COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina residents would be able to use gold and silver coins as currency under a bill advanced Tuesday by a House panel.
The measure approved by the House Judiciary Committee would let people use the precious metals as money as long as businesses agree to take them. Legislators had made the argument that they didn't want to force businesses to take the metals and have to figure out the worth of the coins from one day to the next and amended the bill to remove such a requirement.
Advocates of the measure say the metal coins are more stable than the dollar, although Rep. Greg Delleney, who chaired the subcommittee that studied the bill, has previously warned that, if the dollar collapses, people will be in trouble no matter what the metals are worth.
The bill that advanced Tuesday would also exempt the coins from any sales tax, a provision also included in the only other similar bill to become law in the country. Last year, Utah became the first state in the country to legalize gold and silver coins as currency, exempting the sale of the coins from state capital gains taxes. Several other states including North Carolina have explored similar bills.
The U.S. and many other countries largely abandoned gold-backed money during World War I because they needed to print more cash to pay for the war. Later, during the Great Depression, President Franklin D. Roosevelt took steps that essentially prohibited gold and silver as legal currency to prevent hoarding.
In 1971, President Nixon formally abandoned the gold standard. The U.S. Mint later began producing the gold and silver American Eagle coins, primarily aimed at investment portfolios and allowing people to trade them at market value but with capital gains taxes on profits.
The bill now moves to the House floor. Delleney has said that, while he sees no downside in the measure, putting blind trust in the value of gold and silver is misplaced.
"We're basically creating an alternative currency," Delleney, R-Chester, said Tuesday.
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