The First Bank of the United States was a central bank, chartered for a term of twenty years, by the United States Congress on February 25, 1791. Establishment of the Bank was included in a three-part expansion of federal fiscal and monetary power (along with a federal mint and excise taxes) championed by Alexander Hamilton, first Secretary of the Treasury. Hamilton believed a central bank was necessary to stabilize and improve the nation's credit, and to improve handling of the financial business of the United States government under the newly enacted Constitution.
Officially proposed to the first session of the First Congress in 1790, Hamilton's Bank faced widespread resistance from opponents of increased federal power. Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and James Madison led the opposition, which claimed that the bank was unconstitutional, and that it benefited merchants and investors at the expense of the majority of the population.
The First Bank building is now a National Historic Landmark located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania within Independence National Historical Park.
Read more about First Bank Of The United States: Relation To Hamilton's Other Economic Policies, Hamilton's Plan, Opposition, Presidential Approval, Expiration of Charter, Purchase By Girard, Bank Building
Famous quotes containing the words united states, bank, united and/or states:
“... the yearly expenses of the existing religious system ... exceed in these United States twenty millions of dollars. Twenty millions! For teaching what? Things unseen and causes unknown!... Twenty millions would more than suffice to make us wise; and alas! do they not more than suffice to make us foolish?”
—Frances Wright (1795–1852)
“It was like passing a boundary to dive
Into the sun-filled water, brightly leafed
And limbed and lighted out from bank to bank.
That’s how the stars shine during the day.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“The parallel between antifeminism and race prejudice is striking. The same underlying motives appear to be at work, namely fear, jealousy, feelings of insecurity, fear of economic competition, guilt feelings, and the like. Many of the leaders of the feminist movement in the nineteenth-century United States clearly understood the similarity of the motives at work in antifeminism and race discrimination and associated themselves with the anti slavery movement.”
—Ashley Montagu (b. 1905)
“In the case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of ... powers not granted by the compact, the States ... are in duty bound to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their respective limits the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to them.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)