Another Example of US Exceptionalism

Stamps represent a form of a bearer certificate, like currency. The holder or bearer of a stamp is entitled to a certain amount of a service. In the United States, unlike every other country, this promise has been without time limit going back over 150 years. Every other country in the world has demonetized their postage stamps at a far more recent date. Demonetization renders stamps worthless for the purpose for which they were issued. The stamps of every Euro zone country issued in the original currency of the country were demonetized in 2001. Great Britain demonetized her predecimal stamps around 1970. No country has maintained an unbroken promise of postal validity for its postage stamps as long as the United States. Every stamp issued since 1861 can still be used on a letter (though you would be crazy to use many of them) and the very first issues were only demonetized at the start of the Civil War to deny funding to the secessionist slave states. As this summer’s budget battles in Congress heat up and we hear more talk about the possibility of default on our debt, remember that the full faith and credit of the United States has always been secure until the Congressional folly of the last year. And that fiscal promise has been one of the mainstays of American exceptionalism.