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I had to look up the Secret Service because I thought it was strange that the President's bodyguards would be interested in a suspected counterfeiter. Apparentl

• noir_lord 12y ago
  Not really. Currency protection is one of the absolute most critical functions of a government, if people lose faith in your currency it causes a ridiculous number of problems. When the US was young it's presidents didn't require the level of protection they require now (in fact a few of those presidents would have been as likely to shoot an attacker as not). Eventually they realised that presidents do require protection but deciding who to use for that protection is quite a nuanced task, there are risks involved in having military protection or police protection (remember the political climate at the time was one of ongoing revolutions around the world and in Europe) so they needed an agency that existed, was extremely professional and likely wouldn't ruffle too many feathers. The US Secret Service fit the bill ideally.