A Brief History of the Federal Reserve Bank

The Second Bank
Congress once again created a central bank in 1816, in response to the inflation that resulted from the increase in banknotes printed to pay off the debt occasioned by the War of 1812. A little more than ten years after its opening, however, the new bank came into the cross hairs of Andrew Jackson, who worked to kill it after he was elected president in 1828. Jackson argued that the bank was corrupt and a threat to American liberties. In the cartoon above, Jackson is shown destroying the bank to the approval of the Uncle Sam figure on the right and the annoyance of the bank's president, Nicholas Biddle, who is rendered as the Devil. In 1836, the Second Bank's charter was not renewed.

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