Will the Government Confiscate Your Gold? Don't Put It Past Them...

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Roosevelt did it in 1933 and don’t think they can do it again. What people don’t realize is the US is already bankrupt. Proof of this is the insurmountable debt that can never be paid off, and the ongoing QE. 

Money printing is the tool of last resort to prop up an economy and it never works. Never has, and never will. We have to be prepared that the Federal Reserve in conjunction with the US government will do anything to help the big banks survive. 
 

David L Ganz is a prominent New York City attorney who specializes in precious metals and numismatic law.

Now, let’s clear up some misconceptions as to what happened in 1933-1934; what legal authority the president had, and has, to order the seizure of gold (or other precious metal).

Let’s start with the premise that there is simply no element of compulsion that can be employed to make a citizen turn in gold coin or bullion, especially if the coin is legal tender. The premise is absolutely wrong.

In 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt (using the “Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917″) issued an executive order on April 5, 1933 (Please see original U.S. post office poster) requiring that less than a month later on or before May 1,1933, all persons in possession or control of gold coin, gold bullion, and gold certificates (i.e. paper currency redeemable in gold coin of the United States) to turn them in to any federal reserve bank .

(The “Trading with the Enemy Act” is still around; it was last amended by Congress a couple of years ago and the general consensus in the legal community is that a confiscation could happen again in the near future. 
Let’s take a look at Title 12 of the United States Code, Sec 95:

Sec 95. Emergency limitations and restrictions on business of members of Federal reserve system; designation of legal holiday.

(a) In order to provide for the safer and more effective operation of the National Banking System and the Federal Reserve System,…during such emergency period as the President of the United States by proclamation may prescribe, …Any individual, partnership, corporation, or association, or any director, officer or employee thereof, violating any of the provisions of this section shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction thereof, shall be fined not more than $10,000 or, if a natural person, may, in addition to such fine, be imprisoned for a term not exceeding ten years. Each day that any such violation continues shall be deemed a separate offense.

(b)(1) In the event of natural calamity, riot, insurrection, war, or other emergency conditions occurring in any State whether caused by acts of nature or of man, the Comptroller of the Currency may designate by proclamation any day a legal holiday for the national banking associations located in that State

FDR’s actions in 1933 – which effectively seized the gold bullion and coin that was not “rare and unusual” – was not the end of it. In 1947, 13 years later, President Harry S. Truman trumped the earlier proclamations:

Proclamation
No. 2725 (2)
Exemption of Member Banks of Federal Reserve System

NOW, THEREFORE, I, HARRY S. TRUMAN, President of the United States of America, acting under and by virtue of the authority vested in me by section 5(b) of the Trading with the Enemy Act of October 6, 1917… Provided, however, that no banking institution shall pay out any gold coin, gold bullion, or gold certificates, except as authorized by the Secretary of the Treasury, or allow the withdrawal of any currency for hoarding. 
 

But, just 16 or 17 years ago, Congress was still amending the section, and it is highly probable that in an emergent situation, this would be revisited by the government to assure its economic and statehood survival.

Those who did not want to turn in their gold (the current argument is that the government lacks the resources to make it mandatory): the executive order provided for severe, Draconian criminal penalties for non-compliance: a $10,000 fine or 10 years imprisonment, or both …There is MUCH, MUCH more to this story. Read the rest here….