Топик: Банковские системы: России, Америки, Британии

The rapid development of American industry and transportation was enhancing the richness of the country's resources, and the idea of democracy was beginning to connote to entrepreneurs the idea of free enterprise and laissez-faire. Hence, the very conditions that made credit restraint advisable also made it objectionable. Meanwhile, a developing agrarian populism, especially in the South and West, and among the poor everywhere, was seeing in democracy opposition to privilege and aristocracy and wealth. The bank became known as "the monster," and the enemy of the common people. These incongruous strains against the bank united under the leadership of Andrew Jackson, who became president in 1829. His attacks on it were sustained and colourful and rallied wide support. Attacks on the bank's constitutionality continued, although a decade earlier the Supreme Court, in McCulloch v. Maryland, had found the charter constitutional under the doctrine of implied powers, leader of the Whigs in the Senate from 1831, championed the bank against the Jacksonian Democrats and in 1832 deliberately injected the bank question into the presidential campaign by bringing about the renewal, four years early, of the bank's charter, adopted by Congress on July 3. Jackson promptly vetoed the bank renewal act as unconstitutional, disdaining the Supreme Court decision and asserting that officeholders were bound by their oaths to uphold the constitution as they, not others, understood it. In a demagogic veto message he depicted the bank as the "prostration of our Government to the advancement of the few at the expense of the many."

The bank issue dominated the campaign of 1832, in which Jackson decisively defeated Clay. The veto stood, but the bank's charter still had four years to run, so Jackson determined to scuttle it ahead of time by withdrawing government funds from it. He shuffled his cabinet twice before finding in Roger B. Taney--who as attorney general had declared the move legal--a treasury secretary willing to withdraw U.S. deposits from the Bank of the United States and place them in various state-chartered private institutions, which quickly became known as "pet banks."

The Bank carried on as best it could until the expiry of its charter in 1836, when it sought and won a state charter as the Bank of the United States of Pennsylvania. The long and rancorous affair became known as the, and Jackson's victory in it precluded for almost 80 years--until the creation in 1913 of the FederalReserveSystem--any effective regulation of private banks in the United States.

Federal Reserve System

central banking authority of the United States. It acts as a fiscal agent for the U.S. government, is custodian of the reserve accounts of commercial banks, makes loans to commercial banks, and is authorized to issue Federal Reserve notes that constitute the entire supply of paper currency of the country. Created by the of 1913, the system consists of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the 12 Federal Reserve banks, the, the Federal Advisory Council, and, since 1976, a Consumer Advisory Council; there are several thousand member banks.

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System determines the reserve requirements of the member banks within statutory limits, reviews and determines the discount rates established by the 12 Federal Reserve banks, and reviews the budgets of the reserve banks. A Federal Reserve bank is a privately owned corporation established pursuant to the Federal Reserve Act to serve the public interest; it is governed by a board of nine directors, six of whom are elected by the member banks and three of whom are appointed by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The Federal Reserve banks are located in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and San Francisco, and also in Cleveland, Ohio; Richmond, Va.; Atlanta, Ga.; St. Louis, Mo.; Minneapolis, Minn.; Kansas City, Mo.; and Dallas, Texas. The Federal Open Market Committee, consisting of the seven members of the Board of Governors and five members elected by the Federal Reserve banks, is responsible for the determination of Federal Reserve bank policy in the purchase and sale of securities on the open market. The Federal Advisory Council, whose role is purely advisory, consists of 12 members, one of whom is elected by the board of directors of each of the Federal Reserve districts. All national banks are required to be members of the Federal Reserve System, and state banks may become members if they meet membership qualifications.

The Federal Reserve System exercises its regulatory powers in several ways, the most important of which may be classified as instruments of direct or indirect control. One form of direct control can be exercised by adjusting the legal reserve ratio--i.e., the proportion of its deposits that a member bank must hold in its reserve account--thus increasing or reducing the amount of new loans that the commercial banks can make. Because loans give rise to new deposits, the potential is, in this way, expanded or reduced. This policy tool has not been used very frequently in recent years.

The money supply may also be influenced through manipulation of the (also called rediscount) rate, which is the rate of interest charged by Federal Reserve banks on short-term secured loans to member banks. Since these loans are typically sought to maintain reserves at their required level, an increase in the cost of such loans has an effect similar to that of increasing the reserve requirement.

The classic method of indirect control is through, first widely used in the 1920s and now employed daily to make small adjustments in the market. Federal Reserve bank sales or purchases of securities on the open market tend to reduce or increase the size of commercial-bank reserves; e.g., when the Federal Reserve sells securities, the purchasers pay for them with checks drawn on their deposits, thereby reducing the reserves of the banks on which the checks are drawn.

The three instruments of control described here have been conceded to be more effective in preventing inflation in times of high economic activity than in bringing about revival from a period of depression. A supplemental control occasionally used by the Federal Reserve Board is that of changing the margin requirements involved in the purchase of securities.