Creature From Jekyll Island by G. Edward полностью

In February of 1787, Washington wrote to Henry Knox: "If any person had told me that there would have been such formidable rebellion as exists, I would have thought him fit for a madhouse."3

Just three months prior to the opening of the convention, Washington voiced his reasons for rejecting the notion of fiat money. In answer to the complaint that there was not enough gold coin (specie) to satisfy the needs of commerce, he replied: The necessity arising from a want of specie is represented as greater than it really is. I contend that it is by the substance, not the shadow of a thing, we are to be benefited. The wisdom of man, in my humble opinion, cannot at this time devise a plan by which the credit of paper money would be long supported; consequently, depreciation keeps pace with the quantity of the emission, and articles for which it is exchanged rise in a greater ratio than the sinking value of the money. Wherein, then, is the farmer, the planter, the artisan benefited?

1. Quoted by Atwood, p. 3.

2. Ibid., p.

3. Ibid., p. A.

THE LOST TREASURE MAP

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An evil equally great is the door it immediately opens for speculation, by which the least designing and perhaps most valuable part of the community are preyed upon by the more knowing and crafty

speculators.1

THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION

This was the prevailing view held by the great majority of delegates to the Convention. They were adamant in their resolve to create a constitution which would prevent any state, and especially the federal government itself, from ever again issuing fiat money.

And they said so in unmistakable terms.

Oliver Ellsworth from Connecticut, who later was to become our third Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, said:

This is a favorable moment to shut and bar the door against paper money. The mischief of the various experiments which have been made are now fresh in the public mind and have excited the disgust of all the respectable parts of America.

George Mason from Virginia told the delegates he had a

"mortal hatred to paper money." Previously he had written to George Washington: "They may pass a law to issue paper money, but twenty laws will not make the people receive it. Paper money is founded upon fraud and knavery."

James Wilson from Pennsylvania said: "It will have the most salutary influence on the credit of the United States to remove the possibility of paper money."

John Langdon from New Hampshire warned that he would

rather reject the whole plan of federation than to grant the new government the right to issue fiat money.

George Reed from Delaware declared that a provision in the Constitution granting the new government the right to issue fiat money "would be as alarming as the mark of the beast in Revelation."

Thomas Paine, although not a delegate to the Convention, had written the previous year that he was strongly opposed to fiat money, which he called counterfeiting by the state, and he especially abhorred legal tender laws which force people to accept the L Washington to Stone, 16 February, 1787. Quoted by Bancroft, pp. 231-32.

2. For the context of this and the following statements expressing a similar sentiment see Bancroft, pp. 30,43-44,82; also Paul and Lehrman, p. 168.

316 THE CREATURE FROM JEKYLL ISLAND

counterfeit. He said: "The punishment of a member [of a legislature] who should move for such a law ought to be death."

An interesting thought.

If any further evidence is needed that the Founding Fathers intended to prohibit the federal government from issuing "bills of credit," consider this. The first draft of the Constitution was copied in large measure from the original Articles of Confederation. When it was taken up for consideration by the delegates, therefore, it contained the old provision that had caused so much chaos. It stated: "The legislature of the United States shall have the power to borrow money and emit bills of credit." But, after a lively discussion on the matter, the offending provision was voted to be removed from the Constitution by an overwhelming margin.1 Voicing the sentiment of the majority of the delegates, Alexander Hamilton said: "To emit an unfunded paper as the sign of value ought not to continue a formal part of the Constitution, nor ever hereafter to be employed; being, in its nature, repugnant with abuses and liable to be made the engine of imposition and fraud."2

The journal of the Convention for August 16 contains this notation:

It was moved and seconded to strike out the words "and emit bills of credit," and the motion ... passed in the affirmative. [The vote cleared by a margin of better than four to one.]3