The Federal Reserve Cartel: The Eight Families

Discussion in 'Economics' started by AMT4SWA, Jun 1, 2011.

  1. United States Notes (as opposed to Federal Reserve notes) were issued by the Treasury until 1971, when the United States went off the gold standard and floated its currency.

    So there goes that theory.

    5yr
     
    #31     Jun 3, 2011
  2. Presidential Executive Order 11,110 is quite infamous among conspiracy buffs. Jim Marrs, author of Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, writes that the order instructs the Treasury secretary to issue about $4.2 billion in silver certificates as a form of currency in place of Federal Reserve Notes.1 Written by John F. Kennedy, Marrs also speculates this order was part of a larger plan by Kennedy to reduce the influence of the Federal Reserve by giving the Treasury more power to issue currency. The order wassigned June 4, 1963. A few months later, of course, Kennedy was killed, and conspiracy theorists hypothesize a link between the murder and E.O. 11,110. They argue that the Federal Reserve was somehow involved in the assassination to protect its power over monetary policy.
    The executive order modifies a pre-existing order issued by Harry Truman in 1951. E.O. 10,289 states "The Secretary of the Treasury is hereby designated and empowered to perform the following-described functions of the President without the approval, ratification, or other action of the President..." The order then lists tasks (a) through (h) which the Treasurer can now do without bothering the President. None of the powers assigned to the Treasury in E.O. 10,289 relate to money or to monetary policy. Kennedy's E.O. 11,110 then instructs that

    SECTION 1. Executive Order No. 10289 of September 9, 1951, as amended, is hereby further amended (a) By adding at the end of paragraph 1 thereof the following subparagraph (j):
    '(j) The authority vested in the President by paragraph (b) of section 43 of the Act of May 12, 1933, as amended (31 U.S.C. 821(b)), to issue silver certificates against any silver bullion, silver, or standard silver dollars in the Treasury not then held for redemption of an outstanding silver certificates, to prescribe the denominations of such silver certificates, and to coin standard silver dollars and subsidiary silver currency for their redemption,' and (b) By revoking subparagraphs (b) and (c) of paragraph 2 thereof.

    SECTION 2. The amendments made by this Order shall not affect any act done, or any right accruing or accrued or any suit or proceeding had or commenced in any civil or criminal cause prior to the date of this Order but all such liabilities shall continue anymay be enforced as if said amendments had not been made.
    John F. Kennedy, THE WHITE HOUSE, June 4, 1963.
    To understand exactly what Kennedy's order was trying to do, we must understand the purpose of the legislation which gave the order its underlying authority. The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1933 (ch. 25, 48 Stat 51) to which Kennedy refers permits the President to issue silver certificates in various denominations (mostly $1, $2, $5, and $10) and in any total volume so long as the Treasury has enough silver on hand to redeem the certificates for a specific quantity and fineness of silver and that the total volume of such currency does not exceed $3 billion. The Silver Purchase Act of 1934 (ch. 674,48 Stat 1178) also grants this power to the Treasury Secretary subject to similar limitations. Nowhere in the text of the order is a quantity of money mentioned, so it is unclear how Marrs arrived at his $4.2 billion figure. Moreover, the President could not have authorized such a large issue because it would have exceeded the statutory limit.2
    As economic activity grew in the fifties and sixties, the public demand for low denomination currency grew, increasing the Treasury's need for silver to back additional certificate issues and to mint new coins (dimes, quarters, half-dollars). However, during the late fifties the price of silver began to rise and reached the point that the market value of the silver contained in the coins and backing the certificates was greater than the face value of the money itself.2

    To conserve the Treasury's silver needs, the Silver Purchase Act and related measures were repealed by Congress in 1963 with Public Law 88-36. Following the repeal, only the President could authorize new silver certificate issues, and no longer the Treasury Secretary. The law, signed by Kennedy himself, also permits the Federal Reserve to issue small denomination bills to replace the outgoing silver certificates (prior to the act, the Fed could only issue Federal Reserve Notes in larger denominations). The Treasury's shrinking silver stock could then be used to mint coins only and not have to back currency. The repeal left only the President with the authority to issue silver certificates, however it did permit him to delegate this authority. E.O. 11,110 does this by transferring the authority from the President to the Treasury Secretary.2

    E.O. 11,110 did not create authority to issue new silver certificates, it only affected who could give the order. The purpose of the order was to facilitate the reduction of certificates in circulation, not to increase them. In October 1964 the Treasury ceased issuing them entirely. The Coinage Act of 1965 (PL 89-81) ended the practice of using silver in most U.S. coins, and in 1968 Congress ended the redeemability of silver certificates (PL 90-29). E.O. 11,110 was never reversed by President Johnson and remained on the books until 1987 when there was a general cleaning-up of executive orders (E.O. 12,608, 9/9/87). However, by this time the remaining legislative authority behind E.O. 11,110 had been repealed by Congress with PL 97-258 in 1982.2

    In summary, E.O. 11,110 did not create new authority to issue additional silver certificates. In fact, its intention was to ease the process for their removal so that small denomination Federal Reserve Notes could replace them in accordance with a law Kennedy himself signed. If Kennedy had really sought to reduce Federal Reserve power, then why did he sign a bill that gave the Fed still more power?

    Marrs also makes some other factual errors in his conspiracy tale that suggest he is not very familiar with the Federal Reserve or the financial system. He writes that a source of tension between the Federal Reserve and the Kennedy Administration was the Treasury's desire to allow banks to underwrite state and local government bonds, thereby weakening the "dominant" Federal Reserve banks. However, such a move, which was later permitted by Congress, would not have affected the Federal Reserve system because it had never been involved in underwriting bond issues. Marrs also claims that Kennedy signed a bill that changed the backing of small denomination currency from silver to gold to "add strength to the weakened U.S. currency." This is completely false. U.S. currency has not been on the gold standard since 1934, and silver certificates, as their name suggests, had never been redeemable in anything but silver. In addition, U.S. currency was not "weak" during Kennedy's time: There had not been any significant inflation since the late forties, and the exchange rate value of the dollar was fixed according to the Bretton Woods agreement.

    In the introduction to his book, Marrs advises the reader not to trust his book. This appears to be good advice.

    References:
    1. Marrs, Jim (1989), Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy, New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers.

    2. Woodward, G. Thomas (1996), "Money and the Federal Reserve System: Myth and Reality," Congressional Research Service.


    http://www.publiceye.org/conspire/flaherty/flaherty9.html
     
    #32     Jun 3, 2011
  3. Executive Order 11110


    AMENDMENT OF EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 10289 AS AMENDED, RELATING TO THE PERFORMANCE OF CERTAIN FUNCTIONS AFFECTING THE DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY

    By virtue of the authority vested in me by section 301 of title 3 of the United States Code, it is ordered as follows:

    SECTION 1. Executive Order No. 10289 of September 19, 1951, as amended, is hereby further amended -

    (a) By adding at the end of paragraph 1 thereof the following
    subparagraph (j):
    "(j) The authority vested in the President by paragraph (b) of section
    43 of the Act of May 12, 1933, as amended (31 U.S.C. 821 (b)), to issue silver certificates against any silver bullion, silver, or standard silver dollars in the Treasury not then held for redemption of any outstanding silver certificates, to prescribe the denominations of such silver certificates, and to coin standard silver dollars and subsidiary silver currency for their redemption," and (b) By revoking subparagraphs (b) and (c) of paragraph 2 thereof.
    SECTION 2. The amendment made by this Order shall not affect any act done, or any right accruing or accrued or any suit or proceeding had or commenced in any civil or criminal cause prior to the date of this Order but all such liabilities shall continue and may be enforced as if said amendments had not been made.

    JOHN F. KENNEDY
    THE WHITE HOUSE,
    June 4, 1963



    Executive Order 11110 is still valid. According to Title 3, United States Code, Section 301 dated January 26, 1998:

    Executive Order (EO) 10289 dated Sept. 17, 1951, 16 F.R. 9499, was as amended by:
    EO 10583, dated December 18, 1954, 19 F.R. 8725;
    EO 10882 dated July 18, 1960, 25 F.R. 6869;
    EO 11110 dated June 4, 1963, 28 F.R. 5605;
    EO 11825 dated December 31, 1974, 40 F.R. 1003;
    EO 12608 dated September 9, 1987, 52 F.R. 34617
    The 1974 and 1987 amendments, added after Kennedy's 1963 amendment, did not change or alter any part of Kennedy's EO 11110. A search of Clinton's 1998 and 1999 EO's and Presidential Directives has also shown no reference to any alterations, suspensions, or changes to EO 11110.
     
    #33     Jun 3, 2011
  4. ammo

    ammo

    people that believed in conspiracies were once considered fools,its now obvious that those who don't are the fools,i agree with your global reset conclusion
     
    #34     Jun 3, 2011
  5. The Federal Reserve Bank, a.k.a Federal Reserve System, is a Private Corporation. Black's Law Dictionary defines the "Federal Reserve System" as:
    "Network of twelve central banks to which most national banks belong and to which state chartered banks may belong. Membership rules require investment of stock and minimum reserves."

    Privately-owned banks own the stock of the FED. This was explained in more detail in the case of Lewis v. United States, Federal Reporter, 2nd Series, Vol. 680, Pages 1239, 1241 (1982), where the court said: "Each Federal Reserve Bank is a separate corporation owned by commercial banks in its region. The stock-holding commercial banks elect two thirds of each Bank's nine member board of directors".

    The Federal Reserve Banks are locally controlled by their member banks. Once again, according to Black's Law Dictionary, we find that these privately owned banks actually issue money:
    "Federal Reserve Act. Law which created Federal Reserve banks which act as agents in maintaining money reserves, issuing money in the form of bank notes, lending money to banks, and supervising banks. Administered by Federal Reserve Board (q.v.)". The privately owned Federal Reserve (FED) banks actually issue (create) the "money" we use.

    In 1964, the House Committee on Banking and Currency, Subcommittee on Domestic Finance, at the second session of the 88th Congress, put out a study entitled Money Facts which contains a good description of what the FED is:
    "The Federal Reserve is a total money-making machine. It can issue money or checks. And it never has a problem of making its checks good because it can obtain the $5 and $10 bills necessary to cover its check simply by asking the Treasury Department's Bureau of Engraving to print them".
     
    #35     Jun 3, 2011
  6. Old money is old for a reason. Somehow they'll buy their way through those write-offs. Sadly.
     
    #36     Jun 3, 2011
  7. #37     Jun 3, 2011
  8. Why so down on the Fed?

    Aren't you proud of all the African-Americans who've been Fed Chairmen? :D :D :D
     
    #38     Jun 3, 2011
  9. I can provide research to debunk/counter any research you provide - that's the glory of the Internet. Doesn't make either of us any more correct.
     
    #39     Jun 3, 2011
  10. I love reading these threads... Sorta like watching Jerry Springer.
     
    #40     Jun 3, 2011