(no subject)

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

1) If any state makes any thing a tender in payment of debts which isn't gold and silver coin, then that state has broken the supreme law of the land vis-a-vis Article one Section ten.
2) All fifty states make federal reserve notes a tender in payment of debts.
Therefore:
3) All fifty states have broken the supreme law of the land.

Some of you want to say the U.S. constitution is irrelevant, or the interpretation of the U.S. constitution is somehow fallacious. I'd like to point you to Cornell Law School's site. Notice how there's a hyperlink in section nine for the direct taxes clause, and the link takes you to the sixteenth amendment. The U.S. went through the amendment process to invalidate an original law of the constitution, but the Federal Reserve Act merely went through Congress and then to the President's desk. The exact same thing happens with the war on drugs. We amend the constitution to prohibit alcohol, but we don't amend the constitution to prohibit a less harmful drug like marijuana.

Where's the irrefutable logic which shows how the U.S. doesn't have to amend the constitution?

Comments

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

You haven't shown any legitimate evidence where the constitution means coining money includes printing paper. Where there is no power explicitly stated for the federal government, it does not exist.

[jennem.livejournal.com]

Congress has the power to COIN MONEY. That power is not limited to creating gold and silver coins. Article 1, Section 8, also gives Congress the power to make all laws that are necessary and proper for carrying into execution the power to coin money. Ergo, if Congress wants to "coin" a federal reserve note, Congress can "coin" a federal reserve note.

You have absolutely no constitutional support or basis for asserting that the power to coin is limited to creating gold coins.

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

I do have constitutional support from Federalist #44.

The extension of the prohibition to bills of credit must give pleasure to every citizen, in proportion to his love of justice and his knowledge of the true springs of public prosperity. The loss which America has sustained since the peace, from the pestilent effects of paper money on the necessary confidence between man and man, on the necessary confidence in the public councils, on the industry and morals of the people, and on the character of republican government, constitutes an enormous debt against the States chargeable with this unadvised measure, which must long remain unsatisfied; or rather an accumulation of guilt, which can be expiated no otherwise than by a voluntary sacrifice on the altar of justice, of the power which has been the instrument of it. In addition to these persuasive considerations, it may be observed, that the same reasons which show the necessity of denying to the States the power of regulating coin, prove with equal force that they ought not to be at liberty to substitute a paper medium in the place of coin.

[jennem.livejournal.com]

OH LOOK. The Federalist Papers aren't constitutional authority–they're extra-constitutional authority.

Moreover, that's not evidence of an intention to limit Congress' power to coin paper money. That's a justification for Article 1, Section 10, which is wholly inapplicable to the federal government.

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

The constitutional basis, which you're ignoring, is the two different verbs used. Coin money, and emit bills of credit. You're not showing me any historical evidence which supports your assertion that Congress can coin paper money. No one talks about coining money EVER. They talk about firing up the printing press.

[jennem.livejournal.com]

Bills of credits were IOUs. Federal reserve notes are not IOUs. You're conflating federal reserve notes with bills of credit because you think it gives you this sooper-sekrit insight into this totes unconstitutional practice. I hate to break it to you—it doesn't.

Congress' power to coin money was not limited, in any way, shape, or form, by the constitution to creating gold and silver currency. Hell, in Section 10, the Constitution limits a state's ability to make anything except gold and silver coin legal tender. If the Framers wanted to limit Congress's ability to coin to gold and silver, don't you think they'd have DONE IT?

The constitutional basis for allowing congress to coin paper money is: "The Congress shall have the power to coin money." Period.

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

transitive verb

–verb (used with object)
7. to make (coinage) by stamping metal: The mint is coining pennies.
8. to convert (metal) into coinage: The mint used to coin gold into dollars.
9. to make; invent; fabricate: to coin an expression.
10. Metalworking. to shape the surface of (metal) by squeezing between two dies. Compare emboss (def. 3).

[jennem.livejournal.com]

I direct your attention to #9: to make.

As in, the power "to make" money.

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

That's actually an expression -- not money. As in, "she coined a new phrase to make fun of her opponent because her legal arguments lacked sufficient strength".

[jennem.livejournal.com]

No. That's just the example the dictionary used. Its not limited to "an expression."

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

If it's not limited to "an expression", what else besides an expression and paper money can be coined?

[jennem.livejournal.com]

At any rate, let's pretend for the sake of argument that you're totally right. The federal government has been getting away with this huge constitutional violation for the last 70 years or so, and you're the bright guy that's going to shine the light on this illicit and unconstitutional practice.

What's to stop the federal government from making something out of a metal (any metal, pick your poison), and saying, "this is worth $1, this is worth $10, this is worth $20, this is worth $50, and so on). Based on your limited interpretation of the word "coin" (to exclude paper, and include metal), such a practice would be completely constitutional. (Note: they already do this with the penny, nickels, quarters, etc. Are you seriously arguing that the constitution requires us to walk around with a bunch of coins that jangle in our pockets (weighing us down). You really thinks that's what the constitution requires?)

If you put a little sliver of metal in a paper dollar, does that fix your constitutional conundrum?

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

Show me past and present state legal tender laws -- something to the effect of the states saying "you can accept these cupro-nickel coins if they're minted by our super secret state bank which works outside of the constitutional restriction stating we cannot coin money". Until then, no, it doesn't.

[jennem.livejournal.com]

What do past and present state legal tender laws have to do with the federal government's power to assign coined (according to your definition) money value?

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

The federal government solely has the power to coin money. That is legal tender because it's money. States cannot coin money, but they can make something a tender in payment of debts. Can their power to make something a tender in payment of debts a power of legislation reserved to them via the 10th amendment?

[jennem.livejournal.com]

What does that have to do with Congress' power to coin money using metal (as required by your myopic definition of the word "coined'), and then assigning that tiny little coin a specific value.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

Is that a 1789 dictionary you are using?

Cause if you are arguing for the never-changing meaning of the precise wording of the Constitution, you'd better not be using a lexicon of English words from more than 200 years after the fact.

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

Do you think a 1789 English lexicon defined the verb coin to include printing paper money?

[jennem.livejournal.com]

I think if the Framers intended to limit Congress' ability to coin money to a gold or silver standard, they would have said so in the text of the Constitution (this reasoning is supported by evidence that the Framers* considered such limitations as applicable to the states, as you've pointed out yourself).

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

I'm still waiting to see state legal tender laws. If the states are restricted from making something a tender in payment of debts, I want to see the laws based upon that interpretation of "no state shall make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts". It has to be consistent with the fact that only the feds can coin money and regulate the value thereof, which means, really, the only thing the states can consider money is what the feds make.

[jennem.livejournal.com]

You're not making any sense.

It has to be consistent with the fact that only the feds can coin money and regulate the value thereof, which means, really, the only thing the states can consider money is what the feds make.

I'd say, that's a "yes." What that has to do with your interpretation on the limit of the federal government's power to create legal tender only in the form of a metallurgical coin, I'm not sure.

At any rate, I'm going to bed. I think my position is pretty well established in the 10+ comments that have been made. I'm comfortable leaving the conversation as is for others to read and consider.

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

I'd say, that's a "yes."

If you say that's a "yes," then maybe if the founders meant for any other thing to be money, they shouldn't have used the noun phrase "gold or silver coin". Maybe they should've thought of all those other metals which were already well-used long before they were even born?

[sgiffy.livejournal.com]

Exactly. Now you are getting it.

[yahvah.livejournal.com]

No, don't think that I'm suddenly joining the side of all the people who are totally wrong and have an inconsistent position. Once again, let me try to make this as clear as possible.

Law 1: Congress can coin money.
Law 2: No state can coin money.
Law 3: No state can make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts.

States do not make money, nor has it been sufficiently shown by the opposition that states made or make laws saying what is money. It has not been sufficiently shown that the phrase "a tender in payment of debts" does not synonymously mean "offered as payment of debts". Until it's sufficiently shown, states cannot make any form of money, and can only offer gold and silver coins as payment. States offer federal reserve notes as payment, which are not gold and silver coins. Law 3 is not upheld.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

I think you aren't using a dictionary that allows you to answer that question either.

And it isn't like "to coin" is the only word you are defining via the dictionary.