Columnist Theodore R. Johnson called out President Donald Trump’s “sacrilegious campaign to put his name on everything” pertaining to America, including a proposed $1 coin.
“If the Treasury Department gets its way, … Trump will make history as just the second living president to have his face minted,” Johnson told the Washington Post, adding that the proposed $1 coin would be struck in time for the nation’s 250th anniversary next year. Draft designs show the president with a full head of hair on the front and the president pumping his fist in front of a billowing American flag on the back.
“It’s probably illegal,” said Johnson. “Existing law only permits deceased people’s portraits on United States currency. The specific statute governing next year’s milestone also stipulates that 'no portrait of a living person' can be on the back of the special edition coins."
But that probably won’t matter with a friendly Congress filled with Trump supporters, said Johnson.
Calvin Coolidge, the president who presided over the "Roaring 20s" before his hands-off laissez-faire economic policies and regulatory failures led to the Great Depression, was the first living president minted, appearing on a commemorative half dollar coin for the nation’s 150th birthday in 1926.
“It was illegal then, too, but Coolidge got around the law by having his administration approve the design while a friendly Congress did nothing to stop it,” said Johnson.
“The administration’s claim for the $1 coin is that it’s a token to honor America on its semiquincentennial, not a tithing to the president,” said Johnson. But that’s hard to buy considering how hard Trump’s people assured the public that the grandiosity of the Army’s 250th anniversary parade had nothing to do with its occurrence on Trump’s birthday.
“Presidential inaugurations and addresses … often include retellings of the American story as a promised land for a people in exodus, paying homage to the sacrifices required for survival and prosperity and offering testimony about the nation’s destiny and purpose in the world,” said Johnson. “But Trump’s version paints himself as the chosen one.”
“He is refashioning the Smithsonian and the Library of Congress to be more to his liking, proposing deporting citizens who protest rituals like the national anthem, and vowing executive punishment for anyone who burns the flag,” Johnson said. “It’s as if he considers constitutionally protected activities that criticize the country to be a personal affront.”
Johnson adds that more than 1 million “Coolidge coins” were minted; more than 85 percent of them went unsold and were melted. Should the Trump dollar design be approved, the same fate likely awaits it as Americans don’t prefer $1 coins. But Republicans are already considering a Trump $250 bill.
That, too, is probably illegal, said Johnson, “But in the eyes of his party apostles, not making the nation’s anniversary about Trump would be something worse: sacrilegious," he added.
Read the Washington Post report at this link.