Quotable Quotes

From the Qur’an

Those who swallow usury cannot rise except as one whom Satan has prostrate by his touch. That is because they say, trading is only like usury; and Allah has allowed trading and forbidden usury. to whomsoever then the admonition has come from his Lord, then he desists, he shall have what has already passed, and his affair is in the hands of Allah; and whoever returns to it – these are the inmates of the fire; they shall abide in it. Allah does not bless usury, and He causes charitable deeds to prosper, and Allah does not love any ungrateful sinner. Surely they who believe and do good deeds and keep up prayer and pay the Zakat, they shall have no fear, nor shall have they grieve. O you who believe, be careful of your duty to Allh and give up what remains due from usury, if you are believers. But if you do it not, then be apprised of war from Allah and His messenger, and if you repent, then you shall have your capital; neither shall you cause wrong nor suffer wrong. And if (the debtor) is in hardship, then let there be postponement until (he is in) ease, and that you remit it as alms is better for you, if you knew. And guard yourselves against a day in which you shall be returned to Allah; then every soul shall be paid back in full what it has earned, and they shall not be dealt with unjustly. 

Surah al-Baqarah, verse 275-281. 

Abraham Lincoln 

Money is the creature of law and the creation of the original issue of money should be maintained as the exclusive monopoly of national Government. Money possesses no value to the State other than that given to it by circulation. Capital has its proper place and is entitled to every protection. The wages of men should be recognised in the structure of and in the social order as more important than the wages of money. 

No duty is more imperative for the Government than the duty it owes the People to furnish them with a sound and uniform currency, and of regulating the circulation of the medium of exchange so that labour will be protected from a vicious currency, and commerce will be facilitated by cheap and safe exchanges. 

The available supply of Gold and Silver being wholly inadequate to permit the issuance of coins of intrinsic value or paper currency convertible into coin in the volume required to serve the needs of the People, some other basis for the issue of currency must be developed, and some means other than that of convertibility into coin must be developed to prevent undue fluctuation in the value of paper currency or any other substitute for money of intrinsic value that may come into use. 

The monetary needs of increasing numbers of People advancing towards higher standards of living can and should be met by the Government. Such needs can be served by the issue of National Currency and Credit through the operation of a National Banking system .The circulation of a medium of exchange issued and backed by the Government can be properly regulated and redundancy of issue avoided by withdrawing from circulation such amounts as may be necessary by Taxation , Redeposit, and otherwise. Government has the power to regulate the currency and credit of the Nation. 
Government should stand behind its currency and credit and the Bank deposits of the Nation. No individual should suffer a loss of money through depreciation or inflated currency or Bank bankruptcy. 

Government possessing the power to create and issue currency and credit as money and enjoying the right to withdraw both currency and credit from circulation by Taxation and otherwise need not and should not borrow capital at interest as a means of financing Governmental work and public enterprise. The Government should create, issue, and circulate all the currency and credit needed to satisfy the spending power of the Government and the buying power of the consumers. The privilege of creating and issuing money is not only the supreme prerogative of Government, but it is the Governments greatest creative opportunity. 

By the adoption of these principles the long felt want for a uniform medium will be satisfied. The taxpayers will be saved immense sums of interest, discounts, and exchanges. The financing of all public enterprise, the maintenance of stable Government and ordered progress, and the conduct of the Treasury will become matters of practical administration. The people can and will be furnished with a currency as safe as their own Government. Money will cease to be master and become the servant of humanity. Democracy will rise superior to the money power. 

Page 91 of Senate document 23 

Thomas Jefferson

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.  

John F. Kennedy

Executive Order 11,110 

AMENDMENT OF EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 10289 *, AS AMENDED, RELATING TO THE PERFORMANCE OF CERTAIN FUNCTIONS AFFECTING THE DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY 
By virtue of the authority vested in me by section 301 of title 3 of the United States Code, it is ordered as follows: 

Section 1. Executive Order No. 10289 of September 19, 1951, as amended, is hereby further amended- 

(a) By adding at the end of paragraph 1 thereof the following subparagraph (j) : 
"(j) The authority vested in the President by paragraph (b) of section 43 of the Act of May12,1933, as amended (31 U.S.C.821(b)), to issue silver certificates against any silver bullion, silver, or standard silver dollars in the Treasury not then held for redemption of any outstanding silver certificates, to prescribe the denomination of such silver certificates, and to coin standard silver dollars and subsidiary silver currency for their redemption," and- 
(b) By revoking subparagraphs (b) and (c) of paragraph 2 thereof. 
Sec. 2. The amendments made by this Order shall not affect any act done, or any right accruing or accrued or any suit or proceeding had or commenced in any civil or criminal cause prior to the date of this Order but all such liabilities shall continue and may be enforced as if said amendments had not been made. 

The White House, June 4. 1963. *3 CFR,1949-1953 Comp., p.787 ; 16 F.R.9499

John Kenneth Gilbraith 

The study of money, above all other fields in economics, is the one in which complexity is used to disguise the truth or to evade the truth, not to reveal it. (p.5)

The process by which banks create money is so simple that the mind is repelled; where something so important is involved, a deeper mystery seems only decent. (p.18)

Money: From Whence it Came, and Where it Went.

Henry Ford

The youth who can solve the money question, will do more for the world than all the professional soldiers of history.  

Mackenzie King Canadian Prime Minister 1935

Until the control of the issue of currency and credit is restored to government and recognized as its most conspicuous and sacred responsibility, all the talk of the sovereignty of Parliament and of democracy is idle and futile… Once a nation parts with control of its currency and credit, it matters not who makes the nation’s laws… Usury once in control will wreck any nation.  

Sir Josiah Stamp governor of the Bank of England in the 1920s

Banking was conceived in iniquity and born in sin… Bankers own the earth. Take it away from them but leave them the power to create money, and, with a flick of the pen, they will create enough money to buy it back again… If you want to be the slaves of the bankers and pay the cost of your own slavery, then let bankers continue to create money and control credit. 

William Paterson (founder of the Bank of England) 

The Bank (of England) hath the benefit of interest on all monies it creates out of nothing.

David Ricardo

The advantage would always be in favour of the issuers of paper; and as the state represents the people, the people would have saved the tax if they and not the banks had issued the million.

Thomas Edison 

It is absurd to say that our country can issue thirty billion dollars in bonds but not thirty million dollars in currency. Both are promises to pay. But one fattens the usurers, and the other helps the people.

Anthony Nelson for the Treasury in a letter on 22 February 1993

The Government can and does finance itself to a small extent by the issue of non-interest bearing money: this is the aggregate known as M0, the stock of which is currently £194 billion. The size of the stock of M0 is limited by the demand for this form of money. … The money that banks create is either interest-bearing or renders some sort of service that costs banks money to provide.

Irving Fisher

If two parties, instead of being a bank and an individual, were an individual and an individual, they could not inflate the circulating medium by a loan transaction, for the simple reason that the lender could not lend what he didn’t have, as banks can do… Only commercial banks and trust companies can lend money which they manufacture by lending it.