9-11 Coin Flap a Case of Selective Outrage

National Collector’s Mint is under fire once again for marketing a coin to profit off the Sept. 11 attacks.

An e-mail went out yesterday pitching the “Fifth Anniversary World Trade Center Commemorative” featuring a pop-up of the twin towers.

National Collector’s Mint, Port Chester, NY, is the same company New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer sued in 2004 for claiming its so-called Freedom Tower coin was a "government issue" silver dollar and a "U.S. territorial minting" from the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands.

The coin was not government issued. The islands use U.S. currency and are not authorized to mint money.

In October, a New York Supreme Court judge ordered National Collector's Mint to pay nearly $370,000 in penalties. According to Spitzer's office, about 20,000 customers canceled their orders for the coin and about 5,000 returned their orders and sought a refund.

Now comes the Fifth Anniversary World Trade Center Commemorative, and along with it, the predictable backlash.

“The hucksters who two years ago tried to peddle the fraudulent Freedom Tower Silver Dollar are back with an even more offensive scheme for trading on the memory of 9/11 for money,” said an Aug. 18 house editorial in the New York Daily News.

“They go by the name of the National Collector's Mint of Port Chester, N.Y., and they're marketing a monstrosity called the 2001-2006 World Trade Center Commemorative over the Web and on late-night cable TV. You've got to see it to believe it.”

It is natural to be taken aback at first by the National Collector’s Mint’s chutzpah. But what is so different about that coin than Twin-Tower souvenirs available all over New York City?

Yes, the $29.95 coin has all of 30-some cents worth of silver in it. But why is that any worse than paying $10, $15, or $20 for a commemorative something else that also costs far less to make than its selling price? Near as we can tell, National Collector’s Mint isn’t marketing the coin as an investment.

Certainly, it would be preferable for the company to have a clean reputation. And if it turns out National Collector’s Mint is lying when it claims the Fifth Anniversary coins were made with silver from a “bank vault found under tons of debris at ground zero,” then law enforcement should go after the company again. Likewise, if it turns out that the claim that $5 of the purchase price of each coin goes to charity is a lie. But those would be false advertising claims.

Outrage over 9-11-related profits has a history of irrational selectivity. People get upset over a couple movies, but not about the avalanche of books sold on the subject. While New York City politicians were trying to stop 9-11 memorabilia from being auctioned on eBay in 2002, vendors were hawking cheesy souvenirs less than a block away from Ground Zero.

Those who are outraged over National Collector’s Mint’s coins should at least be consistent and be upset over the red, white, and blue ribbons on seemingly every other car on America, the Internet e-commerce sites brimming with 9-11-related t-shirts, and even New York City firefighter t-shirts and caps that have been so popular since 9-11. They are all selling for a profit, as well.

The best response to an attack on capitalism is more of it.