Feds seek $7M in privately made 'Liberty Dollars' http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Feds-seek-7M-in-privately-apf-641808269.html?x=0&.v=1 Has anybody seen a "Liberty Dollar" or pictures of one?
Was having trouble with the white balance on my camera so coin looks blue rather than silver, but here is a pic of one of the few I own.
I used to work for Sunshine Minting up in Idaho if you're interested here in the newspaper article from up there somebody still up there linked me to http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2011/apr/03/bogus-coins-bullion-seized-in-cda-become-focus-of/
I must be missing something because these look like normal silver rounds to me. What's got the black-booted guys all up in arms about these?
What planet you been living on Peter ? What's got 'em up in arms is that these silver rounds were being sold and being used in commerce as alternative currency to US currency.
Oh, and here's another currency being used as an alternative to US Dollars, but I don't see the black-boots going after Mickey.
From the link: ". . . "The prosecutors successfully painted Mr. von NotHaus in a false light and now the U.S. Attorney responsible for the prosecution is painting the case in a false light, saying that it establishes that private voluntary barter currency is illegal," Michel wrote. . . " Based on the pictures 2schnauzers2luv posted I'd like to buy one. Since the confiscation and conviction of Bernard von NotHaus they've probably become very collectible. I couldn't find any for sale using a Google search.
Now I'm not sure on the full story of these, at least I haven't been keeping up on it. This is the second time I know of this happening, it happened once before about a month before I started working there. I think if a business wants to take silver, gold, 'disney dollars', bags of dirt for their products, they can.
"Oh, and here's another currency being used as an alternative to US Dollars, but I don't see the black-boots going after Mickey." von NotHaus should use Mickey dollars as part of his defense.
I agree with Peter. If this is the case , then they should be going after Disney and any strip clubs here in NY that have their money.
I guess there's still some on Ebay. This looks very similar http://cgi.ebay.com/Naked-2008-57-S...ultDomain_0&hash=item563a23e2b9#ht_1506wt_907
Yes, there are some on ebay. If you scroll down to coins and paper money then type in NORFED Liberty Dollar, you'll find some.
Disney dollars are very obviously not U.S. currency: it very clearly says "Legal Tender Only at Disneyland". For legal purposes, it has the status of a coupon or gift certificate. Silver rounds are very obviously not U.S. currency: they lack a denomination. Liberty Dollars carry a denomination in dollars, and have legends and designs similar to those found on U.S. currency. Some people were spending them without explanation, and some businesses accepted them at face value, only to discover later that the bank wouldn't take them and the melt value was well below face. Von NotHaus insists that he wasn't *trying* to deceive anybody, but the jury apparently didn't buy it. If he'd denominated the rounds in ounces and not in dollars, he'd've had no trouble. If he'd kept the "dollars" but left off the "USA" and "Liberty" and such, it's anybody's guess how the law would've been interpreted. I'm sure nobody who reads this board would confuse a Liberty Dollar with a U.S. coin, but then the general public has never read the Red Book. Plenty of cashiers aren't sure whether Kennedy halves or $2 bills are real money, and those are the folks who might be fooled by a Liberty Dollar. There was a story a few years ago, when the goverment first sent out a warning about the Liberty Dollars to banks, that a few days later a bank manager called the police to arrest a customer who was depositing a few hundred Ike dollars.... That kind of confusion, about what is and is not money, gets in the way of commerce, and it's what the government is trying to prevent by prosecuting von NotHaus.