Status Report: States take on the Fed’s Money Monopoly

States continue to pass measures that chip away at the Federal Reserve’s monopoly on money by facilitating and encouraging the use of gold and silver.
Under a bill recently signed into law by North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper signed a bill into law investors will no longer have to pay state sales taxes when they buy gold and silver. The new law removes an important roadblock in the way of their everyday use as money, taking the first step toward breaking the Federal Reserve’s monopoly. With the governor’s signature, the law went into effect retroactively to July 1, 2017.
A month earlier, Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards signed a similar bill into law that went into immediate effect.
While repealing state sales taxes on precious metals may seem like a relatively small step, it removes one barrier to owning gold and silver and eliminates a penalty on the use of sound money.
A new Arizona law that goes into effect Aug. 9 eliminates states capital gains taxes on gold and silver specie, removing another barrier. Rep. Mark Finchem (R-Tucson) sponsored HB2014. The legislation eliminates state capital gains taxes on income ‘derived from the exchange of one kind of legal tender for another kind of legal tender.’ The bill defines legal tender as ‘a medium of exchange, including specie, that is authorized by the United States Constitution or Congress for the payment of debts, public charges, taxes and dues.’ ‘Specie’ means coins having precious metal content.
In effect, passage of HB2014 ‘legalized the Constitution’ by treating gold and silver specie as money.

This post was published at Schiffgold on AUGUST 3, 2017.