PRESS RELEASE
First State Hearing on Glass-Steagall in 2016
Jan. 20, 2016 (EIRNS)—The Washington State Senate Financial Institutions and Insurance Committee will hold a hearing today on Senate Joint Memorial 8005, which calls on Congress to enact pending legislature to restore the FDR Glass-Steagall law.
Memorials to Congress to reinstate Glass-Steagall are also pending in South Carolina (H 4486), New Jersey, and Pennsylvania.
The Washington State memorial asks “that Congress enact legislation that would reinstate the separation of commercial and investment banking functions that were in effect under the Glass- Steagall act, prohibiting commercial banks and bank holding companies from investing in stocks, underwriting securities, or investing in or acting as guarantors to derivative transactions, in order to prevent American taxpayers from being called upon to fund hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out financial institutions.”
Bills to reinstate Glass-Steagall are pending in both the House and the Senate. The House bill by Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH), HR 381, has 70 sponsors in all, and is being blocked from a hearing by the Committee on Financial Services chairman. The Senate bill by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, S. 1709, has 8 sponsors in all.
