The E-Sylum:  Volume 8, Number 27, July 3, 2005, Article 7

JUNE WAS A GREAT MONTH FOR DONALD SCARINCI

Dick Johnson writes: "Not only was New Jersey numismatist,
attorney and E-Sylum subscriber Donald Scarinci named to the
Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee this June, but his book
on one of the framers of the U.S. Constitution was published
in June as well.

Numismatic News in its June 14, 2005 issue carried the story
of Scarinci’s CCAC nomination by a California Senator and
appointment approval by U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow.
Scarinci joins ten other members of the citizens’ committee to
advise both the Treasury and U.S. Mint on the concept and
suitability of our country’s coin and medal designs. Congress
recommends four of the committee’s members, the Treasury
names the remaining seven.

A 20-year collector whose initial numismatic interests were in
America’s Colonial and early American era coins, Scarinci five
years ago turned to art medals in a big way for the medallic
beauty they contain. He has developed a keen eye and insight
into what makes good design and great medallic art -- ideal
for the work he must do on the citizens advisory committee.

He has collected examples of great medallic art of the past
plus the works of living American artists, as well as overseas
art medalists. He has attended the last two FIDEM conventions
of world art medalists in Europe and exhibitions in this country
of the American medallic sculptors’ group, AMSA.

For 18 months Scarinci has been deep into another research
project, this one on America’s most famed art medal series,
The Society of Medalists. He is planning a comprehensive work
on the fine art medal series as his next book project. Already he
has interviewed the majority of living artists who had created
Society issues and five officials of the Medallic Art Company
which struck the art medal series over a 75-year period,
1930-1995.

Last Monday, June 27th, New Jersey Media columnist Herb
Jackson wrote in his column "Capital Games" about Scarinci’s
new book. It’s about someone you have never heard of, David
Brearley, Jackson notes. Brearley just happened to be a Colonial
jurist, a chief justice on the New Jersey Supreme Court in 1779
and one of the framers of the U.S. Constitution. Sorry he is so
obscure.

Perhaps that is one reason Don wrote about him –– he wants to
change that. Don served as legal councel to the governor’s
transition team in 2002. The transition office in Trenton was
across the street from the New Jersey State Archives. Don’s
searching there discovered a cache of letters and documents
about Brearley, including such issues of modern-day importance
as how much power the president should have versus Congress
to appoint judges, government ministers and ambassadors.

Brearley headed a constitutional committee, Don relates in
the book, "David Brearley and the Making of the United States
Constitution." just one of its accomplishments was the creation
of the electoral college. This effects us 212 years later, columnist
Jackson points out, in how a president could lose the popular
vote and still win a presidential election (a la, George W. Bush
in 2000).

"There is an interesting numismatic hook to David Brearley,"
Don told me recently. "He was a signer on New Jersey Colonial
notes of 1780 and 1781. The John Ford example of the extremely
rare uncut sheet of notes of 1780 from New Jersey is now in
my collection."

Scarinci is senior partner in Scarinci & Hollenbeck, a law firm in
Lyndhurst, New Jersey, which has over four dozen lawyers on
its staff and is councel to 50 New Jersey municipalities and
government agencies. The growing firm recently moved to
Lyndhurst for larger quarters from its previous offices in Secaucus.

Read Herb Jackson’s article on Don’s new book even if you
are not a lawyer. You just might want to read the book! You
will find the article at: Full Story

  Wayne Homren, Editor

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