Charles Rist explores the history of gold as a monetary standard in the United States as well as conventional misconceptions during and after its implementation in US monetary policy. This book contains many of his speeches, articles, and some personal reflections of this world-renowned monetary economist. Rist does a magnificent job of highlighting and debunking various fallacies regarding opposition to gold as a monetary standard. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in gold’s history as money in the United States.

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Contents

Introduction by Philip Cortney

From John Law to Allan Sproul

Blunder of Money Managers

No Shortage of Gold

Distrust of Money Managers

Meaning of Standard of Value

The Price of Gold

Objections to Raising the Price of Gold

Free Markets For Gold Essential

Gold the Only Discipline

Gold Money Versus Paper Money

Obstacles to Gold Standard

International Monetary System

Precarious Monetary System

Fundamental Truths

A Sound International Monetary System

The Dollar Exchange Standard

Prerequisites and Problems

A Strange Phenomenon

Betrayal By Intellectuals

A Strange Idea

The Essence of the Gold Standard

Deflation After Civil War

Return to Gold!

Preface

1. Freedom for the Gold Market

2. The Two Monetary Markets

3. The New Franc

4. The Blocking of 5000 Francs Notes

5. Gold and Paper

6. How to Bring Gold Back to Europe

7. Change in Orientation

8. Gold, International Currency

9. The Distribution of Gold in the World

10. Gold and a Return to the Ideas of John Law

11. The Price of Gold in the United States

12. Old Ideas on Money Which Have Become New

13. About Gold for Europe

14. Prices Quoted in Gold

15. The Paradoxes of the European “Payments Union”

16. Progress in Monetary Conceptions

17. The Failure of the International Monetary Fund

18. The Gold-Guaranteed Loan and Saving

19. An American Opinion on the Gold Clause of the Pinay Loan

20. Has the Free Price of Gold Rejoined Its Official Price?

21. How to Evaluate the New Price of Gold

22. Drop in World Prices

A Universal Phenomenon

The Remedy: Increase in the Price of Gold

23. Forecasts on the Convertibility of Currencies

Appendix

Index