GOP Platform Includes Proposal to Study Return to Gold Standard

(August 1, 2016 - by Kate Davidson)

The Republican Party’s 2016 platform calls for a commission to explore the feasibility of effectively returning the U.S. to a gold standard.

The idea has been popular with parts of the GOP for years, but hasn’t gone very far.

The new platform, approved at the party’s convention Monday, echoes similar language in the 2012 GOP platform by calling for a commission to “investigate possible ways to set a fixed value for the dollar."

Though it doesn’t mention the gold standard by name, the platform says the commission would be similar to one established under President Ronald Reagan that considered the feasibility of a “metallic basis” for U.S. currency. In that case, the metal was gold, and the commission recommended against a move that would tie the value of the dollar to a fixed amount of it.

“Now, three decades later, as we face the task of cleaning up the wreckage of the current administration’s policies, we propose a similar commission to investigate possible ways to set a fixed value for the dollar,” the platform says.

The party platform isn’t binding on the president or other elected GOP officials, but reflects the thinking of many party activists.

Several Republican presidential primary candidates expressed support or interest in the idea during the campaign. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas reiterated his support for returning to the gold standard in a debate last November. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky said the idea should be studied. Neurosurgeon Ben Carson alluded to the idea, saying, “We’ll have to tie our currency to something,” while former Arkansas Gov.  Mike Huckabee advised, “Tie the dollar to something fixed and if it’s not going to be gold, make it the commodity basket.”

To supporters, part of the appeal of a gold standard is that it makes sustained inflation impossible. However, the U.S. experienced multiple financial crises and recessions while on the gold standard, and many historians say it played a central role in causing the Great Depression. The U.S. went off the gold standard in the 1930s.