Answer to Mr. Keith Wilde's Criticism of my

COL. EDMUND D. TAYLOR AND CONSPIRACY THEORY

by William R. Carr

It isn't often that I have the opportunity to answer criticism from and English or Canadian scholar, so I could not pass up this opportunity. I don't know that Keith Wilde is a scholar (in fact, don't know who he is at all), but he is obviously a serious writer who takes an interest in the subject of monetary policy and has acknowledged that my material has been helpful to him in providing leads for his own research. I was pleased to find that someone has found these pages helpful or interesting, and appreciate the criticism as well.

Most particularly, I'm pleased that Mr. Wilde writes in connection with a "U.K. group working to overturn the Money Power" by promoting financial literacy. I'm glad to learn that someone is seriously working on the matter. Even to have rated any mention at all in such a forum is somewhat of a feather in my cap, though some of the mention is somewhat less than flattering -- but that's apparently business as usual, and to be expected, in the world of literary criticism.

Mr. Wilde takes exception to something to which I had failed to attach any particular significance. I'm glad he pointed out what he considers worse than simply a lack of scholarship. Since he has chosen to characterize it as a "bizarre" case of "duplicity" and a "contemptible" use of scholarship to "deceive", however, I feel honor-bound to respond.

Mr. Wilde was writing on the Wythenshawe PROMPT (popular resistance overcoming money power totally), a blog-type of Internet forum featuring essays and commentaries by various members of the group. 

The site where Mr. Wilde's comments appear is located at http://copsewood.net/pipermail/prompt/2004-February/000024.html. Another post, which also touches on this subject, comes either before or after the one at that URL .

Mr. Wilde mentions an additional post entitled "News of the Weird" in which these web pages are apparently also mentioned (presumably because they qualify as weird). The following excerpts are from two of his PROMPT posts.

Mr. Wilde wrote:

In the "News of the Weird" that I posted a couple of days ago I noted the helpful leads provided by William R. Carr, while at the same time regretting his duplicitous use of the material to forward and maintain the aura of his favored conspiracy theory. Repeating myself in part:

[T]he... site...opens up a lot of useful and entertaining information. It is provided by William R. Carr who describes himself as a veteran conspiracy buff.

Look especially in the links Carr provides for details about Gerry G. McGeer. ...Carr is particularly interested in conspiracy, however, and ... in spite of all the help [he] provides, he still manages to continue to the flavor of mystery concerning authorship of the statement. He quotes extensively from McGeer's book, in a chapter on "Lincoln, the Practical Economist" [note that this is chapter V], to show that Lincoln did in fact have a strong interest in stiffing the international bankers's (English and Rothschilds) and driving them off the continent. But then, remarkably, after apologizing for so much verbatim quotation, he drops McGeer and inserts page after page of conspiratorial detail about international bankers and assassins, etc. After that we finally get Lincoln's Monetary Policy, but this time the source is a book by Jerry Voorhis, the California Congressman of Nixonian fame (for what I don't remember)! Instead of reproducing McGeer's own explanation of the policy summary, as I have provided above, Carr quotes Voorhis' introduction: On page 186 of The Conquest of Poverty by G. G. McGeer there appears the following summary of the views of President Abraham Lincoln. The Library of Congress Legislative Reference Service says: 'The statements in this extract are not in Lincoln's own words, but they represent his monetary views expressed in his writings.'

This is doubtless a distortion by Voorhis (who may have been quoting someone else—see my "news of the weird"), for it is unlikely that the certification in question would be any more than a statement from the photocopy operator that the pages copied came indeed from the book cited. Carr then compounds the distortion with the following bizarre speculation:

Since the above monetary policy statements are not in Lincoln's own words, it would be interesting to know just whose words they were. Could they have formed the basis of Col. Edmund Taylor's greenback proposal to Lincoln-perhaps Taylor's own words? [Taylor is the new mystery man in Carr's conspiracy theory.]

Why do I call this bizarre? Because page 186 is in the very same chapter of McGeer's book that Carr has quoted from so abundantly. He could not have missed it-especially when Voorhis pointed him back to it. (Chapter V begins at page 144 and Chapter VI starts on page 212.) This is a disgusting misuse of information to foster continued belief in a fantasy. But the great mystery is why the conspiracy theorists would want to disguise the source. McGeer after all agreed with them—may even have been first in advancing the theory. And he is certainly as clear and forceful as any of them as a polemical writer. Furthermore, he has an enviable record of success as a campaigner. More of that later...

In that post I also acknowledged the helpful leads provided by the self-described conspiracy buff, William R. Carr, at www.heritech.com/pridger/lincoln/lin-ken.htm . I(n) so doing, however, I expressed incredulity that after quoting McGeer extensively from the very chapter in which "Lincon's Monetary Policy" appears, Carr then turned to a book by Jerry Voorhis as his source for "Lincoln's" statement...

While this is a contemptible use of "scholarship" to deceive, the Carr does open up some interesting connections which may point to McGeer as the source of an American tradition in conspiracy theory!

Mr. Wilde does me considerable honor by saying my site "opens up a lot of useful and entertaining information." Then he accuses me of "a disgusting misuse of information to foster continued belief in a fantasy" and the "contemptible use of 'scholarship' to deceive." Ouch!

Certainly, Mr. Wilde has a right to his opinion, but I have not yet been able to determine exactly what his purpose is. It seems it was more than to merely point out poor scholarship. Apparently, as a scholar, he has a pretty low opinion of "conspiracy buffs" and figures that the alleged conspiracies that continue to surrounded the Lincoln and Kennedy assassinations, as well as hard luck that Edmund Taylor encountered, are simple fantasies.

One wonders why Mr. Wilde would read a page entitled "Col. Edmund D. Taylor and Conspiracy Theory" in the first place.

He has particularly taken issue with (and gone the extra mile to call it "duplicity"), the use of two extracts of which I have made use — one of which rested upon the other, and ponders: "(T)he great mystery is why the conspiracy theorists would want to disguise the source."

The short answer to this is that this one doesn't disguise sources. (I cannot, of course, speak for "conspiracy theorists" in general.) What was disguised anyway? As Wilde himself points out, the quote from Voorhis clearly references McGeer's work. Is that how scholars disguise sources? Or is that just a trick of conspiracy theorists? Only a very imaginative conspiratorial mind would consider this evidence of a desire to disguise a source (but then, as a conspiracy buff, perhaps I'm not qualified to make that judgment).

It almost appears that Mr. Wilde is accusing me of a conspiracy to hide the sources of the sources I openly referenced and quoted from. Accusing a conspiracy buff of a conspiracy to "continue belief in a fantasy" is sort of like accusing a cartoonist of believing that drawn images can talk.

As for any lack of scholarship, I'll be the first to concede that I'm no historical scholar — or any kind of scholar at all. Any admitted "conspiracy buff," has already excused myself from that role — something a serious scholar should readily know. I wrote the article for fellow conspiracy buffs and any anybody else that might find the information interesting or informative. I definitely did not write the article for monetary historians or history PhDs. I'm flattered that anybody with a serious interest in the nature of money and monetary reform would take any interest in my writing at all.

The fact is, the article, "Edmund D. Taylor and Conspiracy Theory," was originally a much shorter article than what is now presented on these pages. As mentioned at the beginning of the article, it was essentially little more than speculation about a rather mysterious and enigmatic character who claimed to be the father of the Lincoln greenback, together with my own ideas why Col. Taylor has apparently been relegated to the historical "memory hole."

Then the article grew as I added more material over time. Most of the material, including quotes and the lengthy excerpt from Gerald McGeer's book, The Conquest of Poverty, was inserted long after (a year or two after), the article was originally written. The purpose was to help make the case that Lincoln intended to make the greenback permanent monetary policy and further explain that policy — as well as the perverse nature of the still dominate money power and its debt money system.

These additions were inserted without any careful rewriting or rearrangement of the whole article, and I was well aware that it tended to render the article more than just slightly disjointed. In some ways it has become a patchwork, including several tidbits of unverified "information" from unknown web sources thrown in simply as matters of related interest.

A scholarly treatise? Hardly. Both my time and objective in maintaining these pages were, and continue to be, strictly limited.

After I happened to discover parts of McGeer's book on the Internet, I inserted the extract ahead of that of Voorhis (which had been appended to the article long before I'd discovered McGeer's book). I saw no reason to remove the Voorhis extract at the time, since it (in spite of the fact that it referenced McGeer's work), was a separate and independent work on the perversities of the money power by an American political figure — one who probably met with political misfortune precisely because of his unorthodox monetary views. As Wilde points out, it was the rising star of future president Richard Nixon that cut Voohis' political career short.

One of the things Mr. Wilde seems to feel rather strongly about is his opinion that "Lincoln's Monetary Policy," which is now rather famous and widely distributed as being Lincoln's own words, are in fact those of McGreer, stating what he thought Lincoln's policy would be in concise terms. However, McGeer precedes his summation of that policy with, "Let us now, from his speeches and his messages to Congress, summarize the monetary policy that Lincoln, at the time of his assassination, was about to more clearly define and establish." (emphasis added)

In other words, McGeer did attribute the words to Lincoln, though he has apparently gathered and assembled them from various speeches and messages to Congress, perhaps given over a period of years. McGee placed quotes before them as if they were the single articulated policy that McGeer believes Lincoln was about to more completely reveal just prior to his assassination. Nonetheless, if McGeer's scholarship is reliable, they would be Lincoln's own words.

Writing on the subject of conspiracy scenarios (some of which I rather firmly believe, and others that I simply suspect are more in line with truth than what is generally believed or promoted), was my primary purpose. I have not intentionally misrepresented any facts and have tried to provide a credible account of what "might well have been," and, in my untutored opinion, "probably was." Since I don't "know it all," however, I may certainly be deemed guilty of a great multitude of omissions. I can, however, assure my readers, including Mr. Wilde, that "duplicity" and "contemptible" deception were not among my purposes. Indeed, I would consider such practices a crime akin to the conspiracies of which I have written. If I'm guilty of a crime, it would perhaps be the crime of poor scholarship.

POST NOTE: Since initially posting this response to his criticism, I have been in contact Mr. Wilde (who is an economist), and more fully understand why he believes "Lincoln's Monetary Policy" is actually McGeer's articulation of the policy rather than Lincoln's own words. As Mr. Wilde points out, the quote marks may have simply been McGreer's paraphrasing of what he believes Lincoln "would have said" from what he had gathered from Lincoln's speeches and messages to Congress. While I'm not entirely convinced, I'll readily concede the possibility, and that Mr. Wilde is probably much better qualified to make the judgment than I. Whether or not the words are actually those of Lincoln (and I believe Mr. Wilde would agree), they very likely accurately reflect Lincoln's monetary philosophy and are no less important regardless of who actually cobbled them together.

All criticism and bent ego aside, readers with a serious interest in money matters and monetary reform are encouraged to investigate the material and discourse being made available through the Wythenshawe PROMPT. The information brief below was taken from the PROMPT web site.

The Wythenshawe PROMPT A UK Group working to overcome the Money Power [The] Wythenshawe Prompt seeks to promote financial literacy in Wythenshawe, a southern suburb of Manchester, UK. Its origin was the coach party... from Wythenshawe that went to Cologne in 1999 as part of the vast Jubilee 2000 protest at the G8 summit. Out of that pilgrimage has come Wythenshawe Prompt. Jubilee Wythenshawe is still actively tackling the question of Third World debt, but to understand Third World debt-slavery and the debt-based money system itself means acquiring financial literacy, which is the task Wythenshawe Prompt has set itself. The next Wythenshawe Prompt conference will be on Saturday, May 8th 2004 10 a.m. to 12 noon, at the Wythenshawe Friends Meeting House, Sale Road, Northenden, M23 0DJ. For details of this and all subsequent activities of Wythenshawe Prompt call me, Kevin Donnelly, 0161 998 4791 or email me at kevin@kevdon.demon.co.uk Better still join the Prompt mail list where you can get regular information and also have your say -- http://copsewood.net/mailman/listinfo/prompt We need more people to get involved, of course. Anyone with IT and website management skills especially welcome!

 

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