Though Strong was responsible for many of the errors surrounding the reestablishment of the gold standard, and for the easy money policy that led to the stock market bubble, there is little doubt that in early 1931 he would have acted more vigorously and with greater effect than his successor, George Harrison, to prevent the cascade of bank runs. Moreover, on the international front he was the only member of the quartet with the necessary combination of ability, brains, and vision but also the economic firepower of the Fed’s gigantic gold reserves behind him to have assumed the leadership of
...more
