Points to ponder.

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I guess I would want them to send or authorize an email blast with the link embedded. That was all I was saying.

I know that your considerable efforts led to the collection of the responses received to date. The fact is that we wouldn't know of the Presidents approval ratings unless the polling companies (paid considerable monies) called the average American in their homes and made it as easy as possible.

I work with a volunteer group that supports a professional society. The apathy of those that PAY for the priviledge of joining the group is amazing, and this is with concerned professionals. the fact that average Americans don't care about their coinage doesn't anger me, but it does speak to the larger issue of apathy. Frankly, I do my part and try to encourage those around me to enjoy and learn about their coinage. But I do take issues with one point you make...

The US is a republic, not a democracy. I have neither money, power, nor influence to change the operating meat grinder known as the US Gov't. I am young, but one thing I do know is that I must convince my congressional representatives to fight for this change. And while it is important to me, I do believe it will be a hard sell without 1000 names on paper in my district to be heard and listened to.

Resignation: probably. Apathy, not in my opinion. ND can fight because he has influence in the Sun Tzu way. He is a counselor to the Congress given his occupation. I can help craft a message, but without convincing those with power, money or influence to convince those in office, our system ofers little in the way of mechanisms for change.

Sorry for the length, I got wordy....
Cris

 

I know you aren't - this is good debate. Healthy debate is what founded this country.

And I completely agree with you. 75% is complete apathy, not to mention a tremendous statistical problem to overcome. I guess it comes down to a question of cycles. Most Americans don't care about their coinage because it is just something they throw into vending machines and get too much of stuffed into a mason jar on their dresser.

You and I, on the other hand, do care. But it is still about cycles. For an all out assualt on the Congressional representives it would take thousands of man-hours, tens of thousands of dollars and effort - tremendous effort. And all of this takes one person with the passion to act for all. Committees pass bad laws, or ineffective ones which in my opinion is the same bloody thing.

So the question is - how can we enstill passion for coinage in the average American so as to get a major voice for our ideas? I think that is the root cause of the issue; a complete lack of passion by most.

We are singing off the same sheet of music - just different parts.

 

Well the meetings on capital hill are still ongoing. While many are pushing this idea, I have found a few who at least are willing to listen. It seems that the major obstacle, is the idea of removing a president from the coinage. Everyone wants to be re-elected. Mr. Castle believes that with a presidential design on the new dollar, he can get the bill passed. No one stated privately that they believe the coin will be a success or even circulate. Now in public, the opposite is true. They are building the campaign money once more. 40 million dollars was spent on promoting the sac dollar. It could be double that on the new presidential dollar. We all know how well that logic works.
This isn't over by a long shot. While I face an uphill battle, I will not give up.

 

Thoughts:

If we have a coin which honors some person or ideal, it becomes difficult to replace it, because some may feel that the person or ideal continues to deserve recognition, and a new choice may be refuting the old in some way.

Perhaps we need a law which not only preserves a design for a minimum of 25 years, but also terminates the design after 50 or 100 years.

100 years of Lincoln will be enough. Boring! Do you really want a complete set to consist of 500 or 1000 coins?

Perhaps we should not put someone on a coin until they've been dead for 25 or 50 years.

Should the commemorative look-and-feel continue to creep into our coinage? Many of the states and their themes have appeared on commemorative coins before, and so have historical events such as Lewis and Clark.

We are now doing some similar things with our coins, currency, and stamps. Maybe we should put patriots and national heros on currency, national points of interest and achievements on coins, and the lesser but noteworthy events and people (Elvis, baseball, Boy Scouts) on stamps. And let's get U.S. Grant off the fifty.

And please, no presidential series on coins. Most don't deserve the honor.

What would happen to type sets if coins are different each year? I have this question now with the State Quarters, which pose a puzzle in my type collection. Is each state a different type, or not? If a significantly different reverse doesn't make a different type, then wheat and memorial cents aren't different types.

 

GDJMSP's efforts to change designs were mentioned in the hobby press. It may not be so much apathy which prevents more success as it is defeatism. There was a lot of effort expended toward this goal in the late '80's and then it was lost on the eve of victory. It's possible that that effort did pave the way for later changes, though.

While large numbers may not have signed the petition, it is likely that more did take the time to eMail their Congressman.

The problem is really more serious than simply the stagnation involved. The currency system is also losing a great deal of utility because of obsolete denominations and lack of more useful denominations. For instance the quarter which is the largest circulating denomination lacks any real buying power any more. The half dollar which actually circulated in the early sixties is worth nearly $3.50 in todays money. Or todays quarter would be a three cent piece in 1960 money.

 

My bet is that the ones happy with the status quo are merely wanting more money from "Big Coin".

 

Start by dropping the cent (in 2009, Lincoln cent centennial ?), expanding use of the dollar coin, dropping the dollar bill. Advantages: removes meaningless cents, provides space for dollar coin in cash drawers, more durable dollars. Round sales taxes to nearest nickel, rather than nearest cent.

 

Good Healthy discussion here, it seems like this issue is always coming up on the discussion boards.
Everyone who collects coins wants changes, and everyone who doesn't collect doesn't care. People have gotten used to not looking at their coins due to never seeing anything new. If you think I'm kidding, carry around five or six Eisenhower dollars and spend them occassionally where you shop. Nobody under the age of 24 has seen them before. When I pay with these, I always get a few questions from the kids that work at the 7-11 or gas stations about the coins. It's amazing, but a lot of them don't even know that there is a dollar coin. It's also a good way to get them interested-tell them that dimes and quarters from 1964 and before are made of real silver and suddenly they start checking every date on every quarter and dime. I like to keep them busy looking, and maybe one or two of them will actually become a collector of some sort.
Anyway, I didn't know about the online petition, but now I do and I went to the web site and signed both of them.

Joe

 

I support change in design of coins every 20>30 years (with occasional special releases like bicentenials). But the quality of new coins must be improved. While I enjoy spending Sac dollars, I think it was overall a poorly designed coin. So was the SBA.

Change for the sake of change is not a good thing when it comes to coins. Designs should be changed only: A) when a superb replacement has been designed and/or; B) an event, such as the sudden death of a president, calls for a special coin release (Note: both the Kennedy and the Roosevelt dimes are very well designed in my opinion).

The Mint should use focus groups to gage public reaction to a new design just like every other company does before it introduces a new product. With some slight modification, the Sac could have been a very successful coin, and saved the U.S. tax payer billions of dollars by begining the phase out of the dollar bill.

 

if your gonna change the design of a coin, make one good- long term design

making 50 different quarters is ugly

 

On the other hand, if we start redesigning our coins too often, then we would be getting Santa Anna (sp?) nickels, MLK quarters, Juarez dimes, Malcom X pennies.

As a multi-cultural, diverse, nation we cannot continue to have those evil slave owners on our coinage. It is too offensive for the children, and sets a bad example.

 

how true!!

we have absolutely NO minorities on our coins

whats with that

 

I guess they are, but they don't seem to have their hand out like the other groups do.

We cannot always remember all of the "victims of the evil white man" in everything we say and do. The fact that they are not mentioned does not mean they are not entitled to trillions of dollars in "entitlements" stolen from white taxpayers.

Please forgive the oversight and don't call your lawyer. I do not have much, so a lawsuit will not be worth your time.

 

doug has a good point

how did i not see that coming????????

 

Not to honor Lincoln would be a travesty. The man almost singlehandedly kept the country together.

Look at some of the modern commemoratives. Eunice Shriver, the headless Olympic dollars, USO dollar, Nolan Ryan baseball card dollar. I don't want to see junk like this circulating. It's bad enough the mint packages low talent stuff like this for collectors. Elvis on a coin? No thanks, a mediocore talent at best who had a major substance abuse problem.

Why take Grant off the 50?

 

Why take them off of our coins and currency?

No person was supposed to be on them to begin with. It is as simple as that.