Legislators in at least ten states have introduced bills in the past few years to allow state commerce to be conducted with gold and silver.
As we reported, Georgia state Rep. Bobby Franklin (R) recently reintroduced legislation to force his state to conduct all monetary transactions with U.S. gold or silver coins — including the payment of taxes.
The Georgia bill has a long way to go before become law — but it’s by no means the only state that’s considering a future in gold. Lawmakers in Montana, Missouri, Colorado, Idaho, Indiana, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Utah, and Washington have proposed legislation, mostly in 2009, to include gold and silver in its accepted currency forms.
Constitutionaltender.com, a site dedicated to tracking and promoting these bills, explains:
The United States Constitution declares, in Article I, Section 10, “No State shall… make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts”. But, in fact, EVERY state in the United States of America DOES make some other “Thing” besides gold and silver coin a “Tender in Payment of Debts” — some “Thing” called “Federal Reserve Notes.” Thus the need for the “Constitutional Tender Act” — a bill template that can be introduced in every state legislature in the nation, returning each of them to adherence to the United States Constitution’s actual legal tender provisions.
The site’s Facebook page says all donations to the group go to RightMarch, a conservative 501(c)(4) that describes its goal as to “counter the well-financed antics of radical left-wing groups like MoveOn.org, by appealing to the grassroots “silent majority” to take action.” RightMarch is run by Bill Greene, who ran for Congress in Georgia in 2008.
This idea of using gold and silver as currency has recently enjoyed a bit of a renaissance — Fox Business’ Stuart Varney and Andrew Napolitano, for example, recently debated whether the country should return to using gold as everyday currency. Gold vending machines had already been operating in some European countries and the United Arab Emirates before one recently opened in a Florida mall. And, of course, there’s Glenn Beck’s consistent touting of the gold seller Goldline on his radio show.
