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?
Maybe your God, Allah, will show you the light...
LOL - anyone who disagrees with you is automatically a Muslim?
Interesting, considering you use the word “yankee” with the same disdain as a Muslim would use “unbeliever”....
I find that interesting. and I’d still bet most of Cowboyway’s welfare check that both he and you were closer to voting for Obummer than I was or am....
Your Boy George Autographed Book doesn't count either...
She could hardly do worse than William Miller. No instead how about someone who know the law? Or at the very least, someone who has taken the time to read the Texas v White decision.
Maybe your God, Allah, will show you the light...
I can always count on the moronic quality of your posts to sink to ever lower levels.
Nice “Die Hard” reference there...
55 Stat. 839 (1941), 50 U.S.C. War App. 616 (Supp. 1946). The amendment provides: "During the time of war or in a period of national emergency any property or interest of any foreign country or national thereof shall vest, when, as, and upon the terms, directed by the President ... and ... such interest or property shall be held, used, administered, liquidated, sold or otherwise dealt with in the interest of and for the benefit of the United States. ..."
No mention of a treaty there, but plenty of seizure power whatever the act was called.
As I've posted many times before, the Confederate Government recognized that Lincoln's first inaugural speech meant there would be war, which was a national emergency for the new Confederacy. And, they were correct.
Chase also dealt the Texas bonds when he was Secretary of the Treasury. That's another reason for him to recuse himself from the case. He sounds like the Blagojevich holdout juror.
There is also an error of fact in the summary of the case. The summary understates how strong the vote for secession was in Texas. The statement, "The ordinance of secession submitted to the people was adopted by a vote of 34,794 against 11,235.", is incorrect. Not that it would make much difference to the case. However, hopefully our court system now has a little more attention to detail than to make errors like that.
Students at Washington and Lee University have found a use for the penny. They put pennies on the grave of Robert E. Lee’s horse Traveler. They put the Lincoln side face down, but put quarters and nickels face up to honor Washington and Jefferson. Supposed to bring the student luck, I think.
Carter was the worst. Barry isn’t even trying to be President.
I don't know about luck, but it certainly makes them poorer.
I think a lot of the counties in what is now the southern part of West Virginia did not participate in the 1864 election—since the people there still thought of themselves as part of Virginia. I had distant cousins who lived in that area during the war and served in Confederate units.
Thanks. I didn't know about the 1864 election. This summer by chance I drove through two counties that were the subject of Virginia v. West Virginia (1871), Berkeley and Jefferson. I had just finished touring the Antietam/Sharpsburg battleground. It's pretty up there.
In time of war. In time of peace there is no legal grounds for seizing foreign property. And there is also no legal means for a state to seize federal property. So you're admitting that the confederacy deliberately chose war to gain control of Sumter?
As I've posted many times before, the Confederate Government recognized that Lincoln's first inaugural speech meant there would be war, which was a national emergency for the new Confederacy. And, they were correct.
Of course they were correct, it was a self-fulfilling prophecy. War came because war was what the confederacy wanted.
There was no surrender in that speech so there would be war. The Confederacy required submission.
Inciting the wrath of East Tennessee Confederates is a badge of honor. The stay at home element among East Tennessee rebs contained some of the sorriest human beings our nation has ever seen.
When I talk about the worthless Confederates, I'm not talking about the rebel soldiers. I am talking about the losers who tried to tear up the nation in a half-wit scheme to further the interests of slavery.
I strongly suspect Washington would have more respect for Abraham Lincoln's political behavior than that of Jefferson Davis. He knew that there was a larger world beyond the slave shack.
I have read that every Confederate state except SC contributed at least one full regiment to the Union Army. I'm sure some individual S. Carolinians also remained loyal, but not enough to form a regiment. Although I'm sure they could have formed at least one colored regiment from SC.
So armed resistance to tyranny is not legitimate?
How do you reconcile your refusal to kill people to free slaves with the Founders willingness to kill people to resist oppression a very great deal less extreme than slavery? Actually, the Founders revolted more against potential future oppression than against actual oppression. Yet I presume you find their resistance legitimate.
American foreign history for the last 70 years has been very largely that of resistance to those who enslave others. In WWII we destroyed two groups of slavers, in the Cold War and its many brush fire offshoots we resisted, at the risk of destruction of the world and eventually successfully, another group of slavers.
So how many people am I willing to kill to free slaves? As many as necessary. If they don't want to die, I suggest they not fight to defend an evil institution.
beautiful website, handsome mom
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