The Fun Fed

The Fun Fed Ever since the 1930s, Texas Democrat Wright Patman has been fulminating to bring the Federal Reserve System under tighter Government control. As it is, the Fed is a unique agency that, by design, is not subject to congressional appropriations or Government audit. It pays its own way largely out of interest earned on federal securities. The intention was, and is, to give the Fed a measure of independence from political control.

In one of his perennial attacks, Patman, head of the House Banking and Currency Committee, last week at a subcommittee hearing accused the Federal Reserve Board of spending as much as $588,200 on questionable or frivolous items. Examples: $2,514.11 on a picnic with prizes at the Buffalo branch, $50 for a parking fine and towing charge for a New York Fed official, $20.90 for babysitting charges so that a New York member and his wife could attend two dinners. In addition, Patman was disturbed by the Fed's "Thrift" club, in which the system has contributed almost $2,000,000 annually to a kind of mutual-fund program for employees.

One of Patman's complaints may liven up the banker's-gray image. "Has the Federal Reserve System ever paid for Federal Reserve clubs to have parties at Playboy clubs, complete with appropriately attired bunnies?" Patman demanded, having already received reports on the subject from member banks. Replied Federal Reserve Board Chairman Arthur Burns: "I didn't know there was that much imagination on the part of any of my colleagues."

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