid financial devices (derivatives, mortgage backed securities, etc.) being created to hoodwink the greater fools out there who were snapping up these things, I could count on about half the responders to tell me I was too simple-minded to understand these highly complicated financial “products.” I guess all those really bright financial guys are too busy now washing car windows at traffic lights to post here.
And I’d ask you to consider that when gold and silver come up in the news, the talking heads fall into the old, establishment fostered trap of measuring the precious metals in the rapidly failing paper when they SHOULD remark that it is the metals that are – within the narrow confines of fluctuations caused by their uses as industrial commodities – holding THEIR value and it is the paper that is INFLATING. (The classic example is that around 1900, one could buy a fine man’s suit for one ounce of gold. YOU STILL CAN!!!)
A fiat money system of the sort we are now painfully watching collapse creates a FALSE world of FALSE feelings of well-being and elevated lifestyles. During the expansion phase of such a system, those living under it spend or borrow more than they should, have more children than they can afford and, at the national level, come to believe they can afford to allow a score of millions of illegals to come here for educations, welfare payments, medical care, etc. They reject the immutable and universal economic realities and embrace what my old friend, the late Tupper Saussy, called “the IDEASPHERE.”
Now that the inevitable economic catastrophe is upon us, how much fun is it to watch the idiots in congress who triggered this thing scramble for cover by blaming everyone else? Not much!
The only folks who feel good now are the Hank Paulsons and Obamaites of the world who are in the process of conducting what may prove to be one of the largest raids on the REAL wealth of this nation – our labor and real property – ever witnessed.
And I’ll readily concede that while a precious metals backed money system ain’t perfect, ASK YOURSELF HOW THE FIAT MONEY SYSTEM NOW COLLAPSING ALL AROUND US HAS BEEN WORKING FOR YA’?
“Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; if it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it.” — Judge Learned Hand, 1944
DB 3/2009
* * * * * * * *
The Forgotten History of Money
This is the fascinating story of the efforts by certain of the Founding Fathers to prevent the economic distress we find all about us today. It is also a sad story on the basis that modern, “sophisticated” Americans have abandoned the corrective institutional mechanism that remains in place to this day. As you read it, think about a world with many fewer S&L, banking and political scandals and economic problems now considered the norm.
“Blood running in the streets. Mobs of rioters and demonstrators threatening banks and legislatures. Looting of shop and home. Strikes and unemployment. Trade and distribution paralyzed. Shortages of food. Bankruptcies everywhere. Court dockets overloaded. Kidnappings for heavy ransom. Sexual perversion, drunkenness, lawlessness rampant. The wheels of government are clogged, and we are descending into the vale of confusion and darkness. No day was ever more clouded than the present. We are fast verging on anarchy and confusion. (George Washington in a 1786 letter to James Madison, describing the effects of fiat paper money inflation then ravaging America in the pre Constitutional period.)
“The annihilation (of the paper money) was so complete that barber shops were papered in jest with the bills; and sailors, on returning from cruises, being paid off in bundles of this worthless money, had suits made of it, and with characteristic lightheartedness, turned their loss into frolic by parading through the streets in decayed finery which in its better days had passed for thousands of dollars.” (Contemporary writer, Breck, 1786)
“Paper money polluted the equity of our laws, turned them into engines of oppression, corrupted the justice of our public administration, destroyed the fortunes of thousands who had confidence in it, enervated the trade and husbandry, and the manufactures of our country, and went far to destroy the morality of out people.” (Peletiah Webster, 1786)
At the drafting of the U.S.Constitution, there were many “Friends of Paper Money” present. On August 16, 1787, when the discussion arose on Article 1, Section 8, the proposed wording was this: “The Legislature of the United States shall have the power to...coin money...and emit bills of credit of the United States.”
A hot argument ensued on the power to emit bills of credit, which is another way of saying “printing paper money”.
Here are the actual words James Madison wrote describing the debate in his diary: “Mr.G.Morris moved to strike out *and emit bills of credit.* If the United States had credit, such bills would be unnecessary; if they had not, unjust and useless.
MADISON: Will it not be sufficient to prohibit the making them a tender? This will remove the temptation to emit them with unjust views. And promissory notes in that shape may in some emergencies be best.
MORRIS: Striking out the words will leave room still for notes of a responsible minister which will do the good without the mischief. The monied interest will oppose the plan of the Government, if paper emissions be not prohibited.
COL.MASON: Though he had a mortal hatred to paper money, yet as he could not foresee all emergencies, we was unwilling to tie the hands of the Legislature [Legislature = Congress].
MR.MERCER:(A friend to paper money) It was impolitic...to excite the opposition of all those who were friends to paper money.
MR. ELSEWORTH thought this was a favorable moment to shut and bar the door against paper money. The mischiefs of the various experiments which had been made, were now fresh in the public mind and had excited the disgust of all the respectable part of America. By withholding the power from the new Government, more friends of influence would be gained to it than by almost anything else...Give the Government credit, and other will offer. The power may do harm, never good.
MR.WILSON: It will have a most salutary influence on the credit of the United States to remove the possibility of paper money. This expedient can never succeed whilst its mischiefs are remembered, and as long as it can be resorted to, it will be a bar to other resources.
MR.READ thought the words, if not struck out, would be as alarming as the mark of the Beast in Revelation.
MR.LANGDON had rather reject the whole plan than retain the three words *and emit bills*”.
The motion for striking out carried.
Historian George Bancroft later wrote: “James Madison left his testimony that *the pretext for a paper currency, and particularly for making the bills a tender, either for public or private debts, was cut off.* This is the interpretation of the clause, made at the time of its adoption by all the statesmen of that age, not open to dispute because too clear for argument, and never disputed so long as any one man who took part in framing the constitution remained alive.”
(Bancroft – founder of the U.S.Naval Academy at Annapolis among other accomplishments – wrote a book on this very subject entitled “A Plea for the Constitution of the United States: Wounded in the House of Its Guardians.” During WWII, FDR – a serious friend of paper money – ostensibly to supply the war effort, ordered the printing plates for many historical books smelted. Bancroft’s book was among them. A photocopy of one of the remaining originals can be found here
ROGER SHERMAN(1721 1793)should be a name familiar to every American. As familiar as Washington, Madison, Jefferson and Adams. He is the only man to have signed all 4 documents surrounding the formation of the United States of America: The Continental Association of 1774, The Declaration of Independence, The Articles of Confederation and The United States Constitution. He was a Judge of the Superior Court in New Haven, Connecticut, serving that office with distinction from 1766 until 1788. He served as Treasurer of Yale University from 1765 to 1776. He was renouned for his high intelligence and unswerving honesty and was described by John Adams “as honest as an angel and as
firm in the cause of American independence as Mount Atlas.” He served in the U.S.Senate from 1791 until his death in 1793.
Why is Roger Sherman*s name unfamiliar? HE WAS AN ENEMY OF PAPER MONEY!! In 1751, Roger Sherman and his brother William sued James Battle for paying a debt to their shop in New Milford, Connecticut, in depreciating paper currency. Over a period of 15 months, Battle had charged “divers wares and merchandizes” amounting to 129 pounds of what
Sherman assumed were pounds of Connecticut “Old Tenor”, a stable currency whose value were well preserved by taxation taking it out of circulation. But Battle assumed the debt was denominated in pounds of ever depreciating Rhode Island currency, tendered in same, and the Shermans took a beating in the payment and sued for recovery of loss by depreciation. The Shermans lost when Battle argued that he was merely following the accepted custom of the day. In 1752, Sherman wrote his book “A Caveat Against Injustice or An Inquiry into the Evils of a Fluctuating Medium of Exchange” indicting UNBACKED PAPER MONEY.
It was this experience that Sherman brought to the Constitutional Convention and prompted him to rise on August 28,1787 and propose new, more restrictive wording to Article 1,Section 10. The standing version under consideration was worded this way: “No state shall coin money; nor grant letters of marque and reprisal; nor enter into any Treaty, alliance, or confederation; nor grant any title of Nobility.” (From Madison’s Notes of the Convention) “Judge Sherman and Mr. Wilson moved to insert the words *coin money* the words *nor emit bills of credit, nor make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts* making these prohibitions absolute, instead of making the measures allowable with the consent of the Legislature of the U.S. Mr. Sherman thought this a FAVORABLE CRISIS FOR CRUSHING PAPER MONEY. If the consent of the Legislature could authorize emissions of it, the friends of paper money would make every exertion to get into the Legislature in order to license it.” Mr. Sherman*s and Mr. Wilson*s motion was quickly agreed to and became the supreme law of the land.
Some additional quotations to ponder:
“All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise not from defects in the constitution or confederation, nor from a want of honor or virtue so much as from downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation” (John Adams in a letter to Thomas Jefferson, 1787)
“I deny the power of the general government to making paper money, or anything else, a legal tender.” (Thomas Jefferson)
“You have been doubtless been informed, from time to time, of the happy progress of our affairs. The principal difficulties seem in great measure to have been surmounted. Our revenues have been considerably
more productive than it was imagined they would be. I mention this to show the spirit of enterprise that prevails.” (George Washington in a letter to the Marquis de LaFayette, June 3, 1790 AFTER the United States Constitution prohibited unbacked paper money at Article 1, Section 10)
“Since the federal constitution has removed all danger of our having a paper tender, our trade is advanced fifty percent. Our monied people can trust their cash abroad, and have brought their coin into circulation.” (December 16, 1789 edition of The Pennsylvania
Gazette)
“Our country, my dear sir, is fast progressing in its political importance and social happiness.” (George Washington in a letter to the Marquis de LaFayette, March 19, 1791)
“The United States enjoys a sense of prosperity and tranquility under the new government that could hardly have been hoped for.” (George Washington in a letter to Catherine Macaulay Graham, July 19,1791)
“Tranquility reigns among the people with that disposition towards the general government which is likely to preserve it. Our public credit stands on that high ground which three years ago would have been
considered as a species of madness to have foretold.” (George Washington in a letter to David Humphreys, July 20, 1791)
“It is apparent from the whole context of the Constitution as well as the times which gave birth to it, that it was the purpose of the Convention to establish a currency consisting of the precious metals.
These were adopted by a permanent rule excluding the use of a perishable medium of exchange, such as certain agricultural commodities recognized by the statutes of some States as tender for debts, or the still more pernicious expedient of PAPER CURRENCY.” (Andrew Jackson, 8th Annual Message to Congress, December 5, 1836)
DESPITE WHAT YOU WERE TAUGHT IN SCHOOL, THE HISTORICAL RECORD IS CRYSTAL CLEAR: AMERICA WAS TO HAVE BEEN SPARED THE DESTRUCTIVE EFFECTS OF AN UNBACKED PAPER MONEY SYSTEM. MOST OF THE PROBLEMS WE FACE TODAY CAN BE TRACED TO WHAT ANDREW JACKSON CALLED “THE PERNICIOUS EXPEDIENT OF PAPER MONEY”.
History teaches that an “artificial” money creates an equally “artificial” world where the price for some item...even our most popular welfare “program”...can be deferred to future generations (our multi-trillion national debt) or “paid” with a “money” created out of thin air which robs the value from the money we might be unfortunate enough to have in our pockets at that moment (inflation). And one thing you must remember about inflation is that it is not an “equal opportunity” destroyer: Those first in line to get their hands on the new money rolling off the presses (the modern friends of paper money) have a chance to spend it before it loses its value. The little people (that’s us, folks!) farthest down the line are the ones who feel the fullest effects of this destructive process.
That’s because it was planned that way.
Just for the newbies here who havem’t seen it, I post this for the umpteenth time.
I point out again that when we hear that gold (or silver) is so much an ounce, we are being given a ratio — almost always the case with the media friends of paper money — precisely opposite of how it SHOULD be expressed.
At the moment, gold is NOT, for example, $1,400. an ounce, rather, the “dollar” has been reduced to a value of 1/1,400th of an ounce of gold. If the “dollar” is inflated to 1/6,300th of an ounce of gold, folks would get a more meaningful picture of what the politicians and the Fed have done to the currency.
Another interesting stat is that before the vote-buying politicians and masters of the universe at the Fed pulled us off a precious metals standard back in the day, the dollar was equal to 1/35th of an ounce of gold. And it has been calculated that the “dollar” of today is equivalent to less than 1 cent when measured against the dollar of 1913 or so BEFORE the Fed and the beloved INCOME TAX.
Sadly, it will ever be thus and it seems we must relearn those painful lessons every few generations.
In case some of you hadn’t noticed, class is now in session.
(Above comments added 11-2009)
Submitted for your consideration while standing by for FURIOUS FLAMES from the FRIENDS OF PAPER MONEY!
(I wrote this a number of years ago when things were NOT going well with the economy. Trust me: They WILL get ugly once again as man — or certain men — cannot resist playing God. We continue to violate the universal, immutable laws of economics at our great peril.)
History proves that EVERY house of cards eventually comes down. And the higher the card house, the harder the fall when it finally comes. And when it does, the more freedoms we will voluntarily surrender to “restore order.” It was the Founders’ concern about this historically valid problem which prompted their attempt — now ignored — to keep American “money” sound and honest.)
And I certainly recognize that NO system of commodity backed paper “money” is foolproof (and we now seem to be led by some of history’s biggest fools) how’s the current UNBACKED system working out for you?
Dick Bachert 1998
***************
2009 UPDATE:
I have noted with interest that I have lately been getting far, far fewer flames from the paper money lovers out there. And when, over 2 years ago, I began ranting about the incredibly stupid financial devices (derivatives, mortgage backed securities, etc.) being created to hoodwink the greater fools out there who were snapping up these things, I could count on about half the responders to tell me I was too simple-minded to understand these highly complicated financial “products.” I guess all those really bright financial guys are too busy now washing car windows at traffic lights to post here.
And I’d ask you to consider that when gold and silver come up in the news, the talking heads fall into the old, establishment fostered trap of measuring the precious metals in the rapidly failing paper when they SHOULD remark that it is the metals that are – within the narrow confines of fluctuations caused by their uses as industrial commodities – holding THEIR value and it is the paper that is INFLATING. (The classic example is that around 1900, one could buy a fine man’s suit for one ounce of gold. YOU STILL CAN!!!)
A fiat money system of the sort we are now painfully watching collapse creates a FALSE world of FALSE feelings of well-being and elevated lifestyles. During the expansion phase of such a system, those living under it spend or borrow more than they should, have more children than they can afford and, at the national level, come to believe they can afford to allow a score of millions of illegals to come here for educations, welfare payments, medical care, etc. They reject the immutable and universal economic realities and embrace what my old friend, the late Tupper Saussy, called “the IDEASPHERE.”
Now that the inevitable economic catastrophe is upon us, how much fun is it to watch the idiots in congress who triggered this thing scramble for cover by blaming everyone else? Not much!
The only folks who feel good now are the Hank Paulsons and Obamaites of the world who are in the process of conducting what may prove to be one of the largest raids on the REAL wealth of this nation – our labor and real property – ever witnessed.
And I’ll readily concede that while a precious metals backed money system ain’t perfect, ASK YOURSELF HOW THE FIAT MONEY SYSTEM NOW COLLAPSING ALL AROUND US HAS BEEN WORKING FOR YA’?
“Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; if it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it.” — Judge Learned Hand, 1944
DB 3/2009
* * * * * * * *
The Forgotten History of Money
This is the fascinating story of the efforts by certain of the Founding Fathers to prevent the economic distress we find all about us today. It is also a sad story on the basis that modern, “sophisticated” Americans have abandoned the corrective institutional mechanism that remains in place to this day. As you read it, think about a world with many fewer S&L, banking and political scandals and economic problems now considered the norm.
“Blood running in the streets. Mobs of rioters and demonstrators threatening banks and legislatures. Looting of shop and home. Strikes and unemployment. Trade and distribution paralyzed. Shortages of food. Bankruptcies everywhere. Court dockets overloaded. Kidnappings for heavy ransom. Sexual perversion, drunkenness, lawlessness rampant. The wheels of government are clogged, and we are descending into the vale of confusion and darkness. No day was ever more clouded than the present. We are fast verging on anarchy and confusion. (George Washington in a 1786 letter to James Madison, describing the effects of fiat paper money inflation then ravaging America in the pre Constitutional period.)
“The annihilation (of the paper money) was so complete that barber shops were papered in jest with the bills; and sailors, on returning from cruises, being paid off in bundles of this worthless money, had suits made of it, and with characteristic lightheartedness, turned their loss into frolic by parading through the streets in decayed finery which in its better days had passed for thousands of dollars.” (Contemporary writer, Breck, 1786)
“Paper money polluted the equity of our laws, turned them into engines of oppression, corrupted the justice of our public administration, destroyed the fortunes of thousands who had confidence in it, enervated the trade and husbandry, and the manufactures of our country, and went far to destroy the morality of out people.” (Peletiah Webster, 1786)
At the drafting of the U.S.Constitution, there were many “Friends of Paper Money” present. On August 16, 1787, when the discussion arose on Article 1, Section 8, the proposed wording was this: “The Legislature of the United States shall have the power to...coin money...and emit bills of credit of the United States.”
A hot argument ensued on the power to emit bills of credit, which is another way of saying “printing paper money”.
Here are the actual words James Madison wrote describing the debate in his diary: “Mr.G.Morris moved to strike out *and emit bills of credit.* If the United States had credit, such bills would be unnecessary; if they had not, unjust and useless.
MADISON: Will it not be sufficient to prohibit the making them a tender? This will remove the temptation to emit them with unjust views. And promissory notes in that shape may in some emergencies be best.
MORRIS: Striking out the words will leave room still for notes of a responsible minister which will do the good without the mischief. The monied interest will oppose the plan of the Government, if paper emissions be not prohibited.
COL.MASON: Though he had a mortal hatred to paper money, yet as he could not foresee all emergencies, we was unwilling to tie the hands of the Legislature [Legislature = Congress].
MR.MERCER:(A friend to paper money) It was impolitic...to excite the opposition of all those who were friends to paper money.
MR. ELSEWORTH thought this was a favorable moment to shut and bar the door against paper money. The mischiefs of the various experiments which had been made, were now fresh in the public mind and had excited the disgust of all the respectable part of America. By withholding the power from the new Government, more friends of influence would be gained to it than by almost anything else...Give the Government credit, and other will offer. The power may do harm, never good.
MR.WILSON: It will have a most salutary influence on the credit of the United States to remove the possibility of paper money. This expedient can never succeed whilst its mischiefs are remembered, and as long as it can be resorted to, it will be a bar to other resources.
MR.READ thought the words, if not struck out, would be as alarming as the mark of the Beast in Revelation.
MR.LANGDON had rather reject the whole plan than retain the three words *and emit bills*”.
The motion for striking out carried.
Historian George Bancroft later wrote: “James Madison left his testimony that *the pretext for a paper currency, and particularly for making the bills a tender, either for public or private debts, was cut off.* This is the interpretation of the clause, made at the time of its adoption by all the statesmen of that age, not open to dispute because too clear for argument, and never disputed so long as any one man who took part in framing the constitution remained alive.”
(Bancroft – founder of the U.S.Naval Academy at Annapolis among other accomplishments – wrote a book on this very subject entitled “A Plea for the Constitution of the United States: Wounded in the House of Its Guardians.” During WWII, FDR – a serious friend of paper money – ostensibly to supply the war effort, ordered the printing plates for many historical books smelted. Bancroft’s book was among them. A photocopy of one of the remaining originals can be found here
ROGER SHERMAN(1721 1793)should be a name familiar to every American. As familiar as Washington, Madison, Jefferson and Adams. He is the only man to have signed all 4 documents surrounding the formation of the United States of America: The Continental Association of 1774, The Declaration of Independence, The Articles of Confederation and The United States Constitution. He was a Judge of the Superior Court in New Haven, Connecticut, serving that office with distinction from 1766 until 1788. He served as Treasurer of Yale University from 1765 to 1776. He was renouned for his high intelligence and unswerving honesty and was described by John Adams “as honest as an angel and as
firm in the cause of American independence as Mount Atlas.” He served in the U.S.Senate from 1791 until his death in 1793.
Why is Roger Sherman*s name unfamiliar? HE WAS AN ENEMY OF PAPER MONEY!! In 1751, Roger Sherman and his brother William sued James Battle for paying a debt to their shop in New Milford, Connecticut, in depreciating paper currency. Over a period of 15 months, Battle had charged “divers wares and merchandizes” amounting to 129 pounds of what
Sherman assumed were pounds of Connecticut “Old Tenor”, a stable currency whose value were well preserved by taxation taking it out of circulation. But Battle assumed the debt was denominated in pounds of ever depreciating Rhode Island currency, tendered in same, and the Shermans took a beating in the payment and sued for recovery of loss by depreciation. The Shermans lost when Battle argued that he was merely following the accepted custom of the day. In 1752, Sherman wrote his book “A Caveat Against Injustice or An Inquiry into the Evils of a Fluctuating Medium of Exchange” indicting UNBACKED PAPER MONEY.
It was this experience that Sherman brought to the Constitutional Convention and prompted him to rise on August 28,1787 and propose new, more restrictive wording to Article 1,Section 10. The standing version under consideration was worded this way: “No state shall coin money; nor grant letters of marque and reprisal; nor enter into any Treaty, alliance, or confederation; nor grant any title of Nobility.” (From Madison’s Notes of the Convention) “Judge Sherman and Mr. Wilson moved to insert the words *coin money* the words *nor emit bills of credit, nor make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts* making these prohibitions absolute, instead of making the measures allowable with the consent of the Legislature of the U.S. Mr. Sherman thought this a FAVORABLE CRISIS FOR CRUSHING PAPER MONEY. If the consent of the Legislature could authorize emissions of it, the friends of paper money would make every exertion to get into the Legislature in order to license it.” Mr. Sherman*s and Mr. Wilson*s motion was quickly agreed to and became the supreme law of the land.
Some additional quotations to ponder:
“All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise not from defects in the constitution or confederation, nor from a want of honor or virtue so much as from downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation” (John Adams in a letter to Thomas Jefferson, 1787)
“I deny the power of the general government to making paper money, or anything else, a legal tender.” (Thomas Jefferson)
“You have been doubtless been informed, from time to time, of the happy progress of our affairs. The principal difficulties seem in great measure to have been surmounted. Our revenues have been considerably
more productive than it was imagined they would be. I mention this to show the spirit of enterprise that prevails.” (George Washington in a letter to the Marquis de LaFayette, June 3, 1790 AFTER the United States Constitution prohibited unbacked paper money at Article 1, Section 10)
“Since the federal constitution has removed all danger of our having a paper tender, our trade is advanced fifty percent. Our monied people can trust their cash abroad, and have brought their coin into circulation.” (December 16, 1789 edition of The Pennsylvania
Gazette)
“Our country, my dear sir, is fast progressing in its political importance and social happiness.” (George Washington in a letter to the Marquis de LaFayette, March 19, 1791)
“The United States enjoys a sense of prosperity and tranquility under the new government that could hardly have been hoped for.” (George Washington in a letter to Catherine Macaulay Graham, July 19,1791)
“Tranquility reigns among the people with that disposition towards the general government which is likely to preserve it. Our public credit stands on that high ground which three years ago would have been
considered as a species of madness to have foretold.” (George Washington in a letter to David Humphreys, July 20, 1791)
“It is apparent from the whole context of the Constitution as well as the times which gave birth to it, that it was the purpose of the Convention to establish a currency consisting of the precious metals.
These were adopted by a permanent rule excluding the use of a perishable medium of exchange, such as certain agricultural commodities recognized by the statutes of some States as tender for debts, or the still more pernicious expedient of PAPER CURRENCY.” (Andrew Jackson, 8th Annual Message to Congress, December 5, 1836)
DESPITE WHAT YOU WERE TAUGHT IN SCHOOL, THE HISTORICAL RECORD IS CRYSTAL CLEAR: AMERICA WAS TO HAVE BEEN SPARED THE DESTRUCTIVE EFFECTS OF AN UNBACKED PAPER MONEY SYSTEM. MOST OF THE PROBLEMS WE FACE TODAY CAN BE TRACED TO WHAT ANDREW JACKSON CALLED “THE PERNICIOUS EXPEDIENT OF PAPER MONEY”.
History teaches that an “artificial” money creates an equally “artificial” world where the price for some item...even our most popular welfare “program”...can be deferred to future generations (our multi-trillion national debt) or “paid” with a “money” created out of thin air which robs the value from the money we might be unfortunate enough to have in our pockets at that moment (inflation). And one thing you must remember about inflation is that it is not an “equal opportunity” destroyer: Those first in line to get their hands on the new money rolling off the presses (the modern friends of paper money) have a chance to spend it before it loses its value. The little people (that’s us, folks!) farthest down the line are the ones who feel the fullest effects of this destructive process.
That’s because it was planned that way.
bump for later.
I’ve got 3 or 4 $2.00 gift certs that were issued the year I was born-1957. I have no idea if they’re worth more than two bucks apiece.
Funny thing about gold or any other type of currency. Its value is meaningless to a man who has few needs.
In my case I own my house, grow a sizable portion of my own food and have minimal excess bills. A starving man with a lb of gold would have little to offer me in return for a lb of beans. Its when you look beyond that initial trade that the gold begins to have value but only if there are other goods and services available to be bought with gold.
OOOps! I mean silver certs LOLOL
My Uncle gave me a silver dollar when I was born in 1947. It was a Morgan 1887 which I have been told is one of the most common. Anyway I gave it to my Daughter to hold for my Grandson. It is in beautiful condition which I think is also not uncommon.
I knew it had no real value except maybe $20-25 based on it’s silver content but it still makes a nice keepsake. I also gave her a silver certificate for my Granddaughter. I knew it wasn’t worth a lot but am surprised it is only a few cents more than a regular dollar bill.
I actually thought silver certificates were no longer even legal tender but apparently they are.
...I like mercury dimes...they are small in denomination and cannot be mistaken for anything else.
When tshtf...they can be used without argument or division as the "new"(old) money...they are, after all..
...absolutely pure, undisputed Constitutional money...
During the last gold and silver run up there was a book out called “Wooden Nickles” by Wm. Rickenbacker. An illuminating read. It described the contortions the government was then going through to keep foreign governments from exchanging the dollars they held for gold (they could, citizens couldn’t).
One ploy they used was for the foreign government to send us their dollars and the US would withdraw enough silver certificates to cover them, then redeem them and pay the foreigners in silver.
I remember people could go down to a certain banks and redeem the certificates at 96c an ounce - the then pegged official price. Small amounts were paid off in a small envelope with silver granules - larger amounts in bars.
I also remember the government castigating anybody who saved the silver coins as “hoarders” while they were melting down the coins as fast as they could. I expect to see the same with the lowly 5c piece soon as its intrinsic value hit 6.5c today. The “hoarder” epithet will probably appear when the intrinsic value hits a dime or so and the nickles start to disappear when the “new, improved” (i.e. debased) nickle makes its appearance (Gresham’s Law).
Whether they’ll be melted down (laws already in place agin it) but perhaps a market will start trading bags of them at a ratio of X times face as they now do the silver coins.
For those who have the bucks for speculation, a few bags of nickles might be interesting - no downside, except for storage room. :-) Consider, $1,000 face x 10 or some such. Even x 2 is a nice profit. “Poor Man’s Silver” if you will.
That is true, however, there are no recorded times in the past 5000 years of human history when someone with gold in their hand, went hungry, if there was food to be had.
You're welcome to post that on my thread anytime.
I wasn’t going to give you anything for a 1957 gift certificate. But that’s just me....
Agreed. Until those basic survival needs are met, nothing else matters. Dead men don’t need gold or silver.
And with silver bouncing around 30 FRNS/oz., gas is still around a dime a gallon.
And with silver bouncing around 30 FRNS/oz., gas is still around a dime a gallon.
Time to bring back public hangings for what these Masters of the Universe have done to the “money.”
Apparently, you haven't shopped for a new Chevy, lately, well equipped or otherwise.
Assume that you were to receive full silver spot market value (which will never happen) for your silver dollars, that only comes to approximately $21,000.00.
That will buy you a stripped version of the lowest entry level model that Chevy makes.
In truck terms, I think it would equate to a white, manual trans, 2-wheel drive, vinyl-seated, AM radio, manual window, no CC type of basic piece of crap.
In reality, you would probably get about $22.00 to $24.00 per piece, which comes out to about $16,000.00.
For that, you could probably get a good used Toyota Tundra, with maybe less than 50,000 miles on it, with a fairly decent accessories package.
Just sayin'.
Gotta figure in how much of the price of a car these days is due to fascist government regulation, which didn't exist in 1935. Take that away, and the comparison would still hold.
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