It was confiscated by the government.
Newly mined gold also had to be sold to the Fed, but payment of $35 an oz. was the new price.
Gold was not “confiscated” during the depression. It was turned in by people who were obeying the new law.
No police went door to door conducting gold searches. They did not even go to the homes of “suspected gold hoarders” to check.
(The govt paid out at $20/oz, then turned around and revalued gold at $35/oz, which was the real theft.)
This is not mere semantics. If gold were ordered turned in today, most people would simply refuse to comply. The level of trust in our fedgov today, compared to 1933, is simply nonexistent. So any gold banning law would have to have real teeth to have any effect at all. It would have to be made a felony to own gold over some token amount (”economic sabotage” like in the old USSR, perhaps?).
They would have to do sting operations, and put people in prison to get any level of compliance, but this could blow back in their faces with greater resistance to obeying govt. orders in general.
...by Saint Franklin, America’s foremost admirer of Joseph Stalin.
It was confiscated by the government.
It was a different time - people voluntarily gave up gold coins etc to the government because they were more trusting then than we are today.