By Michael Snyder

We have come to accept that we are permanently trapped in an endless cycle of debt and money creation. But the only reason why debt and money grow at an exponential rate is because that is what our system was designed to do. The Federal Reserve and other central banks around the globe were created with a purpose. The goal was to get humanity into as much debt as possible, and those holding that debt just keep getting wealthier and wealthier. Unfortunately, we have been trained to not even question this deeply insidious arrangement.

Sadly, most Americans don’t even understand what the Federal Reserve is.

One thing that the Federal Reserve is NOT is a government agency. In fact, it is about as “federal” as Federal Express. It is a private central bank designed to make money for the people who created it. In fact, the Federal Reserve was the culmination of an effort by the international banking elite to force a permanent private central bank on the American people that began all the way back during the days of our Founding Fathers.

But don’t just take my word for it. The following are 21 quotes about central banking from past presidents, congressmen and other notable historical figures…

#1 John Adams, the second president of the United States: “All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation.”

#2 James Madison: “History records that the money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and it’s issuance.”

#3 Thomas Jefferson: “I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. Already they have raised up a monied aristocracy that has set the government at defiance. The issuing power (of money) should be taken away from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.”

#4 Abraham Lincoln: “The money powers prey upon the nation in times of peace and conspire against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than a monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, and more selfish than bureaucracy. It denounces as public enemies all who question its methods or throw light upon its crimes. I have two great enemies, the Southern Army in front of me and the bankers in the rear. Of the two, the one at my rear is my greatest foe.”

#5 James A. Garfield: “Whoever controls the volume of money in any country is absolute master of all industry and commerce.”

#6 Woodrow Wilson: “A great industrial nation is controlled by it’s system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated in the hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated governments in the world–no longer a government of free opinion, no longer a government by conviction and vote of the majority, but a government by the opinion and duress of small groups of dominant men.”

#7 Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild: “Give me control of a nation’s money and I care not who makes it’s laws”

#8 Horace Greeley: “While boasting of our noble deeds were careful to conceal the ugly fact that by an iniquitous money system we have nationalized a system of oppression which, though more refined, is not less cruel than the old system of chattel slavery.”

#9 Sir Josiah Stamp, the former President of the Bank of England: “Bankers own the earth. Take it away from them, but leave them the power to create money and control credit, and with a flick of a pen they will create enough to buy it back.”

#10 Rothschild Brothers of London, 1863: “The few who understand the system, will either be so interested from it’s profits or so dependent on it’s favors, that there will be no opposition from that class.”

#11 Charles A. Lindbergh Sr. in 1913: “This [Federal Reserve Act] establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When the President [Wilson} signs this bill, the invisible government of the monetary power will be legalized….the worst legislative crime of the ages is perpetrated by this banking and currency bill.”

#12 Charles A. Lindbergh Sr. in 1923: “The financial system has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board. That Board administers the finance system by authority of a purely profiteering group. The system is Private, conducted for the sole purpose of obtaining the greatest possible profits from the use of other people’s money”

#13 Congressman Louis T. McFadden: “The Federal Reserve banks are one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever seen. There is not a man within the sound of my voice who does not know that this nation is run by the International bankers.”

#14 Congressman Louis T. McFadden in 1932 just before FDR began his first term: “We have, in this country, one of the most corrupt institutions the world has ever known. I refer to the Federal Reserve Board. This evil institution has impoverished the people of the United States and has practically bankrupted our government. It has done this through the corrupt practices of the moneyed vultures who control it.”

#15 Franklin Delano Roosevelt: “The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. since the days of Andrew Jackson.”

#16 Eustace Mullins: “As soon as Mr. Roosevelt took office, the Federal Reserve began to buy government securities at the rate of ten million dollars a week for 10 weeks, and created one hundred million dollars in new [checkbook] currency, which alleviated the critical famine of money and credit, and the factories started hiring people again.”

#17 Congressman Wright Patman, Congressional Record, Sept 30, 1941: “The Federal Reserve bank buys government bonds without one penny…”

#18 Senator Barry Goldwater: “Most Americans have no real understanding of the operation of the international money lenders. The accounts of the Federal Reserve System have never been audited. It operates outside the control of Congress and manipulates the credit of the United States.”

#19 Henry Ford: It is well that the people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.”

#20 Lewis vs. United States, 680 F. 2d 1239 9th Circuit 1982: “The regional Federal Reserve banks are not government agencies. …but are independent, privately owned and locally controlled corporations.”

#21 Boston Federal Reserve Bank: “When you or I write a check there must be sufficient funds in our account to cover the check, but when the Federal Reserve writes a check there is no bank deposit on which that check is drawn. When the Federal Reserve writes a check, it is creating money.”

Why isn’t this one of the biggest political issues in the country today?

The Federal Reserve is at the center of a controversy over central banking that has been around since the very beginning of the United States. Unfortunately, the Federal Reserve system is so incredibly complex and the American people have been so “dumbed down” that the vast majority of the population literally has no idea how our system really works.

If we do nothing, things will continue to get even worse for ordinary Americans.

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