Article 1 Section 10 of the Constitution states that: “No state shall…make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts.”
Fiat currencies, such as the U.S. Federal Reserve Note, are not just unconstitutional and illegal; they are unconstitutional precisely because they undermine the democratic process, consent of the governed, and, ultimately, the republic.
By abdicating a constitutional currency that is backed by gold or silver, a central government can print as much money as it wants to in order to fund itself. It does not need the people’s consent for funding (as defined in Article 1 Section 2 Clause 3) , it only needs its own motivations and a period of judicial non-intervention. This is what happened.
The process by which a government pursues any exploit or operation (which would normally be limited in scope by the requirement to attain consent) is politically unstoppable, unless there is an overhaul and re-application of Constitutional money. As long as the federal government does not need to seek the consent of the governed in order to materially enrich itself, it can, will, and did enrich itself at the expense of the American citizens—whom the government technically exists to represent and serve.
This monopoly enjoyed by unconstitutional money is anti-democratic, and severely hinders the ability of Americans to hold representatives accountable for their decisions. By allowing the federal government to bankroll itself no matter what, the fed was invariably able to staff itself with an uncapped number of unelected bureaucrats, serving in agencies with no oversight, who were tasked with performing functions explicitly reserved for elected representatives. While that process can be reigned in with the overturning of “Chevron deference,” the phenomenon arose due to a fail-point in the federal government requiring consent in order to fund itself. As long as the fundamental vulnerability is not addressed, there can be future rulings or developments that restore the unconstitutional powers of unelected bureaucrats, thereby subverting our representational system of checks and balances.
While the fiat dollar enjoyed world reserve currency status, the explosion of debt was regarded with indifference, and various unconstitutional executive agencies (which are academically known as the “Fourth Estate” or colloquially as integral to the “Deep State”) witnessed ever increasing budgets, in complete defiance of the natural financial check that would exist if consent of the governed had not been extirpated from the budgetary process; in large part by the institution of unconstitutional money.
An obvious first step in restoring consent of the governed to the federal budgetary process is to bring back Constitutional currency, and end the ability of the fed to infinitely fund itself without consent; as it spends itself and Americans into inflationary cycles (which are hidden taxes on the public), economic crises, and bank failure/bailout cycles that undermine the principles of meritocracy while impoverishing the people and threatening the lives, livelihoods, and wellbeing of our great grandchildren.
Richard Nixon, by executive order, ended the dollar’s convertibility to gold. It’s time this was undone so that the wisdom of the Constitution may yet again ensure consent of the governed within the budgetary process of the federal government.