ABSTRACT
The second part of the narrative of the American experience starts with the establishment of the national banking system in the 1860s. A series of banking acts that passed between 1863 and 1865 created a system of national banks, with the Office of the Comptroller of Currency (OCC) as the central supervisor. Jay Cooke had built his reputation as a prominent financier and innovative banker when he formed a syndicate of Wall Street bankers during the Civil War to sell Union government loans across the nation to small investors through a network of brokerage houses and agents. After the Civil War proponents of hard money first passed the Coinage Act of 1873 that demonetized silver and terminated the bimetallic system. The Federal Reserve Act reduced the number of regional reserve banks to 12, with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York the first among equals.
