This quote is brilliant:
If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their Fathers conquered…. I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies…. The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs.
It’s usually attributed to Thomas Jefferson. It pops up on well-meaning Internet sites which favor liberty and sound money. Recent example here.
Unfortunately, Jefferson scholars say it’s a fake.
The first part of the quotation…has not been found anywhere in Thomas Jefferson’s writings…the words “inflation” and “deflation” are not documented until after Jefferson’s lifetime.
[The second and third parts are loose paraphrases of Jefferson…] The first known occurrence in print of the spurious first part with the two other quotations is in 1948…
Chalk it up to “Things that Jefferson should and probably would say, if he could see us now.” And always Google your quotes from dead people; especially if they’re too good to be true.
Addendum: Even though the Community Conservatives article linked above used a fake Jefferson quote, it had a number of other good things to say. For just one, it is the first place where I have seen the phrase “political/financial complex” to describe the elites who (mostly) rule us today.
I myself use (and I had the experience of coining) the phrase “Big Government / Big Banking complex.” Saying “political/financial complex” conveys the same idea – in fewer words. (But the same number of syllables. Odd.)
UPDATE and shifting topic, since this is sort of a Random Thoughts post: Here’s anti-Brexit harpie Christiane Amanpour trying to play ‘gotcha’ with Daniel Hannan of the pro-Brexit campaign, for nine minutes.
It’s a bit tragic. Hannan is clearly telling the truth and making good points. But Amanpour’s thinking is so cliched, so stuck, so “canalized” on her You Are All Racists narrative, that she can hardly let him talk, and ends up interviewing herself. She must have felt that she was scoring points on Hannan; others of us shake our heads at her foolishness and incompetence.
Mayer Rothschild is credited with founding the ‘modern’ banking system. This was based on the usury principles of Biblical borrowing and lending (the tossing of tables at the Temple type). As he was a contemporary of Thomas Jefferson, it is not impossible that TJ knew of this man and his propensity to say such things similar to “Give me control of a nation’s money and I care not who runs the government.” And “A man who owes money will not bite the hand which loans it.” Paraphrased.
Until 1913, the US had its own bank and printed its own money based on the Gold Standard. Rothschild’s proteges ‘convinced’ Woodrow Wilson to abandon that operation to embrace The Federal Reserve Bank – a private, for-profit banking system now linked to Central Banks throughout the world. Shortly after JFKennedy returned the US to having control of its money and printed U S Notes, he was assassinated.
The nations of the world are in so much debt to the banks, these debts can never be repaid – something called debt-slavery. And thus the screaming over Brexit from the political and financial elites. And the abject loathing for Donald J Trump.
As to the interview.. This is why Mrs. Clinton hasn’t had a press conference in over 200 days. Once leftists are out of their echo chamber they cease to function.
I had leftist moron tell me that opensecrets.org is a right wing organization that lies.
When I used federal data to determine that 60% of background checks have been made since Obama took office, I was told I was sick in the head.
When I proved that 99.96% of gun owners in 2015 were not involved in an incident of gun violence I was told I was lying even though I used data from Harvard, NBC, the CDC, gunviolencearchives and the census. They said my sources were biased towards gun rights.. Yes.. Census data on how many adults there are in the US is biased data.
They couldn’t comprehend that comparing 10’s of thousands of incidents of gun violence to 10’s of millions of gun owners is going to give you a really small number ( 0.06%).. Even common core style math brings you to that conclusion.
I saw the video of Hannan schooling that Muslim interviewer. OUCH! I hope Christiane had some ice for that bruise she received.
I wish our GOP elected officials had those kinds of stones. Only Newt Gingrich and Ted Cruz can take it to the State-Run Media like that. SMH…
Regards,
Peter H.