US Constitution Article 1, Section 10, Clause 1
No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.
Explained on the Annotated Constitution website.
Constitution Annotated
Analysis and Interpretation of the U.S. Constitution - constitution.congress.gov
Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900 (UK)
This Act is from the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 09 Jul 1900. Linked here.
Section 115 states:
A State shall not coin money, nor make anything but gold and silver coin a legal tender in payment of debts
Supreme Court 1926
In a case concerning executive authority:
That this is a government of limited powers definitely enumerated and granted by a written Constitution.
That the Constitution must be interpreted by attributing to its words the meaning which they bore at the time of its adoption and in view of commonly accepted canons of construction, its history, early and long-continued practices under it, and relevant opinions of this court.
Black's Law Dictionary - 4th Ed. - What is Money?
‘In usual and ordinary acceptation it means coins and paper currency used as circulating medium of exchange, and does not embrace notes, bonds, evidences of debt, or other personal or real estate.’
‘In its strict technical sense, "money" means coined metal, usually gold or silver, upon which the government stamp has been impressed to indicate its value.’
‘In its more comprehensive and general sense, it means wealth,—the representative of commodities of all kinds, of lands, and of everything that can be transferred in commerce. Paul v. Ball, 31 Tex. 10. A general, indefinite term for the measure and representative of value.’
Key Points:
- Not notes, bonds or evidence of debt.
- Is coined metal (usually gold and silver)
- Measure and representative of value
Documentary - Finding The Money 2024
when was there ever this barter market?
the myth of barter.
Referenced in the context of misconceptions about the existence of a barter economy.
What Is Bartering?
Investopedia defined Bartering as:
Barter is an act of trading goods or services between two or more parties without the use of money —or a monetary medium… In essence, bartering involves the provision of one good or service by one party in return for another good or service from another party.
Black's Law Dictionary 4th Ed. - What is Value?
‘The utility of an object in satisfying, directly or indirectly, the needs or desires of human beings, called by economists "value in use;" or its worth consisting in the power of purchasing other objects, called "value in exchange." Joint Highway Dist. No. 9 v. Ocean Shore R. Co., 128 Cal. App. 743, 18 P.2d 413, 417. Also the estimated or appraised worth of any object or property, calculated in money.’
"Value," as used in Const. U.S. Art. I, § 8, giving Congress power to coin money and regulate the value thereof, is the true, inherent, and essential value, not depending upon accident, place, or person, but the same everywhere and to every one, and in this sense regulating the value of the coinage is merely determining and maintaining coinage composed of certain coins within certain limitations at a certain specific composition and weight. Klattenburg v. Qualsett, 114 Neb. 18, 205 N.W. 577, 578. [emphasis added]
Ayn Rand on Values
"Value" is that which one acts to gain and/or keep. The concept "value" is not a primary; it presupposes an answer to the question: of value to whom and for what? It presupposes an entity capable of acting to achieve a goal in the face of an alternative. Where no alternative exists, no goals and no values are possible.
More in the Ayn Rand Lexicon.
What is Money?
The commodity theory of money: A classic theory, which goes back all the way to Aristotle (Politics, 1255b–1256b), holds that money is a kind of commodity that fulfills three functions: it serves as (i) a medium of exchange, (ii) a unit of account, and (iii) a store of value.
de Bruin, Boudewijn, Lisa Herzog, Martin O’Neill, and Joakim Sandberg, "Philosophy of Money and Finance", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2023 Edition), Edward N. Zalta & Uri Nodelman (eds.), Link