The only member of the Federal Open Market Committee to vote against Wednesday's 50-basis point cut in the federal funds rate was Richard W. Fisher, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
Fisher gave a speech in Philadelphia earlier this month at an event organized by the Global Interdependence Center. Yes, it was about monetary policy - all the rage now.
But he began with a nice anecdote about what Philadelphia and the Girard Trust means to him:
First, a word about Philadelphia. I spent a tad more than my Fed per diem last night and stayed at the Ritz Carlton at Broad and Chestnut. Before it became a hotel, that monumental building housed the old Girard Trust Company. True Philadelphians know the rock-solid financial legacy of Stephen Girard. In 1811, he bought the remaining shares in the First Bank of the United States and renamed it Girard's Bank. History footnotes Girard's Bank as the key financial backer of the U.S. during the War of 1812. According to one estimate, the value of Girard's net worth at his death in 1831 was roughly $2 trillion in today's dollars. Imagine: Girard made Warren Buffett look like a piker! He and his bank were so financially solid that the saying "In Girard we trust" was later morphed into the Girard Trust Company.
It was Girard Trust that took an interest in me in 1963 and gave my family the means to send me far from home to a New Jersey boarding school. I never quite learned why they treated me so kindly, but I do remember my father saying that Girard had a soft spot for wayward boys from "challenged" backgrounds who might - just might - have some potential for salvation. I would never have accumulated all those honors mentioned in President Plosser's introduction, nor would I have had the good life I have enjoyed, nor would I be addressing you today as a Federal Reserve Bank president, had it not been for Girard Trust.
So I slept well last night in the bosom of that solid old building that was once a pillar of financial rectitude - a rare luxury for a policymaker in these fitful times.
