{"id":418,"date":"2009-02-08T22:09:05","date_gmt":"2009-02-08T22:09:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html"},"modified":"2009-02-08T22:09:05","modified_gmt":"2009-02-08T22:09:05","slug":"the-value-of-other-peoples-mon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html","title":{"rendered":"Brandeis, Banks, and Other People’s Money"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brandeis scholar Melvin I. Urofsky compares the financial crisis of a century ago to the one today in an op-ed in the New York Times. \u00a0Prof. Urofsky’s\u00a0reflection on Louis D. Brandeis’ seminal book “Other People’s Money” <\/a>reminds us to be wary of the danger inherent in greedy banks playing around with other people’s cash – and the interested law makers who help them do it. \u00a0 \u00a0<\/font><\/span>
<\/font><\/p>\n

Some things never change. When President Obama spoke last week of “shameful” bonuses for bankers and the financial community’s “irresponsibility,” he echoed charges leveled nearly a century ago by Louis D. Brandeis. Brandeis, a commercial lawyer, leading reformer and future Supreme Court justice<\/span><\/span>, described a dangerous combination of avarice, lack of accountability and poor oversight in “Other People’s Money, and How the Bankers Use It,” one of the best-known expos\u00e9s of the Progressive era.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n


<\/span>Published in 1914, the book was based on the revelations of the House of Representatives<\/span><\/span>‘ Pujo Committee<\/span><\/span> about the predatory practices of J. P. Morgan<\/span><\/span> and other big bankers. “Other People’s Money” influenced both Woodrow Wilson<\/span><\/span>‘s New Freedom agenda<\/span><\/span> and Franklin Roosevelt<\/span><\/span>‘s New Deal<\/span><\/span>. It also offers valuable lessons for today.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n


<\/span>Our current crisis, after all, was in part fueled by bankers making big gambles with other people’s cash. They bundled and sold sub-prime mortgages, took their profits, and then left others holding portfolios full of worthless, even toxic, paper. This was exactly the kind of behavior that Brandeis despised. He believed that it was one thing for an individual to put up capital in risky ventures, playing to win but prepared for failure. But he saw the bankers of his time dodging failure by manipulating the marketplace at the expense of smaller entrepreneurs and consumers.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n


<\/span>As president, Wilson tried to put a stop to this. He read the book and called Brandeis in to help draft three bills crucial to the New Freedom agenda — the Federal Reserve Act<\/span><\/span>, the Clayton Antitrust Act<\/span><\/span>, and the law establishing the Federal Trade Commission<\/span><\/span>. These measures allowed Congress to take away banks’ control over currency, banned interlocking directorates (in which banker representatives controlled other corporations), and established rules of fair competition.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

The Value of Other People’s Money<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brandeis scholar Melvin I. Urofsky compares the financial crisis of a century ago to the one today in an op-ed in the New York Times. \u00a0Prof. Urofsky’s\u00a0reflection on Louis D. Brandeis’ seminal book “Other People’s Money” reminds us to be wary of the danger inherent in greedy banks playing around with other people’s cash –…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy"],"yoast_head":"\nBrandeis, Banks, and Other People's Money - Progressive Revival<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Brandeis, Banks, and Other People's Money - Progressive Revival\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Brandeis scholar Melvin I. Urofsky compares the financial crisis of a century ago to the one today in an op-ed in the New York Times. \u00a0Prof. Urofsky’s\u00a0reflection on Louis D. 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Urofsky compares the financial crisis of a century ago to the one today in an op-ed in the New York Times. \u00a0Prof. Urofsky’s\u00a0reflection on Louis D. Brandeis’ seminal book “Other People’s Money” reminds us to be wary of the danger inherent in greedy banks playing around with other people’s cash –…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html","og_site_name":"Progressive Revival","article_published_time":"2009-02-08T22:09:05+00:00","author":"Paul Raushenbush","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html","name":"Brandeis, Banks, and Other People's Money - Progressive Revival","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/#website"},"datePublished":"2009-02-08T22:09:05+00:00","dateModified":"2009-02-08T22:09:05+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/#\/schema\/person\/79cf4745abafd37be8b44cd0493ca805"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/02\/the-value-of-other-peoples-mon.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Brandeis, Banks, and Other People’s Money"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/","name":"Progressive Revival","description":"Politics from the New Religious Progressives","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/#\/schema\/person\/79cf4745abafd37be8b44cd0493ca805","name":"Paul Raushenbush","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/8a4\/8a469b4689362184dbcd8bfb43296365x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/8a4\/8a469b4689362184dbcd8bfb43296365x96.jpg","caption":"Paul Raushenbush"},"description":"Rev. Paul B. Raushenbush is the moderator of the Progressive Revival blog and the Associate Dean of Religious Life at Princeton University. .An ordained American Baptist minister, Rev. Raushenbush speaks and preaches at colleges, churches and institutes around the country including the College of Preachers at the National Cathedral in Washington D.C., The Chautauqua Institute in upstate New York, and the New America Foundation. Rev. Raushenbush has served at Seattle First Baptist Church, the Presbyterian Chaplaincy at Columbia University and as College and Young Adult Minister at The Riverside Church in New York City. He has appeared on ABC World News Tonight and is a repeated guest on CNN. He has been quoted in The New York Times and The Washington Post and is a contributing editor for Beliefnet.com. His first book, Teen Spirit: One World, Many Faiths (HCI) was released in the Fall of 2004. He is the editor of the 100th Anniversary edition of Walter Rauschenbusch\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s book Christianity and the Social Crisis \u00e2\u20ac\u201c In the 21st Century (HarperOne). His work at Princeton includes strengthening the interfaith community on campus. He is the Co-Director of the Program on Religion, Diplomacy and International Relations at The Liechtenstein Institute on Self Determination at Princeton University. Rev. Raushenbush studied religion at Macalester College before attending Union Theological Seminary in New York City where he graduated with distinction.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/author\/praushenbush"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}