123 lines
5.8 KiB
Plaintext
123 lines
5.8 KiB
Plaintext
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Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 10 Num. 31
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=======================================
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("Quid coniuratio est?")
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DOLLARS AND LAWFUL MONEY
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Excerpts from *What Are We Using For Money?* by Paul Bakewell
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"All history warns us against rash experiments
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which threaten violent changes in our monetary
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standard and the degradation of our currency.
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The past is full of lessons teaching not only
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the economic consequences but the national
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immorality that follows in the train of such
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experiments." -- Grover Cleveland, Message to
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Congress of December 2, 1895
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We have no real dollars, no real money and no real monetary
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system in the United States. We have no Unit coin, such as our
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former gold dollar. We lack entirely the coined money which the
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Constitution contemplated and which was "lawful money."
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The very word "Dollar" means a coin. The Joachimsthaler was the
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original German silver coin. The word was corrupted to the
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German "thaler" meaning a German silver coin, and the Spanish
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silver coin used at the time of the discovery of America was
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called the "dollar."
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The first Coinage Act enacted in Congress in 1792 fixed the basic
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coin at 371.25 grains of pure silver or 416 grains of standard
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silver and called it the "dollar" or "Unit."
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Because of its meaning, the word dollar is limited to a coin -- a
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piece of metal stamped by the government. The stamp of the
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government upon the particular coin was a guarantee that the
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value of the coin was equal to the value stamped upon its face.
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From 1792 down to 1934 we had real money -- coin stamped by the
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government -- and the paper currency which was used was
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convertible into coin upon demand.
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The phrase "lawful money" at common law meant coined money and
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nothing else. Our own courts had limited the phrase to coin.
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Years ago the Supreme Court decided that when a marshal had been
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ordered to collect a "certain sum in lawful money of the United
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States" he could collect only coined money of the United States,
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and could not accept depreciated paper currency. (Griffin &
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Irwin vs. Thompson, 2 Howard 244; McFarland vs. Gwin, 3 Howard
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717.)
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In 1868 the Supreme Court unanimously said that nothing other
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than coined money had been recognized by the legislation of the
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national government as lawful money. (Bank vs. Supervisors, 7
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Wallace, p. 30.)
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Until 1934 the promise on our paper currency to pay "dollars" in
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"lawful money" meant exactly what it said. Today we continue to
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use the words dollars and lawful money out of habit and custom,
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and overlook that we no longer have either dollars or lawful
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money.
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Today [1952] the Federal Reserve Notes promise payment in dollars
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and state that they are redeemable in lawful money. [CN: No
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longer true nowadays.] But what do those words mean?
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Mr. A.F. Davis sent a Federal Reserve Note for $10 to the
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Treasury Department and asked for $10 in lawful money. In reply
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the Treasury Department sent him two $5 United States Notes,
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which also promised payment in dollars. Mr. Davis then sent one
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of those $5 Notes to the Treasury Department and demanded $5.
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The Treasury Department returned that $5 note to Mr. Davis and
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wrote that the term "lawful money" no longer had its former
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special significance.
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The people established our government to protect their life,
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liberty and property. How then may that government deprive the
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people who established it of their right to own real money? How
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could the government take gold from the people and then deprive
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those people of their property by debauching the currency?
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+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
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(From July 1995 Conspiracy Nation Newsletter)
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CONSPIRACY NATION: The way I understand it is, what's
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backing up the dollar right now is, basically, people's
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confidence in the government. And if people have no
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confidence -- because there's no *gold* backing it up!
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What's backing up the dollar?
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SHERMAN SKOLNICK: There's *nothing* backing the dollar
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now. It's legal tender, without any backing.
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Views expressed do not necessarily reflect those
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of Conspiracy Nation, nor of its Editor in Chief.
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Aperi os tuum muto, et causis omnium filiorum qui pertranseunt.
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Aperi os tuum, decerne quod justum est, et judica inopem et
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pauperem. -- Liber Proverbiorum XXXI: 8-9
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