The Forgotten History of Money
By
Dick Bachert (with a humble bow to my friend F.Tupper Saussy and his research in
“The Miracle on Main Street”)

Part 2 of 3 parts

Historian George Bancroft later wrote: "James Madison left his testimony that "the pretext for a paper currency, and particularly for making the bills a tender, either for public or private debts, was cut off." This is the interpretation of the clause, made at the time of its adoption by all the statesmen of that age, not open to dispute because too clear for argument, and never disputed so long as any one man who took part in framing the constitution remained alive."

ROGER SHERMAN (1721-1793) should be a name familiar to every American. As familiar as Washington, Madison, Jefferson and Adams. He is the only man to have signed all 4 documents surrounding the formation of the United States of America: The Continental Association of 1772, The Declaration of Independence, The Articles of Confederation and The United States Constitution. He was a Judge of the Superior Court in New Haven, Connecticut, serving that office with distinction from 1766 until 1788. He served as Treasurer of Yale University from 1765 to 1776. He was renowned for his high intelligence and unswerving honesty and was described by John Adams "as honest as an angel and as firm in the cause of American independence as Mount Atlas." He served in the U.S. Senate from 1791 until his death in 1793.

Why is Roger Sherman’s name unfamiliar? HE WAS AN ENEMY OF PAPER MONEY!! In 1751, Roger Sherman and his brother William sued James Battle for paying a debt to their shop in New Milford, Connecticut, in depreciating paper currency. Over a period of 15 months, Battle had charged "divers wares and merchandizes" amounting to 129 pounds of what Sherman assumed were pounds of Connecticut "Old Tenor", a stable currency whose value were well-preserved by taxation taking it out of circulation. But Battle assumed the debt was denominated in pounds of ever-depreciating Rhode Island currency, tendered in same, and the Shermans took a beating in the payment and sued for recovery of loss by depreciation. The Shermans lost when Battle argued that he was merely following the accepted custom of the day. In 1752, Sherman wrote his book "A Caveat Against Injustice or An Inquiry into the Evils of a Fluctuating Medium of Exchange" indicting UNBACKED PAPER MONEY.

It was this experience that Sherman brought to the Constitutional Convention and prompted him to rise on August 28, 1787 and propose new, more restrictive wording to Article 1, Section 10. The standing version under consideration was worded this way: "No state shall coin money; nor grant letters of marquee and reprisal; nor enter into any Treaty, alliance, or confederation; nor grant any title of Nobility." (From Madison’s Notes of the Convention) "Judge Sherman and Mr. Wilson moved to insert the words “coin money” the words “nor emit bills of credit, nor make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts” making these prohibitions absolute, instead of making the measures allowable with the consent of the Legislature of the U.S. Mr. Sherman thought this FAVORABLE CRISIS FOR CRUSHING PAPER MONEY. If the consent of the Legislature could authorize emissions of it, the friends of paper money would make every exertion to get into the Legislature in order to license it." Mr. Sherman's and Mr. Wilson's motion was quickly agreed to and became the supreme law of the land – and remained so for nearly 100 years.