June 16 – 22

JUNE 16

1929 – DEATH OF VERNON PARRINGTON, HISTORIAN

“The only safe and rational currency is a national currency based on the national credit sponsored by the state, flexible and controlled in the interests of the people as a whole.”

2021 – “LOCALIZING MONETARY REFORM” posted article by Greg Coleridge and Steve Norris

“Organizing for any solution to a national problem presents multiple challenges, among them is to make the proposed solution relevant locally to people’s lives.

“Bigger problems require proportionally bigger solutions, but those solutions can be difficult for individuals to relate to unless there are tangible ways presented to both understand the problem and solution and to take actions to bring change.

“Educating on our destructive monetary system and proposing ways to democratize it to benefit people, places and the planet certainly falls into this category of a big problem needing a big solution. But how to localize it?

“There are multiple strategies available to monetary reformers…”

Localizing Monetary Reform

JUNE 17

2009 – PRESIDENT OBAMA RELEASES PLAN FOR FINANCIAL REFORM

“President Obama’s plan to reshape financial regulation seeks to give Washington the tools to police the shadow system of finance that has grown up outside the government’s purview, and to make it easier for regulators to head off problems at large, troubled institutions. However, the president’s plan results from many compromises with industry executives and lawmakers, and is not as bold as some had hoped.” Among the less than ” compromises with industry” were permitting financial institutions to promote various types of derivatives, cutting the number of bank regulators, and granting new powers to the private Federal Reserve.

JUNE 18

1926 – BIRTH OF CHARLES WALTERS, FOUNDER OF ACRES MAGAZINE, A VOICE FOR ECO-AGRICULTURE

“[O]ur forefathers took steps to protect the economic freedom of the United States by giving to Congress, elected by the people, the power to provide a monetary system independent of the monetary systems of other countries, and to regulate the value of the dollar, adopted as our monetary unit, or measure of value. This power automatically gave Congress the right to determine the value of the United States production in terms of United States money.”

2008 – CHRIS DODD PROPOSED HOUSING BAILOUT

As the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee Connecticut’s Christopher Dodd proposes a housing bailout to the Senate floor that would assist troubled subprime mortgage lenders such as Countrywide Bank, Dodd admitted that he received special treatment, perks, and campaign donations from Countrywide, who regarded Dodd as a “special” customer and a “Friend of Angelo.” Dodd received a $75,000 reduction in mortgage payments from Countrywide. The Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee Kent Conrad and the head of Fannie Mae Jim Johnson also received mortgages on favorable terms due to their association with Countrywide CEO Angelo R. Mozilo.

2022 – “HOW TO RELATE MONETARY REFORM TO CBDC with Edgar Wortman” video

“Dutch monetary reformer, Edgar Wortmann, got his kick-start at American Monetary Institute’s Chicago 2013 conference. Steven Zarlenga, Michael Kumhof and Steve Keen provided him with essential information to co-create the monetary reform movement in The Netherlands. This movement, Ons Geld (Our Money),  was inspired by digitization of money. It considers digitization essential to providing sound money, outside the credit system. But digital money, such as Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) or a digital euro, can do harm too.”

JUNE 19

1902 – DEATH OF LORD ACTON, ENGLISH HISTORIAN, POLITICIAN, AND WRITER

“The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.”

1946 – DEATH OF HENRY SIMONS, PROFESSOR OF ECONOMICS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

“The mistake lies in fearing money and trusting debt.”

JUNE 20

1756 – BIRTH OF WILLIAM RICHARDSON DAVIE, NORTH CAROLINA DELEGATE TO THE 1787-8 CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION AND GOVERNOR OF N. CAROLINA

“So low and hopeless are the finances of the United States, that, the year before last Congress was obliged to borrow money even, to pay the interest of the principal which we had borrowed before. This wretched resource of turning interest into principal, is the most humiliating and disgraceful measure that a nation could take, and approximates with rapidity to absolute ruin:

Yet it is the inevitable and certain consequence of such a system as the existing Confederation.”

JUNE 21

1940 — DEATH OF SMEDLEY BUTLER, MARINE CORP MAJOR GENERAL (MOST DECORATED MARINE IN US HISTORY AT THE TIME OF HIS DEATH)

“I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country’s most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism…I wouldn’t go to war again, as I have done, to protect some lousy investment of the bankers. There are only two things that we should fight for. One is the defense of ouR homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket…. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912…”

2012 – DEATH OF ANNA SCHWARTZ, CO-AUTHOR OF “A MONETARY HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES”

“A Monetary History of the United States” contributed to a new consensus on monetary issues, including the sources of the Great Depression. The 888-page book asserts that the 1929 stock market crash and subsequent Great Depression was caused by mistakes by the Federal Reserve. . Former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke called the work, ‘the leading and most persuasive explanation of the worst economic disaster in American history.’ ‘You’re right; we [the Fed] did it. We’re very sorry. But thanks to you, we won’t do it again.’

A month after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, Schwartz said in the Wall Street Journal interview the insolvent financial firms should not be bailed out, but rather shut down.

JUNE 22

1911 – SPEECH OF PRESIDENT WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT BEFORE NEW YORK STATE BANKERS’ ASSOCIATION

“There is no legislation, I care not what it is, tariff, railroad, corporation, or of a general political character, that at all equals in importance the putting of our banking and currency system on a sound basis.”

Of course, Taft’s definition of a “sound” banking and currency system was the plan being pushed by major bankers – the creation of a private central bank (which basically defines the Federal Reserve) and the ability of banking corporations to create our nation’s money – as debt.

1949 – BIRTH OF ELIZABETH WARREN, US SENATOR, MASSACHUSETTS

“What we need is a system that puts an end to the boom and bust cycle. A system that recognizes we don’t grow this country from the financial sector; we grow this country from the middle class.”                        “Powerful interests will fight to hang on to every benefit and subside they now enjoy. Even after exploiting consumers, larding their books with excessive risk, and making bad bets that brought down the economy and forced taxpayer bailouts, the big Wall Street banks are not chastened. They have fought to delay and hamstring the implementation of financial reform, and they will continue to fight every inch of the way.”

2009 –  “NATIONALIZE THE FED – END BANKS POWER TO CREATE MONEY” VIDEO PRESENTATION BY STEPHEN ZARLENGA

“Stephen Zarlenga works with Rep. Kucinich on The American Monetary Act, designed to resolve the banking crisis. This clip from a longer film defines 3 steps: In addition to nationalizing the Fed. and removing the power of banks to create money as debt out of thin air, the Act reminds us of the Constitution, Article I, Sec. 8, that states that our government has the sovereign power to issue money and spend it into circulation. Whatever you think about point 3 –  the government could not possibly do any worse than the banks.”

May 12 – 18

MAY 12

1863 – “LOST PROPERTY” VIRGINIA NEWSPAPER ADS OF REWARD FOR RETURN OF RUNAWAY SLAVES

“In the back of the Staunton Spectator, May 12, 1863, there appeared a section for Advertisements and Lost Property. Directly under and advertisement of ten pigs for sale, there is the section of lost property, for which rewards are offered. There are six articles that report lost animals or slaves. 50 is offered for a stolen black horse, as well as 50 for a dark bay mare. Intermixed with these ads for horses, are rewards for runaway slaves, ranging from 50 to 300 per slave. Descriptions of color, markings, age, and last known location are given for slave and animal alike. The only difference in description between the two categories of lost property is that the horses are reported stolen, while the slaves are reported as runaway; logically showing that the horses could not have let themselves out of their gates.

“This underscores the status of people, slaves at the time, were property.”

https://historyengine.richmond.edu/episodes/view/2534

1933 – THOMAS AMENDMENT BECOMES LAW – GIVES FDR POWER TO CREATE MONEY

Attached as Title III to the Agricultural Adjustment Act of May 12, 1933, the Thomas Amendment, drafted by Oklahoma Senator Elmer Thomas, provided New Deal relief to farmers suffering from low prices due to the Great Depression. The solution was to expand the currency.

“The amendment granted the president broad discretionary powers over monetary policy. It stated that whenever the president desired currency expansion, he first must authorize the open market committee of the Federal Reserve to purchase up to $3 billion of federal obligations. Should open market operations prove insufficient, the president had several options. He could have the U.S. Treasury issue up to $3 billion in greenbacks, reduce the gold content of the dollar by as much as 50 percent, or accept $100 million dollars in silver at a price not to exceed fifty cents per ounce in payment of World War I debts owed by European nations.”

http://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry.php?entry=TH007

1948 – THE FORMATION OF THE STATE OF ISRAEL IS PROCLAIMED

Solomon, the son of David, was an early King of Israel from 970-931 BC. He was also the author of the Book of Proverbs in the Bible. From Proverbs 22:74: “The borrower is servant to the lender.” What was true nearly 3000 years ago is still true today for individuals and organizations — including governments.

2009 – BLOOMBERG ARTICLE: “NY FEDERAL RESERVE BANK CLAIMS IT IS A PRIVATE INSTITUTION”

“The New York Fed is one of 12 regional Federal Reserve banks and the one charged with monitoring capital markets. It is also managing $1.7 trillion of emergency lending programs. While the Fed’s Washington-based Board of Governors is a federal agency subject to the Freedom of Information Act and other government rules, the New York Fed and other regional banks maintain they are separate institutions, owned by their member banks, and not subject to federal restrictions.”

MAY 13

2001 – HENRY GEORGE’S CONCEPT OF MONEY, ARTICLE BY STEPEN ZARLENGA

“On the other hand it is the business of government to issue money. This is perceived as soon as the great labor saving invention of money supplants barter. To leave it to every one who chose to do so to issue money would be to entail general inconvenience and loss, to offer many temptations to roguery, and to put the poorer classes of society at a great disadvantage. These obvious considerations have everywhere, as society became well organized, led to the recognition of the coinage of money as an exclusive function of government. When in the progress of society, a further labor-saving improvement becomes possible by the substitution of paper for the precious metals as the material for money, the reasons why the issuance of this money should be made a government function become still stronger.”

Henry George’s Concept of Money

2013 – “WHAT IS MONEY” VIDEO – (3 MINUTES)

“We all use money, we all rely on money. But do we know how money works? Where does money come from? How is money created?”

[NOTE: The reality described in the UK system is exactly the same reality in the U.S.)

2015 – THE CENTRAL PROBLEM WITH CENTAL BANKS: THEY BECOME THE GREATER FOOLS/BAG-HOLDERS” ARTICLE BY CHARLES HUGH SMITH

The central problem with central banks is their mandate now includes propping up all asset markets globally….Central banks have inflated the markets to such high valuations that no central bank can possibly buy enough to keep the bubble intact…But having succeeded in blowing another unprecedented global bubble in assets, central banks have backed themselves into a corner of direct asset purchases to prop up markets.   http://www.oftwominds.com/blogmay15/no-bid5-15.html

MAY 14

2013 – ARTICLE, “MONEY HAS BEEN PRIVATIZED BY STEALTH” BY BEN DYSON

“It’s common knowledge that printing your own £10 notes at home is frowned upon by Her Majesty’s police. Yet there’s a small collection of companies that are authorized to create – and spend – more new money than the counterfeiters have ever been able to print. In industry jargon, these companies are called “monetary and financial institutions”, but you probably know them by their street name: “banks”.

The money that they create, effectively out of nothing, isn’t the paper money that bears the logo of the government-owned Bank of England. It’s the electronic money that flashes up on the screen when you check your balance at an ATM. This electronic money currently represents over 97% of all the money in the economy. Only 3% of money is still in that old-fashioned form of real cash that can be touched.”

MAY 15

1915 – BIRTH OF PAUL SAMUELSON, ECONOMIST (FIRST AMERICAN TO WIN THE NOBEL PRIZE FOR ECONOMICS)

“Few understand that all our money arises out of debt and IOU operations. The banking system as a whole can do what each small bank cannot do: it can expand its loans and investments many times the new reserves of cash created for it, even though each small bank is lending out only a fraction of its deposits.” Economics, An Introductory Analysis by Professor Paul A. Samuelson. (Best selling college economics textbook of all time, c 1948.)

1931 – “QUADRAGESSIMO ANNO” LETTER ISSUED BY POPE PIUS XI

The Pope discusses the ethical implications of economic and social order in this letter, warning of the dangers of unrestrained capitalism.

“Economic dictatorship is being most forcibly exercised by the few who hold the money and completely control it, control credit and the lending of money.  Hence they regulate the flow of the life-blood whereby the entire economic system lives, and have so firmly in their grasp the soul of economics that no one can breathe against their will.”

MAY 16

1876 – SECOND GREENBACK NATIONAL CONVENTION OPENS IN INDIANAPOLIS

May 16–18, 1876 — Academy of Music, Indianapolis, Indiana. There were 239 delegates present from 17 states. Peter Cooper was nominated for President of the Greenback Party (calling for the creation of debt-free national money) with 352 votes to 119 for three other contenders.

1912 – PUJO COMMITTEE HEARINGS BEGIN

A special subcommittee of the House Banking and Currency Committee began hearings under its Chairman, Arsene P. Pujo. Its purpose was to investigate the powers of the nation’s “money trust.” Its final report, issued in 1913, concluded that the power over the nation’s money and credit was concentrated in a small group of Wall Street bankers. The report created a climate for reform. Unfortunately one of the reforms advocated for was the misnamed Federal Reserve Act, which provided the appearance that finances would become a public function.

2018 – “BIBLIOGRAPHY MONETARY THEORY AND REFORM” WEBSITE POSTING

A tremendous site containing listings organized in the following categories:

A. Proposed Legislations and Organizational Endorsements

B. Academic Studies on Sovereign Monetary Theory and Reform

C. Studies Critical of Sovereign Monetary Theory and Reform (including MMT section)

D. Non-academic Advocacy Pamphlets, Reports, Briefings and Books

E. Supporting Studies Addressing Monetary Issues

F. Journalistic Articles Addressing Monetary Reform

G. Educational and Promotional Videos

H. Other Relevant Background Studies

http://www.alpheus.org/bibliography-monetary-theory-and-reform/?fbclid=IwAR3Xoxucc3GU0Wnert4W4KU-XPHtNmL89T54-auxpiZF8nbI7L_-WOixteM

Check it out…

MAY 17

1901 – FINANCIAL PANIC

The Financial Panic of 1901 was the first stock market crash.  This was caused in part by several powerful investors trying to gain control of the Northern Pacific Railway.  During the afternoon of May 17, 1901 the market started to decline sharply.  Investors on the floor of the New York stock Exchange began to panic.  An overwhelming yell of “Sell, sell, sell” could be heard; only fueling the panic. This cornering of stock caused a panic among many small investors resulting in the ruin of thousands of small investors.

1930 – BANK OF INTERNATIONAL SETTLEMENTS ESTABLISHED

This is the central bank of all central banks, established as an international financial institution to “foster international monetary and financial cooperation.” Headquartered in Basel, Switzerland. The BIS serves to strengthen the international private banking system, not national economies. The BIS advocates the establishment of a global currency, building on the International Monetary Fund “Special Drawing Rights” – a quasi currency, which has a value, based on a basket of 4 major currencies (the dollar, euro, pound and yen).

2002 – TALK BY WILLIAM HUMMEL, AUTHOR, MONETARY RESEARCHER

“Banks are not ordinary intermediaries, like non-banks, they also borrow, but they do not lend the deposits they acquire. They lend by crediting the borrowers account with a new deposit… The accounts of other depositors remain intact and their deposits fully available for withdrawal.  Thus a bank loan increases the total of bank deposits, which means an increase in the money supply.”

MAY 18

1846 – STATE OF IOWA CONSTITUTION ADOPTED

Article VIII of the original constitution states:

“Municipal corporations. Section 4. No political or municipal corporation shall become a stockholder in any banking corporation, directly or indirectly.

Banking associations. Section 5. No Act of the General Assembly, authorizing or creating corporations or associations with banking powers, nor amendments thereto shall take effect, or in any manner be in force, until the same shall have been submitted separately, to the people, at a general or special election, as provided by law, to be held not less than three months after the passage of the Act, and shall have been approved by a majority of all the electors voting for and against it at such election.”

1914 – FORMAL SIGNING OF THE ORGANIZATION CERTIFICATE ESTABLISHING THE CHICAGO FEDERAL RESERVE BANK

“The actual process of money creation takes place in commercial banks. Banks can build up deposits by increasing loans and investments…This unique attribute of the banking business was discovered several centuries ago. At one time, bankers were merely middlemen. They made a profit by accepting gold and coins for safekeeping and lending them to borrowers. But they soon found that the receipts (bank notes or IOUs) they issued were being used as if they were a means of payment. These receipts were acceptable as if they were money since whoever held them could go to the banker and exchange them for metallic money. Then bankers discovered…that they could make loans merely by giving borrowers their promises to pay (bank notes). In this way banks began to create money…More notes (IOUs) could be issued than the gold and coin on hand because only a portion of the notes outstanding would be presented for payment at any one time…Demand deposits (checks) are the modern counterpart of bank notes. It was a small step from printing notes to making book entries to the credit of borrowers which the borrowers in turn, could ‘spend’ by writing checks.”

Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago; Nichols, Dorothy M (1961). Modern Money Mechanics; a workbook on deposits, currency and bank reserves. OCLC 510802. The 1992 revision of this booklet is available on wikisource

1920 – SECRET MEETING BY BANKERS TO REDUCE THE MONEY SUPPLY, WHICH RESULTED IN 5 MILLION UNEMPLOYED

Testimony in 1938 before the House Committee on Banking and Currency by Senator Robert Owen, a co-sponsor of the Federal Reserve Act:

“I wrote into the bill which was introduced by me in the Senate on June 26, 1913, a provision that the powers of the System should be employed to promote a stable price level, which meant a dollar of stable purchasing, debt-paying power. It was stricken out. The powerful money interests got control of the Federal Reserve Board through Mr. Paul Warburg, Mr. Albert Strauss, and Mr. Adolph C. Miller and they were able to have that secret meeting of May 18, 1920, and bring about a contraction of credit so violent it threw five million people out of employment.

In 1920 that Reserve Board deliberately caused the Panic of 1921. The same people, unrestrained in the stock market, expanding credit to a great excess between 1926 and 1929, raised the price of stocks to a fantastic point where they could not possibly earn dividends, and when the people realized this, they tried to get out, resulting in the Crash of October 24, 1929.”

April 7 – 13

APRIL 7

1858 – BIRTH OF DAVIS RICH DEWEY, AMERICAN ECONOMIST AND STATISTICIAN

“The underlying idea in the greenback philosophy…is that the issue of currency is a function of government, a sovereign right which ought not to be delegated to corporations.” 

APRIL 8

1838 – SLAVES USED AS COLLATERAL ON LOAN APPLICATIONS

“George Guion wrote to the Thibodeauxville Branch of Union Bank of Louisiana asking for a loan of 5,000 in addition to a 10,000 mortgage he already had from the bank on his plantation and slaves….As security for the additional loan he offered to the bank his plantation and sixteen slaves whose ages ranged from sixteen months to fifty years. It is unknown if the bank granted his loan…

“Although collateralized transactions usually accounted for a small number of credit transactions, slaves were the most popular form of collateral for those short-term and long-term loans that required collateral. For example, slaves accounted for 80 percent of the securities offered in recorded mortgages in antebellum East Feliciana Parish in Louisiana. Slaves could also be used as collateral for purchasing shares in Louisiana’s investment banks.

“In the South, slaves were property-they could be bought, sold and transported to any location that allowed slavery. As property, their owners could use slaves when they needed loans.”

https://historyengine.richmond.edu/episodes/view/2288

2009 – “AMERICA’S DEBT CRISIS AND THE NEED FOR MONETARY REFORM” PRESENTATION BY JOE BONGIOVANNI, DIRECTOR OF THE KETTLE POND INSTITUTE FOR DEBT FREE MONEY

Part 1: Introduction

Joe promotes public, debt-free money creation by the US Treasury, as opposed to private money creation as debt by the Fed, as the solution to the debt crisis. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AamPaXA_a0M

Part 2 Early History

Joe describes colonial and revolutionary monetary history https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8w0vyB9sq1Y

Part 3- Lincoln’s Greenbacks: 

Lincoln and his experiment with debt-free money http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wzf3h-63sjk

Part 4 Post Civil War

The Greenback Party after the Civil War, Vermonter Bradley Barlow, the Crash of 1907. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsWJK8pQ_uQ

Part 5 Federal Reserve Act: US monetary history from the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 through the Crash of 1929. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6Q7IcTAgcQ

Part 6  Chicago Plan of 1933

FDR came to power in 1933, more than three years after the 1929 Crash. The national banking system was on the verge of total collapse, despite the Federal Reserve banking system being 20 years old. Fortunately, after the Crash, many economists saw the need for an alternative to the private Fed and it’s boom-and-bust prone fractional reserve banking system. These economists developed a proposal for complete monetary reform that would negate the Fed’s boom-bust cycle and impart soundness to the banking system. The Chicago Plan for Monetary Reform was sidelined in favor of Glass-Steagall and the FDIC. It’s time again for the Chicago Plan.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_wp8N-Q_O4

Part 7: Robert Hemphill quote

Joe discusses the following quote from Robert Hemphill, Credit Manager of the Federal Reserve Bank, Atlanta GA

“If all the bank loans were paid, no one could have a bank deposit, and there would not be a dollar of coin or currency in circulation.

“This is a staggering thought. We are completely dependent on the commercial Banks. Someone has to borrow every dollar we have in circulation, cash or credit. If the Banks create ample synthetic money we are prosperous; if not, we starve. We are absolutely without a permanent money system. When one gets a complete grasp of the picture, the tragic absurdity of our hopeless position is almost incredible, but there it is.

“It is the most important subject intelligent persons can investigate and reflect upon. It is so important that our present civilization may collapse unless it becomes widely understood and the defects remedied very soon.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TTVoNIpBjE

Part 8: Milton Friedman

Joe highlights Milton Friedman’s opposition of money creation by private banks by highlighting the following quote:

“A reform of the monetary and banking system to eliminate both the private creation and destruction of money and discretionary control of the quantity of money by the central bank authority. The private creation of money can perhaps best be eliminated by adopting the 100% reserve proposal, thereby separating the depository from the lending function of the banking system

“These modifications would leave as the chief monetary functions of the banking system the provision of depositary facilities, the facilitation of check clearance, and the like; and as the chief function of the monetary authorities, the creation of money to meet government deficits or the retirement of money when the government has a surplus.”

From A Monetary and Fiscal Framework for Economic Stability in The American Economic Review, June 1948, p.247. Available on the web at : http://www.jstor.org/stable/1810624

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tSXnXE1slk

Part 9: The Solution

Joe recommends the American Monetary Act (http://www.monetary.org/amacolorpamphlet.pdf), a draft of legislation being compiled by the American Monetary Institute as the most workable solution to the current financial crisis, and also the transparency legislation proposed by Dennis Kucinich. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lyGoTEJb6g

2018 – “JEKYLL ISLAND, THE TRUTH BEHIND THE FEDERAL RESERVE” ONLINE POSTED VIDEO

Excellent explanation of the 2013 video describing the creation and impact of the Federal Reserve by Bill Still

APRIL 9

1626 – DEATH OF SIR FRANCIS BACON, PHILOSOPHER, BRITISH LORD CHANCELLOR

“If money be not thy servant, it will be thy master.  The covetous man cannot so properly be said to possess wealth, as that may be said to possess him.”

APRIL 10

1816 – CHARTER APPROVED FOR INCORPORATING THE SECOND NATIONAL BANK OF THE UNITED STATES

As with the earlier Bank of the United States, the Second National Bank of the United States was private with many of the largest investors foreigners and those representing great wealth. Congress chartered (licensed) the bank for 20 years.  It’s worth remembering that corporate charters are democratic tools once used by sovereign people (that would be We the People) to control and define corporate actions. As a result of bank practices geared to serving the interests of banks/bankers, (including limiting the issuance of money into the economy – which triggered economic stagnation), President Jackson pledged that the bank would not be issued a new charter after its 20-year charter ended. Without a charter – which provides those forming corporations certain legal protections (then and now) – corporations cannot exist.

1858 – DEATH OF THOMAS BENTON, US SENATOR FROM MISSOURI

“I object to the renewal of the charter of the Bank of the United States, because I look upon the bank as an institution too great and powerful to be tolerated in a government of free and equal laws.  Its power is that of the purse, a power more potent than that of the sword; and this power it possesses to a degree and extent that will enable this bank to draw to itself too much of the political power of this Union and too much of the individual property of the citizens of these States.  The money power of the bank is both direct and indirect.” http://yamaguchy.com/library/benton/benton_187.html

2012 – “EXPONENTIAL ECONOMIST MEETS FINITE PHYSICIST” BLOG POSTING

“Some while back, I found myself sitting next to an accomplished economics professor at a dinner event. Shortly after pleasantries, I said to him, ‘economic growth cannot continue indefinitely,’ just to see where things would go. It was a lively and informative conversation. I was somewhat alarmed by the disconnect between economic theory and physical constraints—not for the first time, but here it was up-close and personal. Though my memory is not keen enough to recount our conversation verbatim, I thought I would at least try to capture the key points and convey the essence of the tennis match—with some entertainment value thrown in…

“The evening’s after-dinner keynote speech began, so we had to shelve the conversation. Reflecting on it, I kept thinking, ‘This should not have happened. A prominent economist should not have to walk back statements about the fundamental nature of growth when talking to a scientist with no formal economics training.’ But as the evening progressed, the original space in which the economist roamed got painted smaller and smaller.”

Exponential Economist Meets Finite Physicist

APRIL 11

1932 – PECORA COMMISSION HEARINGS BEGIN – INVESTIGATE CAUSE OF US DEPRESSION

The investigation was launched by a majority-Republican Senate, under the Banking Committee’s chairman, Senator Peter Norbeck. Hearings began on April 11, 1932, but were criticized by Democratic Party members and their supporters as being little more than an attempt by the Republicans to appease the growing demands of an angry American public suffering through the Great Depression. Two chief counsels were fired for ineffectiveness, and a third resigned after the committee refused to give him broad subpoena power. Ferdinand Pecora, an assistant district attorney for New York County was hired to write the final report in January 1933. Discovering that the investigation was incomplete, Pecora requested permission to hold an additional month of hearings. His exposé of the National City Bank (now Citibank) made banner headlines and caused the bank’s president to resign. Democrats had won the majority in the Senate, and the new President, Franklin D. Roosevelt, urged the new Democratic chairman of the Banking Committee, Senator Duncan U. Fletcher, to let Pecora continue the probe. So actively did Pecora pursue the investigation that his name became publicly identified with it, rather than the committee’s chairman. Pecora not only documented a litany of abuses, but also paved the way for remedial legislation. The Securities Act of 1933, the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 — all addressed abuses exposed by Pecora. It was only poetic justice when Roosevelt tapped him as a commissioner of the newborn Securities and Exchange Commission.   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pecora_Commission

APRIL 12

1866 – CONGRESS PASSES THE CONTRACTION ACT

The Act authorized the Secretary of the Treasury to begin retiring Greenbacks (public debt-free money first issued by the Lincoln Administration) in circulation and to contract the money supply. By 1876, two-thirds of the nation’s money had been called in by the bankers. A contraction of the money supply when demand is high causes depressions, which is what happened from 1873-79.

1910 – DEATH OF WILLIAM GRAHAM SUMNER, PROFESSOR, YALE UNIVERSITY, MONETARY THEORIST

“For as the currency question is of first importance and we cannot solve it or escape it by ignoring it.  We have got to face it and the best way to begin is not by wrangling about speculative opinions as to untried schemes but to go back to history and try to get hold of some firmly established principles.”

1945 – DEATH OF PRESIDENT FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT

 “The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the Government ever since the days of Andrew Jackson … The country is going through a repetition of Jackson’s fight with the Bank of the United States – – only on a far bigger and broader basis.”

APRIL 13

1743 – BIRTH OF THOMAS JEFFERSON, THIRD PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES

“This institution (the Bank of England) is one of the most deadly hostility against the principles of our Constitution…suppose an emergency should occur…an institution like this…in a critical moment might overthrow the government.”

“And I sincerely believe, with you, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies; and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.”

“Bank-paper must be suppressed, and the circulating medium must be restored to the nation to whom it belongs.”

2015 – DEATH OF EDUARDO GALEANO, URUGUAYAN JOURNALIST, WRITER AND NOVELIST

Great quote for monetary reformers: “The system steals with one hand what it lends with the other.” 

[Note: This is never more true than the present time. The $450 billion corporate slush fund bailout given to the Treasury Department in the recent economic “stimulus” bill was handed over the Federal Reserve, which in turn handed it over to several major banking corporations to distribute to “needy” mega corporations. These banks will profit from the administration of the funds.]

2021 – “HOW MONETARY REFORM SOLVES CLIMATE CHANGE AND ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINATION” BY MARK PASH

How Monetary Reform Solves Climate Change and Environmental Contamination

“Now we have the biggest global crisis in World history that of Climate Change and Environmental degradation. And the current money-banking system in 2020 lent over a trillion dollars to fossil fuel companies. This is going in the opposite direction for adequate climate control. We have most of the technical solutions. Then, what is missing? It is mainly money! Therefore, we have to “Go Back to the Greenbacks” and eliminate the unsustainable, extremely skewered, private money system…

“The following is a list of specific operations solving climate change that we can implement to save our planet and how they can be funded from the new money system of “Back to the Greenbacks”…

“Solar Alternatives…

“Electric Automobiles & Trucks…

“Land…

“Refrigeration…

“Aircraft…

“Water & Agriculture…

“Research & Development…

“Manufacturing…

“Environmental Firms & Trees…”

How Monetary Reform Solves Climate Change and Environmental Contamination

February 11 – 17

FEBRUARY 11                                                               

1847 – BIRTH OF THOMAS EDISON, US INVENTOR

“If our nation can issue a dollar bond, it can issue a dollar bill. The element that makes the bond good makes the bill good… If the Government issues bonds, the brokers will sell them. The bonds will be negotiable; they will be considered as gilt edged paper. Why? Because the government is behind them, but who is behind the Government? The people. Therefore it is the people who constitute the basis of Government credit. Why then cannot the people have the benefit of their own gilt-edged credit by receiving non-interest bearing currency… instead of the bankers receiving the benefit of the people’s credit in interest-bearing bonds?”

2004 – RON PAUL, US CONGRESSMAN, SPEAKING TO THE HOUSE FINANCIAL SERVICES COMMITTEE

He referred to the Federal Reserve by stating, “maybe there’s too much power in the hands of those who control monetary policy?  The power to create the financial bubbles.  The power to maybe bring the bubble about. The power to change the value of the stock market within minutes.  That to me is just an ominous power and challenges the whole concept of freedom and liberty and sound money.”

2020 – PSYCHOLOGIST EXPLAINS WHY ECONOMISTS  – AND LIBERALS – GET HUMAN NATURE WRONG” posted articleP

“That’s why a rebel economist challenging conventional thinking about subjects like human nature faces a heavy lift. Experts have to see a lot of evidence accumulating across many studies before they reach a point where they are finally forced to think differently. Scientific studies are even less helpful in persuading the general public.

“When I asked Haidt how the mavericks could help their cause, he noted that humans are social creatures more influenced by people than by ideas. So, it matters who says something as much as what they say. It also makes a difference how they say it: elephants don’t like to be insulted, and they lean towards arguments made by people they like and admire. Not very rational, perhaps, but likely true.”

https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/blog/psychologist-explains-why-economists-and-liberals-get-human-nature-wrong

FEBRUARY 12

1791 – BIRTH OF PETER COOPER, US INDUSTRIALIST, PHILANTHROPIST (FOUNDED COOPER UNION) AND GREENBACK CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT

“The substitution of greenbacks for National bank notes would have the bounty now paid to banks, which, being invested as a sinking fund, would in less than thirty years pay off the whole debt of the country.”

1809 – BIRTH OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES

“The money power preys upon the nation in times of peace, and conspires against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, more selfish than bureaucracy. It denounces, as public enemies, all who question its methods or throw light upon its crimes. I have two great enemies, the Southern Army in front of me, and the financial institutions in the rear. Of the two, the one in my rear is my greatest foe.” Source:  Letter to a friend on November 21, 1864

1873 – COINAGE ACT PASSED BY CONGRESS (THE “CRIME OF ‘73”)

The Coinage Act removed silver as a form of currency (“demonetized) – leaving gold as the major form of US currency. The public didn’t realize at first what happened. With silver no longer a form of money, the overall amount of currency dramatically declined, causing the prices farmers received for their produce to drop (deflation) but the cost of their debts rise. Thousand of famers lost their land. Those who held silver also suffered. This was one of the sparks of the rise of the farmer-led US Populist movement.

2021 – “MONEY CREATION IS A FORM OF VIOLENCE,” PUBLISHED ARTICLE

“The institutional level of violence is submerged from view so that its forms are almost completely invisible. Violence at this level includes harmful actions by social and financial institutions (the Federal Reserve system, large commercial banks) that obstruct the development of human potential through the use of discriminatory lending and other economic policies and practices. Violence at this level is not universally condemned because it is often subtle, indirect, covert, and involves long-term rather than immediate consequences.”

Money Creation is A Form of Violence

FEBRUARY 13

1728 – DEATH OF COTTON MATHER, AUTHOR, MINISTER AND CONVERT TO PAPER MONEY

“Where money has not been introduced, men are brutish and savage and nothing good has been cultivated.”

FEBRUARY 14

2021 – “THE TRANSFORMATIONAL APPROACH TO PAY FOR HUGE COVI-19 AND CLIMATE COST”S posted article

“There are three approaches of paying for the enormous costs to combat the coronavirus-19 pandemic and the looming climate catastrophe:

1. the traditional approach of raising taxes and borrowing,

2. the present approach of Central Bank funding, called quantitative easing (QE) or monetary financing and

3. the emerging transformational approach that moves from monetary financing to the sovereign approach of financing by the creation of money…

“Very few politicians are discussing about how both the national debt and the Fed’s negative balance sheet are going to be resolved. Here Approach #3 comes into view where money is created in the quantities and qualities that match the needs for dealing with the COVID-19 and climate emergencies. Given that the financial needs are so high, the national economy and the world economy are not in danger of leading to an inflationary spiral. Disciplined imagination will be the limit of spending in this sovereign money approach, not inflation dangers or bank runs.”

The Transformational Approach to Pay for Huge COVID-19 and Climate Costs

2022 – VALENTINE’S DAY – A DAY OF LOVE

In trying to find a link between love and something related to money and debt…

Bible, Romans 13:8 “Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law.”

FEBRUARY 15

2007 – QUOTE BY BEN BERNANKE, CHAIR OF THE US FEDERAL RESERVE (THE PRIVATE CENTRAL BANK OF THE US), ON THE US ECONOMY

“Despite the ongoing adjustments in the housing sector, overall economic prospects for households remain good. Household finances appear generally solid, and delinquency rates on most types of consumer loans and residential mortgages remain low.”

Less than a year later, the economy collapses due to the reckless housing loans and speculation by the financial industry. So much for Federal Reserve chairs being, as many believe, great sages. Congress passes a $700 billion bailout bill. The nation was mired in a ‘Great Recession;’ for many an outright Depression. The economy has in some ways today still not recovered.

FEBRUARY 16

1922 – BIRTH OF MARGARET DEVRIES, IMF HISTORIAN

“The extreme volatility of capital flows in response to interest rate difference or anticipation of exchange rate changes was in large part responsible for undermining the international monetary order that existed until the late 1960’s.”

2018 – MAN MADE MONEY MONEY – STEFF KUYPERS online video posting

“Money is often said to the ‘root of all evil’ what if it could be ‘reconfigured’ to solve the worlds social problems by incentivizing it’s natural strengths?  Stef Kuypers has a history in IT, creative thinking, improvisation and business interventions. He self studied on economics, monetary systems, complexity theory, human behaviour and sociology through diving into online research articles on the subjects and engaging with progressive thinkers. He got interested in monetary systems after discovering that the biggest hurdle to solving our climate change problem is actually our monetary system and more importantly the behaviour it creates. This launched him on a path to create a system which could lead to more sustainable economical and social behaviour. The end result is the Circular Money Economic Ecosystem model. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

FEBRUARY 17

1950 – TESTIMONY OF JAMES PAUL WARBURG BEFORE US SENATE

Warburg, son of Paul Warburg, the “father of the Federal Reserve,” was a banker, advisor to FDR and member of the Council of Foreign Relations. Speaking before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, he stated: “We shall have world government, whether or not we like it. The question is only whether world government will be achieved by consent or by conquest.”

2015 – A NEW ERA FOR MONETARY POLICY – ADAIR TURNER online video posting

“Since the financial crisis of 2007/8 central banks have entered unchartered territory. Unconventional monetary policy tools such as Quantitative Easing and Funding for Lending have blurred the line between monetary and fiscal policy.

“This has opened an opportunity to question current models and conventional wisdom. For example, should central banks add financial stability to their remit?

“New insight has come both from people working inside the system as well as from people working on these issues from the outside. Lord Turner has been a leading voice in this enquiry examining both theoretical and practical policy considerations.

“One of the most pressing questions concerns democratic accountability. Fiscal authorities are directly democratically accountable to the public, but central banks are not. How can these important policy debates become more transparent and accountable, allowing civil society to participate in the crucial debate on how monetary policy can best serve the needs of society?

2023 – FACEBOOK POSTING OF MONEY JOKES LINK

Here’s one:

“Why is it a penny for your thoughts but you have to put your two cents in? Somebody’s making a penny.” — Steven Wright, comedian

More at https://www.rd.com/jokes/money/