Credit-history Books

Bankruptcy is in the air these days, from Enron to overextended former dot-commers. So-called "bankruptcy reform" -- intended to make bankruptcy more difficult and more punitive for debtors -- has been pushed by large creditors for years, and almost passed in the most recent session of Congress.

I'm a first-semester law student. I came to this book with a solid, basic understanding of modern bankruptcy law (gained as a business person and as a legal assistant prior to starting law school). As an undergraduate I took two semesters of legal history, and I have an extensive personal interest in American history.

Despite my background, until I read this book I had no real appreciation of the implications of failing to have an effective bankruptcy law. Focusing primarily on the second half of the eighteenth century (both before and after the American Revolution), Republic of Debtors does an amazing job of showing the social, humanitarian and economic consequences of failing to provide for an orderly discharge of debts in bankruptcy, especially when combined with creditors' remedies such as imprisonment for debt.

I, for one, had never confronted the fact that imprisonment for debt survived so long after the American Revolution, nor did I realize that, aside from some brief experiments, the US did not adopt a set nationwide laws on bankruptcy until the late nineteenth century.

Professor Mann tells the story by drawing on a wide variety of primary materials, including the diaries of imprisoned debtors and documentation of court cases. One particularly interesting chapter deals with the an elaborate form of self-government that evolved within one of the debtor's prisons. As many of those imprisoned were relatively well-educated and had been involved in the movement for independence from England, it was only natural that they would have their own constitution and elected government.

Then, as now, there was a tension between the moral and economic aspects of bankruptcy. On one hand, debtors can be viewed immoral spendthrifts, on the other, as hapless victims of the vicissitudes of a world-wide economy or the bad actions of others. These same tensions underlie the current debate on changes to bankruptcy law, driven by creditors who are seeking a return to a more punitive, moralistic approach to dealing with insolvent creditors.

I strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in the modern bankruptcy debate, early American legal history, or social and economic history generally. It is also just a cracking good read.

Cheers!

Today the rich can still find ways to get out of the spendthrift debts with trusts, shelters, and bankruptcy, but we have to crack down on the debts that poor people get into like student loans, medical expenses, unemployment and the like.

This book tells us that the elite in the U.S. have always been all in favor of getting out of their own debt while holding the lowborn to the "morality" of insolvency for life.

February, 1813. A powerful British fleet takes control of Chesapeake Bay. The British admiralty orders the destruction of the port complex of Norfolk and Portsmouth, the Navy Yard at Gosport, and the frigate USS Constellation. The most important obstacle to success is little, barren, poorly defended Craney Island.
The story is told in its entirety here, for the first time. Included in facinatindg detail is the little known feud between the militia artillerists and the Regular Navy gunners over which is entitled to the credit for breaking the British attack. The spectacle of the Virginia legislature investigating the conduct of a battle fought 35 years before is probably unparalled in the annals of American military history.

A tightly written, thoroughly researched and eminetly readable account of a unique joint service action that never received the serious attention it deserves.

The author is a retied Army officer and former professor of political science.

Chester has become a staple in our classroom. The students love to read his adventures and he helps to make a sometimes confusing topic more understandable.

The author helped launch the first credit card in the 1950's. He describes in detail the many bad things that have happened from Americans becoming too reliant on plastic, living beyond their means. Should be required reading for all high school students!!!!

this is a great book on the history and development of credit use in the united states. i recommend it highly.

impact of credit cards in INDIAN economy and its effects in INDI

From approximately 1312 to 1415 Bruges was the hub of European trade. English wool came to the Staple where it was distributed to the Flemish weavers, made into cloth and sold all over the world. Spices and silks from the caravan trade arrived in Venice and were carted to Bruges for sale in northern Europe. The bulky goods were moved about by the merchant; what about his money? One day he has many bags of gold coins and another day he has few or none. He needs to be able to deposit his gold somewhere and have a written certificate of deposit for it--that is, credit. So one merchant becomes a banker--he stays in one place, receiving and paying out. The coins--from all over the world--are a problem. The banker becomes money-changer. He takes gold coins to the mint to be melted down and made into local coinage.

The Lombards ran pawn shops, the equivalent of today's plastic credit card. Consumer debt, at fairly high interest rates, with the pawned objects as security, starts here. Very poor people who needed to borrow small sums from time to time depended on the Lombards--and hated them too. Notice that widows and others could invest in the pawn shop--loan money to the Lombards--and receive interest once a year. This was working capital for the pawn shop owner; otherwise he would have a warehouse full of objects and no money to lend to his customers.

Goods flowed and credit flowed and business boomed. There were defaults; too many defaults would drive the bankers, money-changers and Lombards into bankruptcy which in turn ruined merchants and manufacturers. Finally Bruges lost out to Antwerp.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The author gives interpretations as well as facts. One can get a clear picture of Bruges in its heyday.

Written by the coins and medals experts of the British Museum, this handsomely designed work succinctly but comprehensively explores the entire history of money, from its earliest beginnings to the electronic transactions of the 1990's.
The book features over 550 beautiful color and black-and-white illustrations, with essays covering ancient and modern coinage in global perspective, and relating the moral, political, religious, and social meanings inevitably associated with so powerful a force. Highly recommended as an excellent introduction to a complex subject, or just for enjoyable and informative browsing.

(The "score" rating is an ineradicable feature of the page. This reviewer does not "score" books.)

This is a collection of articles on authorship, from authors with diverse backgrounds . Some of them are very good. I particularly enjoyed Mr. Galison article on multiple autorship and The CERN. It think only that one would be worth having the entire book.

Professor Beachy's book counters a long scholarly tradition that discounts the importance of bourgeois urban life and politics on the development of liberal politics in Germany. He makes a compelling case that the political dynamics of Old Regime Leipzing, which emerged from local practical politics about taxation and private property, had a profouind effect not only on Leipzig as a citym but also Saxony as a state well into the Nineteenth Century.

Beachy's study bridges the chasm of the Napoleonic Wars and counters the thesis that German politics was necessarily an exception to patterns of liberal development elsewhere in Europe, such as England, France and the Netherlands.