Lords of Finance
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152 “afflicted by the generous use”: Bank of England, letter from Strong to Norman, February 18, 1922.
152 In those days: “Finance as Recreation,” Gettysburg Times, November 19, 1928.
153 “The temptation”: Bank of England, letter from Strong to Norman, January 4, 1924.
9: A BARBAROUS RELIC
155 Time will run back: John Milton quote from Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, 258.
165 In the latter half of 1919: Moggridge, Maynard Keynes, 349-50.
166 “disliked being in the country”: Harrod, The Life of John Maynard Keynes, 364.
166 “ovary”: Skidelsky, John Maynard Keynes: Hopes Betrayed, 211.
166 “tentative almost”: Harrod, The Life of John Maynard Keynes, 339-40.
167 “London’s position”: Keynes, “Memorandum Against the Suspension of Gold,” August 3, 1914, in Collected Writings, 16: 7-15.
167 “humbly and without permission”: Keynes, Collected Writing: A Tract, 4: xv.
167 “conservative bankers”: Keynes, Collected Writings: A Tract, 4: 56.
168 “the allegiance of”: Harrod, The Life of John Maynard Keynes, 339-40.
168 “For the moment”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, January 30, 1924.
169 “the most vindictive man”: Kynaston, The City of London: Illusions of Gold, 65.
169 “He is a brilliant”: Bank of England, letter from Strong to Norman, February 6, 1920.
170 “Keynes’s little book”: Bank of England, letter from Strong to Norman, January 4, 1924.
170 Having jettisoned : Friedman and Schwartz, A Monetary History, 240.
172 “I do not intend”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, January 30, 1924.
172 “A dollar standard”: Keynes, Collected Writing: A Tract, 4: 155.
173 “they might come”: Walworth, Woodrow Wilson, 320, n. 12.
173 Not surprisingly, the Board: Norris, Ended Episodes, 204.
173 “a body of startling incompetence”: Galbraith, The Great Crash, 32.
173 “utterly devoid of global”: Hoover, Memoirs, 9.
174 From Memphis, Tennessee: Interviews with Roy Young and Chester Morrill, Committee on the History of the Federal Reserve System, Washington: Brookings Institution, 1954-55.
174 From Iowa came: Interviews with George Harrison, Leslie Rounds, Roy Young, and Chester Morrill, Committee on the History of the Federal Reserve System, Washington: Brookings Institution, 1954-55.
175 “I’ll see them damned”: Letter from Strong to J. H. Case, April 21, 1923, quoted in Chandler, Benjamin Strong, 228.
176 In the process: Interview with Leslie Rounds, Committee on the History of the Federal Reserve System, Washington: Brookings Institution, 1954-55.
176 “worshipped”: Interview with Jay Crane, Committee on the History of the Federal Reserve System, Washington: Brookings Institution, 1954-55.
10: A BRIDGE BETWEEN CHAOS AND HOPE
179 At 10:00 p.m. on November 8 1923: Stresemann, Diaries, Letters and Papers, 199.
180 On November 5: “Berlin Food Rioters Attack and Beat Jews.” New York Times, November 6, 1923; “Berlin Now Shivering in Sudden Cold Wave,” New York Times, November 8, 1923; Feldman, The Great Disorder, 780.
181 “Babylon of the world” “A kind of madness”: Zweig, The World of Yesterday, 238.
181 “German Chicago”: Large, Berlin, 48.
181 “stone-grey corpse”: Quote by George Grosz in Hanser, Putsch, 253.
181 “beggars, whores”: Sahl, Memoiren, 36-37 quoted in Ian Buruma, “Weimar Faces,” New York Review of Books, November 2, 2006.
183 The previous month: Stresemann, Diaries, Letters and Papers, 145-47.
183 “living on the edge”: Schacht, My First Seventy-six Years, 177.
184 “hindered by personal considerations”: Schacht, My First Seventy-Six Years,177.
184 “narrow Prussian”: Schacht, My First Seventy-six Years, 120.
185 “an enthusiasm suitable”: Feldman, The Great Disorder, 793.
185 Schacht was as skeptical: Schacht, The Stabilization of the Mark, 79, and Feldman, The Great Disorder, 751.
187 “He sat on his chair”: Schacht, My First Seventy-six Years, 187.
187-188 “father of the inflation”: “Stinnes Would Oust Head of Reichsbank,” New York Times, November 13, 1923.
188 “preserve his honor”: Feldman, The Great Disorder, 715.
189 “astonishing appeasement”: d’Abernon, The Diary of an Ambassador, 2: 283.
190 “he always had good luck”: Feldman, The Great Disorder, 822.
190 On November 20: “Herr Havenstein Dead,” Times, November 21, 1923.
190 “an extraordinarily sympathetic personality”: Max Warburg Papers, Unpublished Memoirs, 1923, 69, quoted in Feldman, The Great Disorder, 795.
190 During the war: Feldman, The Great Disorder, 74.
11: THE DAWES OPENING
194 “Be extremely subtle”: Sun Tzu quote from Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, 83.
194 “a tall man with a pointed grayish beard” “I want to get on”: Schacht, My First Seventy-six Years, 194.
194 Decorated in a neoclassical: “The Governor of The Bank of England,” Strand Magazine, April 1939.
196 “quiet, modest”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, October 28, 1921.
196 “You know, of course”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, January 7, 1924.
197 “entertainments,” “sad fate”: d’Abernon, The Diary of an Ambassador, 2: 122-23.
198 “Hell and Maria”: “The Committees,” Time, January 7, 1924.
199 “hollow deep-set eyes”: Klingaman, 1929: The Year of the Crash, 95.
201 “both the element of novelty”: Dawes, The Dawes Plan in the Making, 34-35.
202 “those foul and carrion-loving,” “impenetrable and colossal”: “Whirlwind Diplomacy: How Dawes Plays Game,” New York Times, January 27, 1924.
202 Through a combination of charm: Schuker, End of French Predominance, 284.
203 in 1922, an audit: Brogan, France Under the Republic, 517.
203 $150 million of National Defense Bonds: Shirer, The Collapse of the Third Republic, 161.
204 On January 14: “La Foire aux Devises,” Le Quotidien, March 12, 1924, cited in Schuker, End of French Predominance, 89.
204 Prime Minister Poincaré declared: Jeanneney, François de Wendel, 187-88.
204 “assist in bringing France”: “The Franc Fighting for Its Life,” The Literary Digest, March 22, 1924.
204 “Each time the franc loses”: Keynes, Collected Writing: A Tract, 4: xvi-xvii
205 “stool of repentance”: Schacht, My First Seventy-six Years, 208.
206 “His pride is equaled”: Dawes, A Journal of Reparations, 54.
206 “remarkable revelation”: Dawes, A Journal of Reparations, 54.
209 “It looks to me”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, January 30, 1924.
210 “six main powers”: Ziegler, The Sixth Great Power, 1.
210 One story was that the family: Ferguson, The House of Rothschild: Money’s Prophets, 95-98.
210 “undertaken by any European”: Hobson, Imperialism, 64.
211 The son of an austere Methodist: “Lamont, Thomas William,” in Current Biography, 1940, 476.
213 “until the French are out”: Schuker, End of French Predominance, 215.
213 “swarming, gesticulating”: Saint-Aulaire, Confessions, 718, quoted in Schuker, End of French Predominance, 299.
214 “Europe shall not,” “America’s only purpose,”
214 “In the lean years”: Edwin L. James, “French Condemn Our Role in London,” New York Times, July 26, 1924, and “The ‘Money Devil’ Mixes in the Reparations Row,” The Literary Digest, August 9, 1924.
215 “We cannot accept”: Klein, Road to Disaster, 248.
216 “The United States lends money:” Keynes, “The Progress o
f the Dawes Scheme,” in The Nation and the Athenaeum, September 11, 1926, in Collected Writings, 18: 281.
12: THE GOLDEN CHANCELLOR
217 “I never knew a man”: Greene, The Quiet American, 72.
217 “in the full sunshine”: Graves and Hodges, The Long Weekend, 102.
217 Regent Street had been made over: “England Not Merry Under Labor’s Rule,” New York Times, June 8, 1924.
217 There was a new freedom: Graves and Hodges, The Long Weekend, 108-110.
219 “While England is financially sound”: Sisley, Huddelston. “Personalities and Politics in France,” Atlantic Monthly, January 1925, 117.
221 “You know how controversial”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, October 16, 1924.
221 “hand over to Germany”: Notes on discussion with Walter Leaf, June 13, 1924. Bank of England quoted in Kynaston, The City of London: Illusions of Gold, 109.
221 “rather far behind”: Bank of England, letter from Strong to Norman, July 9, 1924.
222 “There never was a Churchill”: Quoted in Wilson, The Victorians, 485.
222 “how anybody can put their”: Letter from William Bridgeman to his wife, quoted in Manchester, The Last Lion, 785.
223 F. E. Smith, Lord Birkenhead: Wilson, After the Victorians, 248-49
224 “his only mistress” : Moreau, The Golden Franc, 51.
224 He had a Rolls-Royce: Manchester, The Last Lion, 778-79.
224 Norman, despite his inherited wealth: Lyttelton, Memoirs of Lord Chandos, 137.
225 “undetected, like a shadow”: “From the ‘Old Lady.’ ” Time, January 12, 1925.
225 “unremarked”: “Plan to Pay Gold Calls Norman Here” New York Times, January 1, 1925. carved out of the solid bedrock: “Federal Bank Vault Carved in Solid Rock.” New York Times, October 18, 1924.
225 Most noticeable was the number of cars: “One Auto in the City to Each 16 Persons,” New York Times, May 18, 1924, and “Automobile Census Shows World Has 21,360,779 Cars,” New York Times, March 8, 1925. For relative wages between the United States and Europe, see “Premium on Dollar Keeps Wages Up,” New York Times, December 31, 1924.
226 “The great problem is sterling”: Strong memorandum to Carl Snyder, April 3, 1922, quoted in Chandler, Benjamin Strong, 291.
227 “a long period of unsettled conditions”: Strong memorandum, January 11, 1925, quoted in Chandler, Benjamin Strong, 309.
228 “My dear Ben”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, January 18, 1925.
229 “the Louis XVI of the monetary revolution”: Keynes, “Letter to Sir Charles Addis,” July 25, 1924, in Collected Writings, 19: 371-72.
229 “We should run the risk”: Keynes, “The Problem of the Gold Standard,” in The Nation and Athenaeum, May 2, 1925, in Collected Writings, 19: 337-44.
230 “faults in her economic structure”: Keynes, “The Return Towards Gold,” in The Nation and Athenaeum, February 21, 1925, in Collected Writings: Essays in Persuasion, 7: 192-200.
230 “pressing the return to the gold standard”: Taylor, Beaverbrook, 227.
230 “It is an absurd and silly notion”: Taylor, Beaverbrook, 319.
231 “he never could make out”: Churchill, Lord Randolph Churchill, 2: 184.
231 “If they were soldiers”: James, Churchill: A Study in Failure, 204.
231 “survival of a rudimentary”: “Mr. Churchill Exercise,” February 29, 1925, U.K. Treasury Papers, quoted in Moggridge, British Monetary Policy, 76.
232 “We, and especially Norman, feel”: Letter from Edward Grenfell to Jack Morgan, March 23, 1925, quoted in Chernow, The House of Morgan, 275-76.
232 “The Gold Standard is the best ‘Governor’ ”: Moggridge, British Monetary Policy, Appendix 5, 270-72.
232 “The Governor of the Bank”: Winston Churchill to Otto Niemeyer, February 22, 1925, U.K. Treasury Papers in Moggridge, British Monetary Policy, Appendix 5.
233 “Norman elaborates his own schemes”: Letter from Edward Grenfell to Jack Morgan, March 23, 1925, quoted in Chernow, The House of Morgan, 274.
233 “None of the witch doctors”: Leith-Ross, Money Talks, 91.
233 Norman often stopped by: Templewood, Nine Troubled Years, 78.
234 “knave-proof,” “living in a fool’s paradise”: Grigg, Prejudice and Judgment, 183.
235 “You have been a politician”: Grigg, Prejudice and Judgment, 184.
235 “I will make you the golden Chancellor”: Boyle, Montagu Norman, 189.
236 “It is imperative that”: Text of Churchill’s speech, including remark about fortifying himself, from Hansard, House of Commons Debates, 5 Series, vol. 183, cols 49-114.
236 “an amber-coloured liquid”: Howe, A World History, 290.
236 “If the English pound is not”: Churchill, Complete Speeches, 4: 3587.
236 “greatest achievement . . .”: Winston, Churchill. “Montagu Norman,” Sunday Pictorial, September 20, 1931.
237 “a signal triumph”: Times, April 29, 1925.
237 “the crowning achievement”: Economist, May 2, 1925.
237 “The proper object of dear money”: Keynes, “The Economic Consequences of Mr. Churchill,” in Collected Writing: Essays in Persuasion, 9: 220.
237 “because he has no instinctive judgment”: Keynes, “The Economic Consequences of Mr. Churchill,” in Collected Writing: Essays in Persuasion, 9: 212.
237 In 1927, he invited Keynes: Skidelsky, John Maynard Keynes: The Economist as Saviour, 203.
238 “the victims,” “in the flesh [of] the fundamental”: Keynes, “The Economic Consequences of Mr. Churchill,” in Collected Writing: Essays in Persuasion. 9: 223.
239 “the biggest blunder”: Moran, Winston Churchill, 303-304, quoted in Kynaston, The City of London: Illusions of Gold, 129.
239 “misled by the Governor”: Toye, Lloyd George and Churchill, 256.
239 “that man Skinner”: Grigg, Prejudice and Judgment, 193.
239 “to everyone’s surprise”: Amery, Diaries, 552, quoted in Kynaston, The City of London: Illusions of Gold, 129.
239 “The gold standard party”: Keynes, “The Gold Standard,” in The Nation and Athenaeum, May 2, 1925, in Collected Writings, 19: 361.
240 “In a new country”: Strong Memorandum, January 11, 1925, quoted in Chandler, Benjamin Strong, 309.
13: LA BATAILLE
241 Only peril: Charles de Gaulle quote from Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, 728.
245 Noblemen, who might otherwise: Plessis, Histoires de la Banque, 205-10.
246 Over the 120 years: Garratt, What Has Happened to Europe, 164-65.
246 “The hardest thing to understand”: Quoted in Brogan, France Under the Republic, 66.
249 “a kind of Treasury magician”: Binion, Defeated Leaders, 95.
249 As he strode into the Chamber: “Caillaux’s Political Resurrection,” The Literary Digest, May 2, 1925, and “In Parliament,” Time, May 4, 1925.
249 “frivolity”: Moreau, The Golden Franc, 37.
250 “in elegant social circles”: Jeanneney, François de Wendel, 248.
250 “regretted not having thrown”: Jeanneney, François de Wendel, 254.
252 “we are the soldiers”: Bonnet, Vingt Ans de Vie Politique, 101-102, quoted in Jeanneney, François de Wendel, 271.
252 “battle of the franc”: Sisley, Huddleston. “France Mobilizes to Save the Franc,” New York Times, May 30, 1926.
252 It managed to raise: “Save the Franc,” Time, May 3, 1926, and New York Herald Tribune, April 21, 1926.
253 “which must never be brought out”: Sisley, Huddleston. “France Mobilizes to Save the Franc,” New York Times, May 30, 1926.
253 “[laid] down their squabbles”: Letter from Strong to Peter Jay, May 9, 1926, quoted in Chandler, Benjamin Strong, 362.
253 “excoriated from one end”: Letter from Strong to George Harrison, May 23, 1926, quoted in Chandler, Benjamin Strong, 363.
254 “Am I to become
the liquidator”: Moreau, The Golden Franc, 12.
255 “My doubt is only about”: Bank of England, letter from Norman to Strong, June 8, 1926. The two bankers did manage: “Strong Refuses to Discuss Finance,” New York Times, June 30, 1926, and “Financiers Gather at Antibes,” New York Times, July 9, 1926.
255-56 Another intrepid journalist: “M. Strong et Sir [sic] Montagu Norman se reposent paisiblement a Antibes,” La Volonté, July 5, 1926.
256 Strong found his French banking: Leffler, The Elusive Quest, 146.
256 By 1926, an estimated forty-five thousand: “Il y a 500,000 Étrangers a Paris,” Le Journal, February 2, 1925.
256 The French press had: “L’Infiltration des Capitaux Américains dans l’Économie Francaise.” La Vie Financier, April 26, 1926.
257 “destructive grasshoppers”: Le Midi, April 17, 1926.
257 On July 11, in a dramatic protest: “Maimed and Blind Lead Paris Parade to Protest on Debt,” New York Times, July 12, 1926.
258 A couple of days later another party: “Reasonable Resentment,” Washington Post, July 26, 1926.
258 “Don’t boast in cafes”: “Our Tourist Troubles in France,” The Literary Digest, August 14, 1926.
259 “Xenophobic displays”: Moreau, The Golden Franc, 53.
259 “friendly but reserved”: Moreau, The Golden Franc, 43.
259 The governor’s suite at the bank: “Leur Vacances,” Le Petit Parisien, September 4, 1927, and Banque de France, Treasures.
260 “Mr. Norman arrived at eleven”: Moreau, The Golden Franc, 51.
260 “stupid, obstinate”: H. A. Siepman, “Central Bank Cooperation,” quoted in Mouré, The Gold Standard Illusion, 156.
261 “a commodity,” “only ready to sell”: Moreau, The Golden Franc, 182.
263 “slave to the books he has written”: Moreau, The Golden Franc, 124.
263 “You are not going to remain”: See the Introduction by Jean-Noël Jeanneney to Rist, Une Saison Gatée, 11.
264 “The level of the franc”: Keynes, Collected Writing: A Tract, 4: 60.
264 “the sacrifices demanded”: Boyle, Montagu Norman, 226.
265 “The past clung to everything”: Ferguson, The House of Rothschild, 458.
265 A familiar figure: Obituary in Le Monde, July 2, 1949.
266 “No cabinet was formed”: Lottman, The French Rothschilds, 136.