1910
In this group were Paul Warburg, who was earning a $500,000 a year salary from Rothschild owned firm, Kuhn, Loeb & Company. This salary was for him to lobby for a privately owned central bank in America. Also present was Jacob Schiff, a Rothschild who had purchased Kuhn, Loeb and Company shortly after he arrived in America from England.The Rothschilds, Warburgs and Schiffs, interconnected by marriage, were essentially the same family.
Secrecy at this meeting was so tight that all the participants were cautioned to use only first names, to prevent servants from learning their identities. Years later, one participant, Frank Vanderlip, President of National Citibank and a representative of the Rockefeller family, confirmed the Jekyll Island trip in a 9th February 1935 edition of the Saturday Evening Post in which he stated,
"I was as secretive indeed, as furtive as any conspirator ... Discovery we knew, simply must not happen, or else all our time and effort would be wasted. If it were to be exposed that our particular group had got together and written a banking bill, that bill would have no chance whatever of passage by Congress."
It was not just the setting up of a Central Bank that was on the agenda. Other problems for these bankers were that the market share of these big national banks was shrinking fast. In the first ten years of the century the number of United States banks had more than doubled to over 20,000. By 1913 only 29% of all banks were national banks and they held only 57% of all deposits. As John D. Rockefeller put it,"Competition is Sin!"
Senator Aldrich later admitted in a magazine article,
"Before passage of this Act, the New York Bankers could only dominate the reserves of New York. Now we are able to dominate bank reserves of the entire country."
So one of the aims of these conspirators was to bring these new banks under their control. Secondly the nations economy was so strong that corporations were starting to finance their own expansions out of profits instead of taking out huge loans from large banks. Indeed, in the first ten years of the century, 70% of corporate funding came from profits.Basically, American Industry was becoming independent of the money changers, and the money changers were not about to let that happen.
There was also much discussion regarding the name of the new bank, which took place in a conference room in the Jekyll Island Club Hotel. Aldrich believed the word, "bank," should not even appear in the name. Warburg wanted to call the legislation, the, "National Reserve Bill," or the, "Federal Reserve Bill." The idea was not only to give the impression that the purpose of the new central bank was to stop bank runs, but also to conceal its monopoly character.
However it was Senator Aldrich, the egomaniac, who insisted it be called the, "Aldrich Bill." So, after nine days at Jekyll Island, the group dispersed. This group of conspirators immediately set up an educational fund of $5,000,000 to finance Professors at top universities to endorse the new bank.
The new central bank would be very similar to the old Bank Of The United States, in that it would be given a monopoly over United States currency and create that money out of nothing. Also in order to make the public think it was under control of the Government, the plan called for the central bank to be run by a board of governors appointed by the President and approved by the Senate.
This would not cause any undue problems for the bankers, as they knew they could use their money to buy influence over the politicians, in order to ensure the men they wanted got appointed to the board of governors.
