Overflight, 13

THE JEKYLL ISLAND PLAN
As summarized in the opening chapter of this book, the purpose of that meeting was to work out a plan to achieve five primary objectives:
1. How to stop the growing influence of small, rival banks and to insure that control over the nation’s financial resources would remain in the hands of those present;
2. How to make the money supply more elastic in order to reverse the trend of private capital formation and to recapture the industrial loan market;
3. How to pool the meager reserves of all the nation’s banks into one large reserve so that at least a few of them could protect themselves from currency drains and bank runs;
4. How to shift the inevitable losses from the owners of the banks to the taxpayers;
5. How to convince Congress that the scheme was a measure to protect the public.
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To convince Congress and the public that the establishment of a banking cartel was, somehow, a measure to protect the public, the Jekyll Island strategists laid down the following plan of action:
1. Do not call it a cartel nor even a central bank.
2. Make it look like a government agency.
3. Establish regional branches to create the appearance of decentralization, not dominated by Wall Street banks.
4. Begin with a conservative structure including many sound banking principles knowing that the provisions can be quietly altered or removed in subsequent years.
5. Use the anger caused by recent panics and bank failures to create popular demand for monetary reform.
6. Offer the Jekyll Island plan as though it were in response to that need.
7. Employ university professors to give the plan the appearance of academic approval.
8. Speak out against the plan to convince the public that Wall Street bankers do not want it.
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