Ron Paul's Statement Introducing HR 1207

HR 1207 is Dr. Paul's recently introduced legislation to audit the Federal Reserve, officially titled "The Federal Reserve Transparency Act." The bill has the following 11 bi-partisan cosponsors: Neil Abercrombie [HI-1], Michele Bachmann [MN-6], Roscoe G. Bartlett [MD-6], Paul Broun [GA-10], Dan Burton [IN-5], Walter Jones, Jr. [NC-3], Steve Kagen [WI-8], Ted Poe [TX-2], Bill Posey [FL-15], Denny Rehberg [MT], and Lynn Woolsey [CA-6]. If your rep is not among these 11, please contact him or her and urge their support.

Here's Dr. Paul's statement introducing the bill:

Madam Speaker, I rise to introduce the Federal Reserve Transparency Act. Throughout its nearly 100-year history, the Federal Reserve has presided over the near-complete destruction of the United States dollar. Since 1913 the dollar has lost over 95% of its purchasing power, aided and abetted by the Federal Reserve's loose monetary policy. How long will we as a Congress stand idly by while hard-working Americans see their savings eaten away by inflation? Only big-spending politicians and politically favored bankers benefit from inflation.

Serious discussion of proposals to oversee the Federal Reserve is long overdue. I have been a longtime proponent of more effective oversight and auditing of the Fed, but I was far from the first Congressman to advocate these types of proposals. Esteemed former members of the Banking Committee such as Chairmen Wright Patman and Henry B. Gonzales were outspoken critics of the Fed and its lack of transparency.

Since its inception, the Federal Reserve has always operated in the shadows, without sufficient scrutiny or oversight of its operations. While the conventional excuse is that this is intended to reduce the Fed's susceptibility to political pressures, the reality is that the Fed acts as a foil for the government. Whenever you question the Fed about the strength of the dollar, they will refer you to the Treasury, and vice versa. The Federal Reserve has, on the one hand, many of the privileges of government agencies, while retaining benefits of private organizations, such as being insulated from Freedom of Information Act requests.