▪️ EDITOR’S NOTE: This piece was first published in American Thinker. You can link to it here.▪️
In the article “Why American Currency Can Only Feature Images of Dead People” we find out, much to my amusement, why only the dead may appear on our paper currency.
It was due to a ticked-off congressman, Civil War era Representative Martin Thayer of (R-PA), who didn’t like Spencer Clark, the first Superintendent of the National Currency Bureau which later became the Bureau of Engraving and Printing.
What was his beef? Well, Mr. Clark put his own mug on a piece of paper currency. Rep. Thayer decided he was a little too big for his britches and when the annual appropriations bill came up for Treasury, he put in an amendment which said, “Hereafter no portrait or likeness of any living person shall be engraved or placed upon any of the bonds, securities, notes, or postal currency of the United States.”
Spencer Clark was also accused of hiring only beautiful women at Treasury, and paying them $1000 in purloined treasury notes to sleep with him. Other reporting says that he was hiring the wives of Civil War soldiers as a purely altruistic move to help them financially while their husbands were away, or worse. Who knows? Maybe it was a little of both? A lot of both?
He also played a minor but important role in the conspiracy trial to convict the men involved with Lincoln’s assassination.
In any event, he took advantage of a paperwork error naming a “Clark” to be put on a note, but because of some oversight somewhere, no first name was given. So because it didn’t specify which Clark, Spencer decided it would be him.
He got away with it, and you can find the notes for sale on eBay and other places, but no matter the circumstances, a Mr. Spencer Clark became one of only “53 [people] who’ve [ever] been featured on things like legal tender, silver certificates, Federal Reserve notes and, of course, your everyday currency notes.”
You can read the entire thing here.