Members of Congress weigh in on CPIA concerns

November 17, 2010

“Within the past year, requests for import restrictions on coins have been received from Italy and Greece and Memorandums of Understanding are likely to be announced in the near future. The concerns of the collecting community have not only been expressed through significant public comment, but through a growing stack of letters from both the Senate and the House expressing concern over this process. The most recent of these is a letter dated September 27, 2010 from 12 members of Congress, both Republicans and Democrats, addressed to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. It expresses concern over actions of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs that “appear to undermine the legislative intent…” of CPIA. The letter points out that the restrictions on Cypriot and Chinese coins “…only discriminate against American collectors and represent a taking of their private property.” The letter goes on to ask for a careful review of the Italian request stating “…specifically, there should be no expansion of the MOU to include coins, commonplace items that stand outside the scope of the legislative intent behind CPIA.” A copy of the letter is posted in image form below”

Complete Story at The Ancient Coin Collectors Guild.