PRINTER'S NO. 1504
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF PENNSYLVANIA
HOUSE RESOLUTION
No.
268
Session of
2017
INTRODUCED BY RABB, McCLINTON, GAINEY, FREEMAN, PASHINSKI,
THOMAS, DeLUCA, ROZZI, DRISCOLL, KORTZ AND SIMS,
APRIL 20, 2017
REFERRED TO COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE, APRIL 20, 2017
A RESOLUTION
Urging the Congress of the United States to support efforts to
reinstate the separation of commercial and investment banking
functions previously in effect under the Glass-Steagall Act
and support efforts to return to national banking policies to
repair our nation's infrastructure.
WHEREAS, The Federal Reserve has fed a speculative bubble on
Wall Street, much like that of 2007; and
WHEREAS, This speculative bubble is tied to more than $250
trillion of derivatives officially on the books of the major
Wall Street banks; and
WHEREAS, This speculative bubble has soaked up all available
credit and resulted in a weak performance of the United States
economy; and
WHEREAS, State budgets throughout the nation have reflected
the constriction of revenue due to the collapse of production
and high-paying jobs; and
WHEREAS, A growing, productive economy will require a return
to the policies that successfully guided the nation out of
similar crises, including the creation of direct credit to
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industry, infrastructure investment and science-driven
innovations; and
WHEREAS, A prudent course of action would be to restore the
provisions of the Glass-Steagall Act that immediately separate
investment and commercial banking; and
WHEREAS, As law for 66 years, the Glass-Steagall Act
prevented banking crises like the one experienced in 2008; and
WHEREAS, A return to national banking and direct credit to
industry and infrastructure was completed under President George
Washington and Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton,
President John Quincy Adams, President Abraham Lincoln and
President Franklin D. Roosevelt; and
WHEREAS, The early infrastructure of the United States, from
canals to rail systems, was built by national banks; and
WHEREAS, National banking policies orchestrated by Henry
Carey under President Abraham Lincoln created industrial
expansion, including the construction of modern rail and steel
programs; and
WHEREAS, The Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC), a
Federal credit program approved in 1932, was modeled on the War
Finance Corporation and on Alexander Hamilton's prototype, the
First National Bank; and
WHEREAS, The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania recovered from the
Great Depression during Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration
through significant RFC projects, including the construction of
the Keystone Corridor electrification project and the landmark
Pennsylvania Turnpike; and
WHEREAS, A new national bank would be chartered with no less
than $1 trillion of capital, not taxpayer funds, to finance new
projects; and
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WHEREAS, This approach would put millions of unemployed or
underemployed people, especially young people, back to work;
therefore be it
RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania urge the Congress of the United
States to immediately reinstate the separation of commercial and
investment banking functions in effect under the Glass-Steagall
Act and support efforts to return to national banking policies
to repair our nation's infrastructure; and be it further
RESOLVED, That copies of this resolution be transmitted to
the President of the United States, to the presiding officers of
each house of Congress and to each member of Congress from
Pennsylvania.
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