Usury: A Short History of Banking

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Surely the Government is in control of the country and its supply of
money? Surely money is only a symbolic token to facilitate the
production, exchange and distribution of goods and services? Not so,
say the Third Positionists, who reject both Capitalism and
Communism...


In the old days there was no paper money. The accepted token of
exchange was precious metal minted into coins by the Church and the
Crown. Because there was only a limited amount of gold and silver
available, the economic life of the nation had a certain regularity.

An even greater restriction existed throughout Christendom. This was a
prohibition against usury, or charging interest. The Church held it to
be a grave sin and the code was upheld by the civil powers. There were
harsh penalties for those who broke the law.

The regulation of usury was to prevent the separation of money from
reality. Money is not a good, it is a measure. It is fraud to pretend
otherwise, and constitutes theft. Usury is making money from lending
money; it is making money from nothing. This is exactly what is
happening today on a colossal scale.

Several important things arose from the prohibition of usury in
medieval Christendom. Firstly Jews, who had taken to wandering around
Europe in the Middle Ages, began to specialize in money-lending and
other practices which were forbidden to Christians. Exploited
Christians, both peasants and aristocracy, found themselves being bled
dry by usurers, which is why there were sporadic uprisings,
imprisonments and expulsions of Jews throughout Europe. It is one
reason why King Edward I expelled these perfidious people from England
in 1290. Oliver Cromwell allowed them back when the moral authority of
the Church was undermined and the King was beheaded in 1649.

Secondly, gold coins, jewels and other valuables were deposited with
people who held strongboxes. This was usually with goldsmiths and
money-lenders who, more often than not, were one and the same. These
loan-sharks and scriveners realized that, without much chance of being
found out, they could charge people for looking after their deposits
and then use those deposits – which did not belong to them – to make
loans to other people at interest. They soon became rich and powerful.

Gold coins are heavy and awkward to carry around so the custom arose
whereby the money-lenders would issue credit notes to depositors who
began to trade these notes between themselves in commercial
transactions. Paper money had come into existence.

A new form of usury developed as the swindling money-lenders realized
the immoral benefits that could be obtained from such a situation. It
became apparent to these thieves that they could go one step further
than dishonestly using other people’s money for financial advantage at
no cost to themselves. They could invent money from absolutely
nothing. They could issue credit notes with nothing to back them up
and put them into circulation as interest-bearing debts. No-one would
be any the wiser. They calculated that they could safely issue notes
for up to ten times more than the gold deposits they held, because the
depositors would never ask for their deposits back all at the same
time.

The principle of modern banking was thus established: invent money
from nothing, put it into circulation as "running cash notes" that
have to be paid back with real wealth that is produced from our
labour, sit back and become unbelievably wealthy and powerful men:
hidden rulers of nations.

In England this deceitful system was officially sanctioned in 1694.
The usurper of the throne, William of Orange, had overthrown the
legitimate King James II with the financial backing and plotting of
powerful Jewish financiers in Amsterdam. In return he gave the
sovereignty of England to a group of financiers by means of a Charter
allowing them to call themselves the Bank of England. The Charter made
no mention of issuing the nation’s money, but within minutes of
signing the new Bank officials were discussing the form of their
"running cash notes." The same system was adopted in every country by
a process of Masonic revolution and manipulation.

FREEMASONRY AND COMMUNISM

Socialist theorists and ideologues have never attacked the essential
mechanism of capitalism. Although the injustices of the capitalist
system have been attacked in volume after volume, and rightly so, they
have never even hinted at the usury upon which the whole system is
built and from which all the other injustices stem.

Perhaps this is because so many Communist leaders are Jewish. Most of
the ‘Russian Revolutionists’ of 1917 were actually Jews from the lower
east side of New York City. Two hundred and seventy-five of them were
conveyed to Russia aboard the S.S. Christiana, led by Trotsky and
financed by Kuhns, Loebs, Schiffs and Warburgs. This cosy circle of
Jews and Freemasons financed both sides of the Great War.

Marx and Engels, two more Jews, wrote the Communist Manifesto on
behalf of a secret society calling themselves ‘The League of Just
Men.’ This secret society was an arm of the Illuminati, whose power
and influence was the catalyst of the French Revolution. One of the
founding members of the Illuminati was the House of Rothschild, the
Jewish banking house which practically invented supra-nationalism for
personal profit.

THE SITUATION TODAY

Nowadays banking has become extremely sophisticated but the hidden and
usurious mechanism behind it remains the same. After a big enquiry,
hushed up as much as possible, the Bank of England was nationalised in
1946. In theory control of the Bank of England should then have passed
from a group of private individuals to the British Government, but
this is still not the case. Nationalisation only added a thin veneer
of respectability.

The British Treasury, in conjunction with the Bank of England’s
advisers to the Government, determine how much paper money and coin
will be issued each year. This has to accord with the wealth of the
nation for that year. But because banknotes and coins only account for
a tiny percentage of financial transactions, it makes no difference to
the bankers at all. Most financial transactions are carried out with
abstract figures on a computer screen that have no relationship to
real wealth. Everything has to be paid for at interest though – even
when it doesn’t exist!

The Government still has to pay interest on old and new loans from the
Bank. Only a few years ago it was announced that the interest debt on
a loan taken during the Napoleonic War had just been paid off! This is
where much of our tax money goes.

THE NEXT STAGE

The next stage of development for international finance is to get rid
of cash altogether. Then the token accountability of the bankers will
disappear along with the cash. Their intention is that everyone will
have to use credit/debit cards for every type of commercial
transaction.

Electronic technology, when used this way, and when it is not merely
widespread but compulsory, will give them complete control of every
man, woman and child in the world. If you cannot buy or sell – food,
petrol, clothes – without a card you are completely at their mercy. If
you lose the card or it doesn’t work for some reason you will suffer
until issued with a replacement. If you make a protest against some
particular injustice they could invalidate your card. The next time
you go to the supermarket your card may not work. You won’t officially
exist!

Who benefits from such a scheme? The politicians or the bankers? To
ask the question is to answer it. The Bank of England is the real, but
hidden, government of the country. The Government and the politicians
are merely puppets controlled by the Bank – or, more accurately, the
international banking families. None of our cowardly politicians dare
stand up to these hidden and unelected rulers of the world, so
powerful have they become. Two American presidents, possibly three,
were assassinated for attempting to do so. It is far easier for them
to submit to the system and enjoy a rich life than expose the real
tyrants: tyrants who cause high taxes, unemployment, war, famine and
misery for the rest of us. But these despots of the New World Order
forget that Truth is more powerful than they could ever become. And
Truth brings Justice!


The pen is mightier than the pound! This article first appeared in
issue 5 of ‘The Anvil,’ published by The Third Position, BCM ITP,
London, WC1N 3XX.

http://www.heretical.com/miscellx/usury.html

In article ,
Western Voice wrote:
Surely the Government is in control of the country and its supply of
money? Surely money is only a symbolic token to facilitate the

Money supply is controlled by the Bank of England. In theory, the
Treasury can tell them what to do, but the trend has been towards
greater independence.

Francis

A Brief History of Banking

Banking activities were sufficiently important in Babylonia in the second millennium b.c. that written standards of practice were considered necessary. These standards were part of the Code of Hammurabi � the earliest known formal laws. Obviously, these primitive banking transactions were very different in many ways to their modern-day counterparts. Deposits were not of money but of cattle, grain or other crops and eventually precious metals. Nevertheless, some of the basic concepts underlying today�s banking system were present in these ancient arrangements, however. A wide range of deposits was accepted, loans were made, and borrowers paid interest to lenders.[1]



Similar banking type arrangements could also be found in ancient Egypt. These arrangements stemmed from the requirement that grain harvests be stored in centralized state warehouses. Depositors could use written orders for the withdrawal of a certain quantity of grain as a means of payment. This system worked so well that it continued to exist even after private banks dealing in coinage and precious metals were established[2].



We can trace modern-day banking to practices in the Medieval Italian cities of Florence, Venice and Genoa. The Italian bankers made loans to princes, to finance wars and their lavish lifestyles, and to merchants engaged in international trade. In fact, these early banks tended to be set up by trading families as a part of their more general business activities. The Bardi and Peruzzi families were dominant in Florence in the 14th century and established branches in other parts of Europe to facilitate their trading activities[3]. Both these banks extended substantial loans to Edward III of England to finance the 100 years war against France. But Edward defaulted, and the banks failed.

Perhaps the most famous of the medieval Italian banks was the Medici bank, set up by Giovanni Medici in 1397[4]. The Medici had a long history as money changers, but it was Giovanni who moved the business from a green-covered table in the market place into the hall of a palace he had built for himself. He expanded the scope of the business and established branches of the bank as far north as London. While the Medici bank extended the usual loans to merchants and royals, it also enjoyed the distinction of being the main banker for the Pope. Papal business earned higher profits for the bank than any of its other activities and was the main driving force behind the establishment of branches in other Italian cities and across Europe.



Much of the international business of the medieval banks was carried out through the use of bills of exchange. At the simplest level, this involved a creditor providing local currency to the debtor in return for a bill stating that a certain amount of another currency was payable at a future date � often at the next big international fair. Because of the prohibition on directly charging interest, the connection between banking and trade was essential. The bankers would take deposits in one city, make a loan to someone transporting goods to another city, and then take repayment at the destination. The repayment was usually in a different currency, so it could easily incorporate what is essentially an interest payment, circumventing the church prohibitions. An example shows how it worked. A Florentine bank would lend 1000 florins in Florence requiring repayment of 40,000 pence in three months in the bank�s London office. In London, the bank would then loan out the 40,000 pence to be repaid in Florence at a rate of 36 pence per florin in three months. In six months, the bank makes 11.1 percent � that�s an annual rate of 23.4 percent. It is also interesting to note that a double-entry bookkeeping system was used by these medieval bankers and that payments could be executed purely by book transfer[5].



During the 17th and 18th centuries the Dutch and British improved upon Italian banking techniques. A key development often credited to the London goldsmiths around this time was the adoption of fractional reserve banking[6]. By the middle of the 17th century, the civil war had resulted in the demise of the goldsmiths� traditional business of making objects of gold and silver. Forced to find a way to make a living, and have the means to safely store precious metal, they turned to accepting deposits of precious metals for safekeeping. The goldsmith would then issue a receipt for the deposit. At first, these receipts circulated as form of money. But eventually, the goldsmiths realized that, since not all of the depositors would demand their gold and silver simultaneously, they could issue more receipts than they had metal in their vault.



Banks became an integral part of the US economy from the beginning of the Republic. Five years after the Declaration of Independence, the first chartered bank was established in Philadelphia in 1781,[7] and by 1794, there were seventeen more. At first, bank charters could only be obtained through an act of legislation. But, in 1838, New York adopted the Free Banking Act, which allowed anyone to engage in banking business as long as they met certain legal specifications. As free banking quickly spread to other states, problems associated with the system soon became apparent. For example, banks incorporated under these state laws had the right to issue their own bank notes. This led to a multiplicity of notes � many of which proved to be worthless in the (all too common) event of a bank failure.



With the civil war came legislation that provided for a federally chartered system of banks. This legislation allowed national banks to issue notes and placed a tax on state issued bank notes. These national bank notes came with a federal guarantee, which protected the note-holder if the bank failed. This new legislation also brought all banks under federal supervision. In essence, it laid the foundations of the present-day system. [906]









[1] Davies, G. (1994) �A History of Money from Ancient Times to the Present Day�, Cardiff, UK, University of Wales Press.

[2] Davies (1994) op. cit.

[3] Hoggson, N. F. (1926) �Banking Through the Ages�, New York, Dodd, Mead & Company.

[4] Goldthwaite, R. A. (1995) �Banks, Places and Entrepreneurs in Renaissance Florence�, Aldershot, Hampshire, Great Britain, Variorum.

[5] Goldthwaite (1995) op. cit.

[6] Davies (1994) op. cit.

[7] Klebaner, B. J. (1974) �Commercial Banking in the United States: A History�:, Hinsdale, Illinois, Dryden Press.