Ethan Hawke's The Weight Depicts Real-Life Consequences of FDR's Gold Confiscation
Ethan Hawke's new film, The Weight, opens in US theaters on September 18. It tells the story of Samuel Murphy, a Depression-era mechanic who agrees to lead a group of prisoners and guards across 100 miles of Oregon wilderness with four sacks of gold bars.
The film is set in 1933, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 6102, forbidding citizens from hoarding gold coin, gold bullion, or gold certificates within the continental United States. The penalty for non-compliance was a fine of up to $10,000 or ten years in prison.
The executive order was not just economic moralizing; it was a way to force gold back into the Federal Reserve and free the government to expand the money supply without constraint. Gold private ownership remained illegal until President Gerald Ford signed legislation that went into effect on December 31, 1974.
Murphy's crew is trying to smuggle more than just valuable assets; they are challenging the state's monopoly on physical monetary value. Every bar in Murphy's four sacks represents a direct challenge to the government's authority.