Punishment of Counterfeiting – Constitution Article 1 §8.6

This week I’m studying Article 1 §8.6 of the Constitution. It’s about the Congress’ power to punish counterfeiters. I’m not particularly interested in counterfeiting, but I am interested in living in a country that works. In the wonderful anime series Kino’s Journey, a character who’s looking to settle down wanders into a nice, boring country where people live in peace and freedom and are welcoming to newcomers. His companion says it seems like a perfectly normal place, to which he replies, “A lot of people have to work very hard to make a place normal.”

Democracy is not for spectators; but to participate, you have to know the rules. That’s why I’m studying the Constitution, one clause at a time. I’m up to Article 1 §8.6.

Article 1 §8.6

Congress shall have power

To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States;

Sounds fair. I don’t really understand how money works – the whole system is a little artificial – but it makes sense that if there is such a thing as “real” money, fake money would gum up the works. SCOTUS put it more eloquently in United States v. Marigold (1850) when they said Congress’ power to coin money comes with:

the correspondent and necessary power and obligation to protect and to preserve in its purity this Constitutional currency for the benefit of the nation,

On Writing Well

William Zinsser’s book has exhorted generations of writers to cut out all extraneous verbiage. For the most part, he’s right (obviously I tend to ignore that advice). According to the Annotated Constitution, Zinsser would have cut 1 §8.6 out of the Constitution completely. Punishing counterfeiters is a necessary corollary to coining currency and should be covered by the Necessary and Proper Clause. But at the time, they hadn’t written that one yet.