Banks And Politics In America From The Revolution To The Civil War

Hammond, Bray

Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1957. Hardcover. red cloth boards w/ black & gilt spine plate. book xi, 771 pgs. Good (ex-library w/ stamps to textblock edges, IDs to lower spine, discard marks, internal stamps, usual markings, etc. rubbing to corners & spine ends. spine sunned. light staining to back cover. front gutter/hinge cracked; binding material appears intact.). Item #184833

From a college library. Instances of pen and pencil underling and marginalia; though, remains fairly clean. Spine rattled; textblock intact. A suitable reading copy. "With this rather cryptic and exhaustive disclaimer, Bray Hammond began his classic investigation into the role of banking in the formation of American society. Hammond, who was assistant secretary of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System from 1944 to 1950, presented in this 771-page book the definitive account of how banking evolved in the United States in the context of the nation's political and social development. Hammond combined political with financial analysis, highlighting not only the influence politicians exercised over banking but also how banking drove political interests and created political coalitions. He captured the entrepreneurial, expansive, risk-taking spirit of the United States from earliest days and then showed how that spirit sometimes undermined sound banking institutions. In Hammond's view, we need central banks to keep the economy on an even keel. Historian Richard Sylla judged the work to be 'a wry and urbane study of early U.S. financial history, but also a timeless essay on how Americans became what they are.' Banks and Politics in America won the Pulitzer Prize for history in 1958."--Amazon.