A Treasure Trove of Source Documents on the Gold Standard

The gold standard has a superbly rich history (and future).

The World Gold Council is the trade association of gold producers.  Its self-description:

The World Gold Council is the market development organisation for the gold industry. Working within the investment, jewellery and technology sectors, as well as engaging in government affairs, our purpose is to provide industry leadership, whilst stimulating and sustaining demand for gold.

WGC_Wedding_Ring

Byzantine Marriage Ring, World Gold Council Collection

 

We develop gold-backed solutions, services and markets, based on true market insight. As a result, we create structural shifts in demand for gold across key market sectors.

We provide insights into the international gold markets, helping people to better understand the wealth preservation qualities of gold and its role in meeting the social and environmental needs of society.

Based in the UK, with operations in India, the Far East, Europe and the US, the World Gold Council is an association whose 23 members comprise the world’s leading gold mining companies, representing approximately 60% of global corporate gold production.

It has done the world a great service by compiling scores of invaluable historical source documents for ready reference.

Historical records back to the 17th century

To aid further research by scholars, journalists and all those interested in gold’s monetary role, the World Gold Council commissioned a compilation of extracts from key historical documents from 1660 to 1999.

Citations are provided for every source so as to facilitate the reader's further research. These documents are therefore a valuable resource for researchers who seek even more in-depth knowledge of the history of gold.

Approximately 150 documents are divided into three sections that correspond roughly with the changing position of gold in the international economic system:

The Gold Council is pessimistic about the prospects for returning to gold: "Notwithstanding the philosophical arguments that exist today for a return to the classical gold standard, underpinned by concerns over inflation and central banks’ expansive monetary policies, there would be many hurdles."  It may prove of interest to the Council that each of these hurdles is meticulously addressed and resolved in The True Gold Standard, by Lehrman Institute founder and chairman Lewis E. Lehrman.  Available from Amazon.


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George Gilder Thankfully Returns, Bearing Knowledge and Power

by Ralph Benko

George Gilder, whose new book publishes today, is one of the original pillars of Supply Side economics. As stated by Discovery Institute, which he co-founded, “Mr. Gilder pioneered the formulation of supply-side economics when he served as Chairman of the Lehrman Institute’s Economic Roundtable, as Program Director for the Manhattan Institute….”

He was the living writer most quoted by President Reagan. And he is back with his most brilliant work yet — one of potentially explosive importance if taken to heart by our political and policy thought leaders. It is a radical guide, with surprising insights on almost every page, to the creation of a new era of vibrant prosperity.


The Lehrman Standard

by Paul Brodsky

As reviewer Paul Brodsky, a professional investor in New York City, perceptively notes,

"Lewis Lehrman is one of a very small group of contemporary gold advocates able to successfully bridge the gap separating practical conservative intellectualism from fleeting, half-baked idealism. His CV lists great success across many fields including education (degrees and teaching fellowships from Yale and Harvard); industry (past president of Rite Aid); politics (narrow loser to Mario Cuomo in the 1982 New York governor’s race); finance, (past Morgan Stanley managing director); private sector entrepreneur (founder, L. E. Lehrman & Company); public sector advocate (founder, Lehrman Institute); historian (author, Lincoln at Peoria: The Turning Point); and recognized philanthropist (awarded the National Humanities Medal by George W. Bush in an Oval Office ceremony). ... Only someone erudite and elegant in demeanor could hope to pull it off . In an irreconcilably over-leveraged world where irritated bond vigilantes question economic sustainability and angry Tea Partiers protest the immorality of it all, Lehrman’s views are considered and his convictions carry weight. He brings gravitas to his cause, and he does so from within as a member of the club."

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Before the Fed: JP Morgan Summons the Bank Presidents

"Finally, on the night of Sunday, November 2, Morgan summoned the presidents of the major New York banks to his new library, at the corner of Madison Avenue and Thirty-sixth Street, an Italian Renaissance-style palace he had built next door to his house to showcase his collection of rare books, manuscripts, and other artwork. Its marble floors, frescoed ceilings, walls lined with tapestries and triple-tiered bookcases of Circasian walnut, crammed full of rare Bibles and illuminated medieval manuscripts, made it an incongruous setting for a meeting of the banking establishment. Once the moneymen had gathered, Morgan had the great ornamental bronze doors to the library locked and refused to let anyone leave until all had collectively agreed to commit a further $25 million to the rescue fund."

— Liaquat Ahamed, Lords of Finance (Penguin Books, 2009, p. 54)



The Demise of Money and Credit

by Lewis E. Lehrman

Lately we have been engulfed by headlines reporting financial turmoil on every continent, in almost every nation, large and small. The commissars of central planning who so marred the history of the 20th century have been replaced by central banks in the 21st. In Cyprus, the new leadership now dares to confiscate citizens’ wealth with a one-time tax of up to 60 percent on bank deposits above 100,000 euros. Self-interested prime ministers blame continental monetary policies for instigating the currency wars that they themselves surreptitiously carry on.

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Remembering the Fed

Kathleen Packard  |  Jun 19, 2013
America recently celebrated — well, maybe we didn’t celebrate – the 80th anniversary of Franklin Roosevelt’s action to end to the gold standard. But America is also celebrating – well, maybe not everyone is celebrating – the 100th anniversary of the legislation creating the Federal Reserve System. As Lewis E. Lehrman...

The Common Sense of the Common Law

Ralph J. Benko  |  Jun 18, 2013
Constitution.org provides an extensive and thoughtful Memorandum of Law by Larry Becraft, Esq., of Huntsville, Alabama, on Article I, Section 10, clause 1 of the US Constitution. Sir William Blackstone courtesy of Wikipedia One of many interesting matters the Memorandum treats is Blackstone's Commentaries, a book that was a fixture in the...
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Jun 19, 2013
World Press
Philip Scranton

How the U.S. Scuttled the 1933 World Economic Conference

In the spring of 1933, global trade was being undermined by nationalistic economic responses to the Great Depression, including currency...
VIEW WORLD NEWS
Dec 15, 2008
Key Monetary Writings
Lewis E. Lehrman and John D. Mueller

Go Forward to Gold - How to Lift the Reserve Currency Curse

THE most disturbing aspect of the current financial crisis is that no U.S. official has correctly identified its primary cause.
VIEW KEY MONETARY WRITINGS
 
Prosperity Through Gold
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Kathleen M. Packard, Publisher
Ralph J. Benko, Editor

The Gold Standard Now
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Sean Fieler, James Grant,
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Lawrence Parks, Judy Shelton,
Lawrence H. White

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Paul Fabra

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Jeffrey Bell, Ralph J. Benko,
Andresen Blom, Frank Cannon,
Rich Danker, Brian Domitrovic,
Charles Kadlec, Christopher K. Potter,
John Tamny and Frank Trotta

In Memoriam
Professor Jacques Rueff
(1896-1978)

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Money, Gold, and
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