You are here

Ford library confirms Fed letter tying Germany to gold price suppression

Section: Daily Dispatches

5:16p ET Friday, November 18, 2011

Dear Friend of GATA and Gold:

Thanks to our friend A.F. in Australia, the Gerald Ford Presidential Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan, has confirmed the authenticity of the letter written to the president by Federal Reserve Board Chairman Arthur Burns on June 3, 1975, revealing the participation of the West German central bank, the Bundesbank, and the chancellor of West Germany at that time, Helmut Schmidt, in the international gold price suppression scheme.

The Burns letter long has been cited by GATA among its proofs of the scheme, and it was cited in an essay by the German journalist Lars Schall, distributed by GATA on November 13, about his unsuccessful effort to obtain comment about the letter from Schmidt:

http://www.gata.org/node/10668

The letter itself can be found here:

http://www.gata.org/files/FedArthurBurnsOnGold-6-03-1975.pdf

The e-mail from the Ford library confirming the authenticity of the letter is appended.

CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.

* * *

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Dear A.F.:

This is in response to your e-mail of November 15, 2011, concerning the authenticity of the June 3, 1975, memorandum from Federal Reserve Board Chairman Arthur Burns to President Ford located at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

... Dispatch continues below ...



ADVERTISEMENT

The United States Once Again Can Establish
a Stable Dollar Worth Its Weight in Gold

Lewis E. Lehrman, chairman of the Lehrman Institute, sponsor of The Gold Standard Now project, has released a plan to restore economic growth through a stable dollar.

The plan, titled "The True Gold Standard: A Monetary Reform Plan Without Official Reserve Currencies," responds to the recurrent economic crises of the last century and outlines a detailed proposal for America's leadership on "how we get from here to there." That is, how we get from the present unstable paper dollar to a stable dollar as good as gold.

James Grant, author and editor of Grant's Interest Rate Observer, says of the Lehrman plan: "If you have ever wondered how the world can get from here to there -- from the chaos of depreciating paper to a convertible currency worthy of our children and our grandchildren -- wonder no more. The answer, brilliantly expounded, is between these covers. America has long needed a modern Alexander Hamilton. In Lewis E. Lehrman the country has finally found him."

To learn more and to sign up for The Gold Standard Now's free, noncommercial, weekly report, "Prosperity through Gold," please visit:

http://www.thegoldstandardnow.org/gata



I can confirm that the original copy of the seven-page memorandum from Chairman Burns to President Ford is among our holdings at the Ford Presidential Library. It is open to the public and available to any on-site researcher who might request to view it in our research room.

Here is its exact file location:

White House Central Files, FI - Finance, FI 9 Monetary Systems, Box 23, Folder FI 9 1/16/75-6/30/75.

This is the link to the FI-Finance finding aid from our website.

See FI 9: Monetary Systems.

http://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/guides/Finding%20Aids/WHCFFI.HTM

The declassification of this document is as follows:

In 2004, a researcher submitted a request to Ford Library Mandatory Review rchivist Donna Lehman for declassification review of the document. Mrs. Lehman accurately determined that the Federal Reserve Board and the Department of State were the equity holders for this document.

Review decisions by both the FRB and State Department resulted in the document being declassified in full, and the document was marked accordingly by Mrs. Lehman on June 28, 2005 -- hence the initials "dal" on the declassified stamp -- and placed in the open WHCF-Finance, FI 9 file.

I also want to clarify a possible discrepancy concerning when the document was actually declassified and opened at the Ford Library. In his September 29, 2009, Internet article on the website EconomicPolicyJournal.com, Robert Wenzel indicated I stated that the Burns memo to President Ford was not declassified until September 15, 2009. At that time, in confirming the existence of the Burns memo to Mr. Wenzel via telephone, I located a photocopy of it in another open collection within our holdings, the Arthur Burns Papers (Box B52, FRB Subject File, Folder: Gold, June 1975). This photocopy of the memo within the Arthur Burns Papers was marked for declassification and released on September 15, 2009.

If you have any further questions, please contact us via e-mail.

Thank you for your interest in the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.

Sincerely,

Mark Fischer, Archivist
Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
1000 Beal Avenue
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109
Phone: 734-205-0558

* * *

Support GATA by purchasing a silver commemorative coin:

https://www.amsterdamgold.eu/gata/index.asp?BiD=12

Or by purchasing a colorful GATA T-shirt:

http://gata.org/tshirts

Or a colorful poster of GATA's full-page ad in The Wall Street Journal on January 31, 2009:

http://gata.org/node/wallstreetjournal

Or a video disc of GATA's 2005 Gold Rush 21 conference in the Yukon:

http://www.goldrush21.com/

Help keep GATA going

GATA is a civil rights and educational organization based in the United States and tax-exempt under the U.S. Internal Revenue Code. Its e-mail dispatches are free, and you can subscribe at:

http://www.gata.org

To contribute to GATA, please visit:

http://www.gata.org/node/16



ADVERTISEMENT

Be Part of a Chance to Discover
Multi-Million-Ounce Gold and Silver Deposits in Canada

Northaven Resources Corp. (TSX-V:NTV) is advancing five gold and silver projects in highly prospective and politically stable British Columbia, Canada.

Check out the exploration program on our Allco gold/silver project :

-- A large (13,000 hectare) property, covering more than 15 square kilometers of a regional mineralized trend just 3km from a recently announced 1.2-million-ounce gold and 15-million-ounce silver deposit.

-- The property hosts historic high-grade silver workings and many mineral showings as well as former mines at the property's northern and southern boundaries.

-- A deep-penetrating airborne geophysics survey has just been completed on the entire property and neighboring deposits and its results are eagerly awaited.

To learn more about the Allco property or Northaven's other gold and silver projects, please visit:

http://www.northavenresources.com

Or call Northaven CEO Allen Leschert at 604-696-3600.