Louis McFadden: People Profiled in Economics and Banking

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Executive Summary

A resolute opponent of the Federal Reserve and private banking who was a banker himself.

Introduction

For most of his career, McFadden aggressively opposed a private central bank, which is curious as he brought more banking knowledge than nearly any other politician who was a private banking opponent as he worked several decades in a bank, and was the president of a bank before being elected to the US Congress. The McFadden Act renewed the charter of the Federal Reserve in 1927. The Fed’s charter had been set to expire in 1934.

However, before too long, McFadden became one of the most vociferous critics of the Fed.

This article (https://www.federalreservehistory.org/essays/mcfadden-act#footnote2) on the Fed’s website discusses McFadden and this legislation but for some reason leaves out the scathing criticism McFadden leveled against the Fed just a few years late. A quote from him is explanatory of his view of the Federal Reserve:

McFadden on the Federal Reserve

“Some people think that the Federal Reserve Banks are United States Government institutions, that they are private monopolies, which prey upon the people of the United States for benefit of themselves and their foreign customers, foreign and domestic speculators and swindlers and rich and predatory money lenders, in that dark crew, financial pirates, there are those who would cut a man’s throat to get $1 out of his pocket. There are those who send money into states to buy votes to control our legislatures. There are those who maintain international propaganda for the purpose of deceiving us into granting new concessions, which will permit them to cover up their past misdeeds and set again in motion their gigantic train of crime. These 12 private credit monopolies were deceitfully and disloyalty, foisted upon the country by the bankers who came here from Europe and repaid our hospitality by undermining our American institutions.”

McFadden on The Fed Draining the Gold of the US Government

McFadden accused the Fed of draining the gold of the US government.

“McFadden charged in a 1934 address to Congress, he is preparing to cancel the war debts by fraud. He told Congress, there was no national emergency when FDR took office exam in the bankruptcy of the fed a bankruptcy which has been going on under cover for several years and which has been concealed from the people so that the people would continue to permit their bank deposits and their bank reserves and their gold and the funds of the United States Treasury to be impounded in the bankrupt institution. Undercover the predatory international bankers have been stealthily transferring the burden of the Fed debts to the people’s Treasury. And to the people themselves, they took the farms in the homes of the United States to pay for their thievery. That is the only national emergency that there has ever been here since the Depression began.”

Source: The Web of Debt

https://www.amazon.com/Web-Debt-Shocking-Truth-System/dp/0983330859

McFadden went on a rampage against the Fed and private banking interests as is covered in the following quotation.

McFadden on Jewish Banking Interests Concentrated at the Federal Reserve

“…which he claimed was created and operated by Jewish banking interests who conspired to economically control the United States. In a speech in the House of Representatives in December 1931, McFadden accused Paul Warburg, one of the leading forces behind the Federal Reserve Act, of “having engineered the great depression.”[5][6] On June 10, 1932, McFadden made a 25-minute speech before the House of Representatives, in which he accused the Federal Reserve of deliberately causing the Great Depression. McFadden also claimed that Wall Street bankers funded the Bolshevik Revolution through the Federal Reserve banks and the European central banks with which it cooperated. (this has been verified) After the expulsion from Washington, D.C., of the veteran petitioners of the Bonus Army, which he called “the greatest crime in modern history”, McFadden moved to impeach President Herbert Hoover in 1932, and he also introduced a resolution bringing conspiracy charges against the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve. The impeachment resolution was defeated by a vote of 361 to 8; it was seen as a big vote of confidence to President Hoover from the House. According to Time magazine, McFadden was “denounced and condemned by all Republicans for his ‘contemptible gesture’.” The Central Press Association reported that he was “virtually read out of his party … [had] his committee posts … taken away from him…was ostracized by Republicans [and] called crazy …”.[11] Sen. David A. Reed (R-PA) said “We intend to act to all practical purposes as though McFadden had died”.”

This is natural, as McFadden was a Republican and Republicans were normally in favor of private banking interests.

“In 1933, he introduced House Resolution No. 158, which included articles of impeachment for the Secretary of the Treasury, two assistant Secretaries of the Treasury, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, and the officers and directors of its twelve regional banks. In 1934, he made several anti-Semitic comments from the floor of the house and in newsletters to his constituents wherein he cited the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, claimed the Roosevelt administration was controlled by Jews, and objected to Henry Morgenthau, Jr., a Jew, becoming Secretary of the Treasury. Drew Pearson claimed in his “Washington Merry-Go-Round” column that, in a publication by the American fascist Silver Shirts, McFadden had been “extensively” quoted “in support of Adolf Hitler”. In September the Nazi tabloid Der Stuermer praised McFadden.

Source: Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Thomas_McFadden

McFadden on The Fed’s Relationship with the Bank of International Settlements

This was McFadden’s view of the Fed’s cozy relationship with the BIS.

“The Federal Reserve Bank of New York is eager to enter into close relationship with the Bank for International Settlements….The conclusion is impossible to escape that the State and Treasury Departments are willing to pool the banking system of Europe and America, setting up a world financial power independent of and above the Government of the United States….The United States under present conditions will be transformed from the most active of manufacturing nations into a consuming and importing nation with a balance of trade against it.” ~ Louis Thomas McFadden / AZ Quotes.

What is curious is that the Fed later began loaning money to European central banks, for which it is difficult to see where the Fed obtained this authority, as is covered in this interview of Ben Bernake by Alan Grayson. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jjXCm3W4hA&t=22s

Was McFadden Poisoned and Murdered by Private Banking Interests?

As is most often the case for those that stand up to private banking interests, McFadden both had failed attempts on his life and was most likely poisoned as is explained in the following quotation.

“It became known among his intimates that he had suffered two attacks against his life. The first attack came in the form of two revolver shots fired at him from ambushes, he was lighting from a cab in front of one of the Capitol hotels. Fortunately, both shots missed, but the bullets buried themselves in the structure of the cab. He became violently ill after partaking the food at a political banquet in Washington. His life was only saved from what was subsequently announced as poisoning by the presence of a physician in front of the banquet, who at once procure to stomach pump subjugated and subjected the congressman to emergency treatment.”

The theory that McFadden was poisoned by private banking interests that were protecting the Fed is nowhere to be found on the Federal Reserve’s profile of McFadden. Only his support of the Fed through the McFadden Act.

Source: The Web of Debt

https://www.amazon.com/Web-Debt-Shocking-Truth-System/dp/0983330859