While silver is low, we should get a law passed.

When silver hit 49.50 a few months back, it bewilders me how much silver and gold coin got melted.

I think we should enact a law that would make it illegal to melt gold and silver coins.

When silver and gold coins get melted, it destroys numismatic history.

Certain exclusions will be made for fire damaged coins, or mutilated coins.



The sad fact is, while millions of silver coins exist, each "silver boom" sends many thousands into the melting pot.

It will make older silver coins more expensive, as many get melted, scarcity increases.


I really think all of us numismatists should hound congress to make melting of silver and gold coins illegal.

 

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What's the source of your information?

 

If you own a coin, you should be able to do whatever you like with it. Clean it, melt it down or use it for target practice, whatever you want as long as you own it. "Numismatic history" is just an excuse for busybodies to poke their noses into other people's business.

 

It's a well-known fact that tons of silver coins were melted down during the '80s silver boom.

 

I know that.

I asked for the source of the OP's information, thank you.

 

What do you mean?

When silver goes up, or "booms" people will send it off to a refinery.

I'm not really talking about coin collectors, but people who have "gramps old collection" sitting in a coffee can.

When a coin gets melted, that is one less piece of history.

 

And again with the more recent one.

 

Cest la vie!

 

How 'bout getting a law passed that makes it illegal for silver to go above 10 dollars/oz, and gold above 100 dollars/oz. Then no one will really have to worry about melting numismatic treasures, as the price of the metal recovered (melt) just really isn't worth the cost of doing it.

That takes care of everything, eh?

 

P.S. I recently bought 32 silver dimes from 1896 to 1964 at 2.32 each at a show. Maybe a bit much to spend, but if silver goes up above 45/oz, I'm gonna be sorely tempted to melt most, if not all, of them suckers, along with the others I have that are not key coins.

KaPOW on history!! Then those coins will Be History!

 

I wonder how many of those Washington/Adams First Spouse gold coins got melted? $315-$335 issue price...I wonder how many of the 20,000/20,000 still exist?

 

Do you think a law will actually stop people from melting coins? I don't think so, and also do you think police would waste time cracking down on people who are melting coins, make a new code for it? "Hello, dispatch we a five one niner down here melting coins bring in swat, he's armed with a torch and Kennedy's"

 

That is ludicrous. You are free to do whatever you want with your coins, and Congress is free to make whatever laws they choose. You have a problem with our free enterprise system? Always worked this way, and speculation in anything investible (precious metals, stocks, bonds, commodities) has always been at the buyer/seller's risk. That is what makes this country great. You wanna change what works?

 

Let's just not pass any law at all. I'm sick and tired of the government interfering in my business. These are decisions I'm capable of making myself so they can go home and just leave me alone.

Bruce

 

But detecto if you buy all the silver coins now they will be worth more when we decide to melt the others! You could make money off of this.

 

Well I think I need to refine what I meant.

On a small scale, such as making a couple bars or two, I wouldn't mind anyone melting silver or gold coin.

What I should have meant is make it illegal for large scale refiners like ARA and Midwest to melt gold and silver coin.

I know there are a lot of people who advise that you should not clean a coin, and so do I, but when you melt a coin, it's gone. A cleaned coin is still an piece of history.

 

So you want different rules for different people based on the size of their company? Slipery slope when you allow one group to do something but not others...

 

Sorry. What I mean is coins being melted down on a commercial scale.

 

Right. People with money that can buy lots of silver and gold to melt should not be able to, but people who only have a few coins or a couple bullion bars that are melt value should be able to melt them. Perhaps the law shouldn't be that people can't melt large quantities of gold or silver, but that people shouldn't be able to accumulate enough (by buying it fair and square from someone) that they would be able to melt a lot of it.

A cleaned coin is a ruined piece of history. And history isn't made by keeping every item every made so that history can be preserved.

 

A friend of mine is a "rescuer" of coins headed for the refinery. He was hired to go through the coins brought in and can buy at a reasonable price any coin worth substantially more than melt. He's come across several coins that are valued at several thousands of dollars. The rest get melted.