Does Collecting Certain Coins Create an Ethical Dilemma?

Suppose too that we should also be melting everyones gold teeth too. Not that there's any affiixed in me......

 

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...any gold affixed, or any teeth?

Sorry, the dentist in me had to ask. lol

 

The fact is that the Americans took over large areas of North America, slaughtered men, women and children, disrupted families and stole the natives' treasures. They took the gold and silver artifacts, melted them down and created bullion and coinage from the loot. There are no orphans alive today resulting from these actions but 200+ years ago there were plenty.

If you don't consider that North american bullion and coinage to be "blood money" then you don't understand the definition. The recovery of this treasure and subsequent profiteering in its sale is giving acceptance to the way it was collected in the first place. Ideally, it should be returned to the survivors of the civilizations from which it was taken.


Different country, still fits. And with slight modification could probably be made to fit any location and era.

Nice to know someone besides me believes the South had the legal right to secede. But the Norths war on the South may also have been legal. Remember they did fire on a Union Fort first. I often wonder what would have happened if the South had not provoked the initial fighting? Would the Union have started the war? What if they tried but the south didn't take the bait and called for peace negotiations instead? The south started seceding in 1860, but it wasn't until April 1861 that the South to start the shooting. If they had waited long enough there might not have been a Civil War at all.

 

While I am not a Confederate sympathizer, I can understand that Georgia, of all places, might not be so reverent of Mr. Lincoln due to General Sherman's destructive "March to the Sea", which Lincoln called a "Christmas present".

 

You've got a point there. To their credit, Martin Luther King Jr. is well represented in the capital. Now, if only James Brown can take his rightful place in those hallowed halls ;-)

 

It should not matter is part of history

 

That is certainly an improvement from the days of Lester Maddox.

 

I think this is really how you interpret the Constitution. The Constitution didn't allow for secession but it didn't forbid it either. Although I do agree with you, it was legal because nowhere in the Constitution did it say it couldn't be done (this is how I believe it should be interpreted). However, as you say...the South did attack the North.

I personally believe the war would have begun either way. I think Lincoln and the US Congress would have interpreted the actions of the South the be Unconstitutional because it was not outlined in the Constitution as legal.

 

My feeling on the matter is this:

The same people that advertise "WTC ASE" coins, or sell worthless sets to senior citizens, or try to sell state quarter sets for many, many times their actual values...should be legislated out of business. It's predatory behavior specifically designed to take advantage of certain people.

However, deeming some country as "the evil empire" is purely subjective. I'm sure many countries see the US as the evil empire. So on that subject, collect what you want. IMO Nazi silver is just that - coins produced by a state government at a specific time period in history.

Now, if we're talking about gold coins that came from melted down jewelry/fillings from prisoners of concentration camps...entirely different story.

If we're talking about KKK tokens/memorabilia - I personally do not agree with the viewpoints of this or similar groups, but who am I to say someone is wrong for collecting it? I wouldn't feel guilty owning items of this kind, though - because it would be for educational / historical knowledge. I'm not going to make a plaque of Hitler and decorate it with KKK / Nazi coins and hang it in my living room...nor am I going to assemble said set and try to sell it for five times what the coins are worth.

 

But the great unknown, because the Supreme Court was more or less sidelined - but I have wondered what would have happened had some of the secession stuff, the Emancipation Proclamation, the suspension of Habeaus Corpus etc come before the Taney led court? Justice Taney was from Maryland, and was instrumental in the Dred Scott case in 1857. Taney died in 1862, but had he been more demonstrative there could have been some interesting showdowns in the government. Taney was known to be pro-Southern in his opinions.

 

Actually it was Sherman who originally referred to it as a Christmas Present.

 

The Consitution explicitly covers this. Its called the 10th Amendment. In it, any power not explicitly given to the Federal government in the Constitution is expressly reserved for the States. Effectively, if the Constitution does NOT give the right to the Federal government, then they have no rights at all. Therefor, if not covered in the Constitution, it cannot be unconstitutional.

They are trying to stretch the constitution the exact same way today, but its still a false argument, because the 10th amendment explicitly covers this issue. The problem is the courts who simply do not like what the Constitution says, so they make up their own law.

Chris

 

It's somewhere in the constitution about gold and silver being the only legal tender money. That went out the window during the civil war as well.

 

The only part referring to that simply gives the Feds and not the states, the right to coin money. I do not think it defines that only gold or silver can be money, since the first coins struck were copper, (except for trial pieces).

 

The section in the constitution keeps the STATES not the Federal government from making anything but gold and silver a legal tender. The Federal government can make anything a legal tender. The section that reserves to the Federal government the right to create money and regulate it's value does not say anything about it having to be gold or silver.

 

Whoa, whoa, WHOA!!! I'm not taking sides (North vs. South), but that's not how I remember it...:grandpa:

20 Dec 1860: South Carolina secedes from the Union, annexes all property within their borders, and requires all Federal Troops to lay down their arms and surrender...so they can be peaceably repatriated in the North.

26 Dec 1860: Union Major Robert Anderson, commander of a small contingent stationed at Fort Moultrie on Sullivan's Island "sneaks" into (commandeers) Fort Sumter (now a South Carolina facility...NOT a Union fort) so they would have a more defensible position. That is the first aggressive act of the Civil War. Major Anderson invades the South Carolina facility.

09 Jan 1861: The South Carolina Army blockades Fort Sumter (not wanting to fire a shot, just waiting for Major Anderson to surrender peaceably so his group can be sent back north). On the 9th, President Buchanan sends a ship (The Star of the West) to resupply Major Anderson with more troops and provisions. Cadets of the Citadel, stationed at Morris Island, fire a warning shot across the bow of the Star of the West. The North claims it was turning to leave and the South says it didn't, but the net result is that more shots are fired and the ship is hit three (3) times. The ship isn't seriously damaged and no one injured. The ship returns to New York harbor.

March 1861: General P. G. T. Beauregard is placed in command of forces at Charleston Harbor. He begins building up shore batteries aimed at the fort at the same time Major Anderson is installing new guns within Fort Sumter.

April 1861: President Lincoln, refusing to acknowledge South Carolina's right to secede, notifies South Carolina's Governor, Francis W. Pickens that he is sending resupply ships with more troops to Fort Sumter and the Governor was to let them through. The reply to Lincoln was "Evacuate Fort Sumter immediately!!".

12 Apr 1861: After waiting over four (4) months for the Union forces to end their illegal occupation of Fort Sumter and wanting to end the siege before Union reinforcements arrive (further escalating the situation), General Beauregard orders the bombardment of Fort Sumter to commence. The Union Garrison returns fire, but after 34 hours, Major Anderson finally agrees to evacuate the fort. Not one died on either side. However, two (2) Union troops are killed during the Surrender ceremony when a canon misfires.

It sounds like a lawful police action and South Carolina showed great patience and restraint under extreme provocation. That's how I remember it. :thumb:

 

Now...correct me if I'm wrong (because I might be), but I don't think the facts here are completely correct. Fort Sumter was a US Military instillation and thus federal not state property. Thus, when the state of South Carolina left the union...it really only had claim to state property. Therefore, Fort Sumter would have remained property of the US. Now, I'm sure South Carolina didn't see it that way...but I'll bet by law the Union did.

 

However, the Constitution prohibits States from accepting anything but gold and silver in payment of debts. So it wouldn't make any sense to include that prohibition while printing out unbacked paper money. Besides, there was a lot of opposition to paper money in the early days of the Republic due to the problems with the Continental Currency ("not worth a Continental")

Finally, the reason why copper coins were minted first is because there was a problem bonding Mint workers so that they could handle gold and silver.

Also note that copper coinage had no real legal tender status until 1864, when it was given legal tender status up to a face value of 20 cents for the 2-cent pieces, and 10 cents for the 1-cent pieces.

 

Agree 100%. No end to the amusement when I'm in the south listening to folks refering to the civil war as "The War of Northern Agression" --every time I hear that I'm left with a smile on my face that conveys my contempt for the idea.

 

Not only that, but can you imagine just what we would say if someone told us they required "all Federal Troops to lay down their arms and surrender...so they can be peaceably repatriated in the North." I somehow think a solid lead would have a better chance of flying than that we would follow such a requirement.