Executive Order 6713A did not seize anyone’s silver. Signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on May 22, 1934, it approved a Code of Labor Provisions for the Alcoholic Beverage Wholesale Industry under the National Industrial Recovery Act, and it has no connection to precious metals or monetary policy. The silver nationalization order almost everyone is actually searching for is Executive Order 6814, issued about three months later on August 9, 1934, which required most holders of silver bullion in the continental United States to surrender their metal to the U.S. Mint at roughly 50 cents per fine troy ounce.
The mix-up is understandable. Roosevelt issued hundreds of executive orders during the New Deal, often in rapid succession, and the two numbers sit close enough together that they get swapped in secondhand accounts. But the legal authorities, the subject matter, and the consequences are entirely different. If you came here looking for the silver order, you want 6814.
What Executive Order 6713A Actually Did
6713A approved a labor code for alcoholic beverage wholesalers under the National Industrial Recovery Act. That is the beginning and the end of it. There is no silver provision, no delivery requirement, no penalty for hoarding metal, and no connection to Treasury policy. Any source that describes 6713A as a silver seizure order has the number wrong.
Executive Order 6814 and the Silver Purchase Act
The real silver order rested on the Silver Purchase Act of 1934, which Congress passed on June 19, 1934. Roosevelt had asked lawmakers to declare a national policy of building silver into the country’s monetary reserves until silver made up one-fourth and gold three-fourths of the total by monetary value. The Act gave the Treasury Secretary broad authority to buy silver on the open market and, if needed, to force its surrender.
Two motives sat behind the policy. The administration wanted to expand the money supply and push commodity prices upward against the deflation of the Great Depression. It also wanted to prop up the domestic silver-mining industry, which had loud allies among western-state senators. Silver became a deliberate instrument of monetary policy rather than a commodity the Treasury simply watched from a distance.
Executive Order 6814 followed on August 9, 1934. It commanded every person, partnership, and corporation holding silver in the continental United States to deliver that silver to the nearest U.S. Mint.
Who Had to Deliver Silver, and What Was Exempt
The delivery requirement reached silver with a fineness above .8, which effectively meant refined bullion and bars. The order then carved out several categories that did not have to be surrendered:
- All foreign and domestic silver coins. No one had to hand over pocket change or a coin collection.
- Silver held for industrial, professional, or artistic use, up to 500 fine troy ounces per person. Beyond that cap, a special license from the Treasury Secretary was required.
- Silver contained in fabricated articles held for their intended use rather than for bullion value.
- Silver of .8 fineness or below that had not been used in commerce or industry.
- Silver owned by recognized foreign governments, foreign central banks, or the Bank for International Settlements.
- Additional holdings covered by a license the Treasury Secretary could issue to individuals or businesses regularly engaged in silver-related industries.
Ordinary foreign citizens and foreign corporations holding silver inside the United States got no special treatment. Unless their metal fell within one of the listed exemptions, they had to deliver it like anyone else.
What the Government Paid and How Delivery Worked
The compensation formula started at $1.2929+ per fine troy ounce, the official monetary value of silver, and then subtracted a 61 8/25 percent charge for seigniorage, minting costs, and related expenses. The net came to roughly 50 cents per fine troy ounce. Holders could take payment in standard silver dollars, silver certificates, or other U.S. currency.
That 50-cent figure sat slightly above the prevailing open market price of about 43 cents per ounce at the time. The order itself declared the price “not less than the fair value” of the seized silver, measured against recent market prices. Anyone who had bought silver years earlier at higher prices still took a loss, but the government was not paying below the going market rate on the day the order took effect.
Silver holders had 90 days from the effective date to deliver their metal. Anyone who acquired silver subject to delivery after the 75th day had 15 days to turn it in. Silver that temporarily fell within an exemption and later lost that status had to be delivered within 15 days of the change, or at the 90-day mark, whichever came later.
The Treasury covered transportation, insurance, and incidental costs. Holders seeking reimbursement submitted accounts on voucher forms available by writing to the Treasurer of the United States in Washington, D.C. Once the metal reached the Mint, staff weighed and assayed it before issuing payment, and the silver was added to the nation’s monetary stocks to back new silver certificates.
Penalties for Holding Back Silver
The Silver Purchase Act stacked three separate consequences on anyone who ignored the order:
- Forfeiture of the withheld silver to the United States, through the same legal process used for contraband imports.
- A monetary penalty equal to twice the monetary value of the silver not delivered.
- Criminal prosecution for willful violations, carrying fines up to $10,000, imprisonment up to ten years, or both. Corporate officers who knowingly participated faced the same penalties.
Someone who held back $1,000 worth of silver risked losing the metal, paying $2,000 on top, and facing a criminal case as well. The structure was built to make hoarding economically irrational.
How This Compared to the Gold Confiscation
Executive Order 6814 followed the more famous gold confiscation, Executive Order 6102, by about 16 months. That earlier order, signed April 5, 1933, had required the surrender of most privately held gold coin, bullion, and certificates. Both orders shared the same architecture: mandatory delivery to the Mint, fixed-price compensation, carved-out exemptions, and criminal penalties for non-compliance.
The differences mattered. Gold holders were paid $20.67 per ounce, and the government then revalued gold to $35 per ounce through the Gold Reserve Act of 1934, capturing roughly a 69 percent profit on every ounce seized. The silver seizure produced no comparable revaluation windfall. Silver holders also got a somewhat more generous exemption structure: all silver coins were excluded, and industrial and artistic use enjoyed a 500-ounce allowance. The gold order had exempted only $100 in gold coin per person.
When Federal Silver Nationalization Ended
The Silver Purchase Act framework governed silver for nearly three decades. On June 4, 1963, President Kennedy signed Public Law 88-36, which repealed the Silver Purchase Act of 1934 and began dismantling the silver subsidy structure. The Treasury kept redeeming silver certificates for physical silver bullion for another five years, then set a hard cutoff of June 24, 1968. After that date, silver certificates remained legal tender but could no longer be exchanged for metal.
Can the Government Seize Silver Today?
No federal law now restricts how much silver an American can own. You can buy and hold silver bars, coins, or rounds in any quantity without running into an ownership cap.
Selling silver does trigger tax reporting. Dealers must file Form 1099-B with the IRS for certain sales, including transactions involving quantities large enough to satisfy a CFTC-approved regulated futures contract. Sales below those minimum quantities are generally not reportable by the dealer. The IRS also requires that sales of precious metals from a single customer within a 24-hour period be aggregated and treated as a single transaction when determining reporting thresholds. Cash purchases above $10,000 bring separate anti-money-laundering reporting requirements.
Broad emergency powers still exist on paper. The International Emergency Economic Powers Act lets the President regulate or prohibit transactions involving property subject to U.S. jurisdiction during a declared national emergency tied to an unusual and extraordinary threat with a substantial foreign source. During armed hostilities, the President can confiscate property of foreign persons or organizations involved in attacks against the United States. These authorities are sweeping, but they have never been used to nationalize domestically held precious metals, and any such attempt today would face far more aggressive legal challenges than Roosevelt faced in the 1930s.