On July 28 U.S. District Judge Legrome
Davis ruled that the Federal government improperly confiscated ten 1933
$20 Saint-Gaudens double eagle gold coins from the family of Joan
Langbord. The Langbord family negotiated with the U.S. Mint in 2004 to
have the coins authenticated. Several months after turning the coins
over to the Mint, the Langbords were notified that the coins were
authentic and would not be returned on the grounds that they were
government property.
1933 double eagles have a storied past that has been the subject of at
least
two books.
Briefly, most of the 445,500 minted were destroyed after President
Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an executive order in 1933 banning most
private ownership of gold. When the Secret Service became aware in the
1940s that some of these coins were in the possession of collectors and
dealers, it undertook to confiscate and destroy any it could locate.
The government's position is that the coins were never "monetized" and
therefore belong to the government. Joan Langbord's late father,
Philadelphia jeweler Israel Switt, is known to have sold some of the
previously confiscated coins. The Langbords claim to have found the
coins in a safe deposit box containing some of his belongings.
The most publicized case arose in 1996, when British coin dealer
Stephen Fenton was arrested in New York in a sting operation. During a
legal battle lasting several years, Fenton's attorneys presented
evidence that an export license for the seized coin had been issued by
the U.S. government to King Farouk of Egypt and therefore it was owned
legally. The case was ultimately settled and a record price for any
coin was established when it was sold at auction in 2002 for $7.59
million (including a 15% buyer's fee) plus $20 to monetize the coin.
The proceeds were split between Fenton and the U.S. government.
In Langbord v. U.S. Department of Treasury, 06-cv-5315, U.S. District
Court, Eastern District of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia), evidence was
presented that there was a period of three weeks, between the time the
coins were first struck and President Roosevelt's executive order was
finalized, when the coins could have been legally exchanged for other
gold coins with a cashier at the Philadelphia Mint. Judge Davis' ruling
stated the seizure of the coins denied the family the "clearly
delineated paths to justice" established by the U.S. Constitution and
set a deadline of September 28 for the government to either return the
coins to the Langbord family or file a forfeiture procedure.
Receive our free newsletter by e-mail!
Messages sent about once a month feature announcements of new
purchases, special offers and
updates at our web site. Each issue also includes at least one article
containing news and/or commentary pertaining to the world of
numismatics.
To receive future issues of the Telesphere
Numismatics newsletter by e-mail, enter your name and e-mail address in
the form below and click
the "Subscribe Now" button.
Our newsletter is strictly opt-in only. No
one will be added without
requesting it. To protect your privacy, subscriber info will not be
available
to anyone else. Requests to unsubscribe are promptly honored.
on one cent coins are being released during 2009 to
commemorate the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln's birth. The familiar
portrait of Lincoln is retained on the obverse of each. In 1909 Lincoln
became the first former President depicted on a regularly circulating
U.S. coin. The Lincoln cent became and to this day remains one of the
most popular U.S. coins to collect.
CURRENT
SPECIAL
