Kathryn Judge

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Essay
Volume 92.2
Regionalism and the Federal Reserve Banks
Kathryn Judge
Harvey J. Goldschmid Professor of Law at Columbia Law School.

The authors are grateful to Scott Baker, Michael Held, Patricia Mosser, Nathan Tankus, and the participants at the Washington University Law and Economics Workshop and the Women in Law and Finance Workshop at Wharton for helpful comments on earlier drafts. Brian Japari and Alex MacDonald provided exceptionally helpful research assistance. Research for this publication is made possible in part by The Leichtman-Levine Faculty Research Fund at Columbia Law School.

Lev Menand
Associate Professor of Law at Columbia Law School.

The authors are grateful to Scott Baker, Michael Held, Patricia Mosser, Nathan Tankus, and the participants at the Washington University Law and Economics Workshop and the Women in Law and Finance Workshop at Wharton for helpful comments on earlier drafts. Brian Japari and Alex MacDonald provided exceptionally helpful research assistance. Research for this publication is made possible in part by The Leichtman-Levine Faculty Research Fund at Columbia Law School.

Regionalism is central to our country’s central banking system. Rather than rely on a single organization, Congress created twelve Federal Reserve Banks (FRBs), each in a different part of the country. These FRBs are an undertheorized example of how the federal government uses regional bodies to formulate and administer federal policy. This Essay examines the regional aspect of the FRBs, distinguishing between three types of regionalism: regional policy variation, regional policy formulation, and regional policy implementation. Regional policy variation makes less and less sense in today’s national and interconnected financial system. The trend of shifting decisions from the FRBs to national bodies should be continued. But regional voice and implementation should be retained. The Open Market Committee is critical for incorporating regional perspectives into uniform, national policy, and the FRBs carry out these policies at a regional level in ways that enhance legitimacy, improve efficacy, and promote resiliency.

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Essay
86 Special
Judges and Judgment: In Praise of Instigators
Kathryn Judge
Professor of Law, Columbia Law School; Research Member, European Corporate Governance Institute.

The author would like to thank John Coates, John Morley, and Quinn Curtis for helpful comments; Christian Ronald for excellent research assistance; and Lawrence Lessig and Jesse Eisinger for inspiration. Mistakes are mine alone.

This Essay is about mutual funds.

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