Creature From Jekyll Island by G. Edward полностью

The division of the United States into federations of equal force was decided long before the Civil War by the high financial powers of Europe. These bankers were afraid that the United States, if they remained in one block and as one nation, would attain economic and financial independence, which would upset their financial domination over the Europe and the world. Of course, in the "inner circle" of Finance, the voice of the Rothschilds prevailed. They saw an opportunity for prodigious booty if they could substitute two feeble democracies, burdened with debt to the financiers,... in place of a vigorous Republic sufficient unto herself. Therefore, they sent their emissaries into the field to exploit the question of slavery and to drive a wedge between the two parts of the Union.... The rupture between the North and the South became inevitable; the masters of European finance employed all their forces to bring it about and to turn it to their advantage.

The strategy was simple but effective. Within months after the first clash of arms between North and South, France had landed troops in Mexico. By 1864, the Mexicans were subdued, and the French monarch installed Ferdinand Maximilian as the puppet emperor. The Confederacy found a natural ally in Maximilian, and it was anticipated by both groups that, after the successful execution of the War, they would combine into a new nation—

dominated by the financial power of Rothschild, of course. At the same time, England moved eleven-thousand troops into Canada, 1. Bruce Catton, author; Richard M. Ketchum, ed., The American Heritage Picture History of the Civil War (New York: American Heritage Publishing Co., 1960), p. 249.

2. This statement was quoted by Conrad Siem, a German who became a U.S.

citizen and who wrote about the lifeand views of Bismark. It was published in La Vieille France, No. 216, March 17-24, 1921, pp. 13-16. The reader should be cautioned that Bismarck was no paragon of virtue and, as the father of modern socialism, his political views should be taken with a healthy degree of caution. All that aside, there is little doubt that this quotation represents an accurate appraisal of the machinations of the European Cabal at that time.

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positioned them menacingly along the Union's northern flank, and placed the British fleet onto war-time alert.1

The European powers were closing in for a checkmate.

SUMMARY

The Second Bank of the United States was dead, but banking was very much alive. Many of the old problems continued, and new ones arrived. The issuance of banknotes had been severely limited, but that was largely offset by the increasing use of checkbook money, which had no limits at all on its issue.

When the Bank of the U.S. slipped into history, the nation was nearing the end of the boom phase of a boom/bust cycle. When the inevitable contraction of the money supply came, politicians began to offer proposals on how to infuse stability into the banking system. None dealt with the real problem, which was fractional-reserve banking itself. They concentrated instead on proposals on how to make it work. All of these proposals were tried and they failed.

These years are sometimes described as a period of free

banking, which is an insult to truth. All that happened was that banks were converted from corporations to private associations, a change in form, not substance. They continued to be burdened by government controls, regulations, supports, and other blocks against the free market.

The economic chaos and conflict of this period was a major cause of the Civil War. Lincoln made it clear during his public speeches that slavery was not the issue. The basic problem was the North and the South were dependent on each other for trade. The industrialized North sold its products to the South which sold its cotton to the North. The South also had a similar trade with Europe, and that was an annoyance to the North. Europe was selling many products at lower prices, and the North was losing market share. Northern politicians passed protectionist legislation putting import duties on industrial products. This all but stopped the importation of European goods and forced the South to buy from the North at higher prices. Europe retaliated by curtailing the purchase of American cotton. That hurt the South even more. It was a classic case of legalized plunder, and the South wanted out.

1. Catton and Ketchum, p. 250. Also Otto Eisenschiml, The Hidden Face of the Civil War (New York: Bobbs-Merril, 1961), p. 25.

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376 THE CREATURE FROM JEKYLL ISLAND