The Constitutional Law of Money Home

Money and credit are public institutions that are created by law. As the financial crisis revealed, the way they are configured matters enormously. The authority of the Federal Reserve, for example, apparently includes the ability to make monetary policy decisions that move hundreds of billions of dollars. Similarly, the struggle to make a national money, along with the tax and debt levers used to that end, have shaped “federalism” at a basic level. This course will consider how American polities, including the early colonies, the states, and the national government, have created money and used it for public purposes from war to economic development, as well as how those governments have made money available to individuals for their exchange. Our coverage will include the following and similar controversies. 1) The debate over the constitutionality of the Bank of United States, 2) The changing definition of money – including the litigation over the Greenbacks and the legislation identifying government securities as the basis of high-powered money today, 3) U.S. v. Perry and the American devaluation of the dollar, 4) The authority of the Federal Reserve as an independent agency.