Following the Revolutionary War, the newly formed nation of the United States sought a way to re-establish commerce, repay war debt, restore the value of currency, and lower inflation. One of our Founding Fathers — Alexander Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury — devised a plan to accomplish these goals. His idea? Create a national bank that would issue paper money, provide a safe place for public funds, offer banking facilities for commercial transactions, …show more content…
found itself heavily in debt after fighting the War of 1812 and struggling with soaring prices and devalued money from rising inflation. Furthermore, with no national bank, the government had difficulty borrowing money and making payments. Many people felt that the solution to the country's problems lay in establishing another national bank. After much debate and opposition, Congress established the second Bank of the United States (the Second Bank), which, like its predecessor, had a 20-year charter. Opening in 1816, the Second Bank closed in 1836, when Congress failed to override President Andrew Jackson's veto of the reauthorization of the Second Bank. The bank did not fail, but the value of a Central Bank was not realized and politically if died, as most historians believe was because to President …show more content…
The country had been rocked with financial panics on a regular basis since the Civil War. The Panic of 1907 led Congress to establish a commission to consider ways to mitigate such financial crises,
When President Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act into law in 1913, it included an ingenious compromise — a decentralized central banking system. This unique structure helped overcome political and public opposition that stemmed from fears that this new central bank would be dominated either by political interests in Washington or by financial interests in New York.
Over the years, at the Federal Reserve, the conduct of monetary policy has changed, and most of the authority for setting policy is now vested in the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC).
The primary function of the Federal Reserve System is to conduct monetary policy, it does not set the value to the U.S. Dollar. The Federal Open Market Committees sets U.S. monetary policy in accordance with its mandate to promote stable prices, maximum employment and moderate long-term interest rates (monetary policy is covered in more detail in the