Editing Federal Reserve Note (section)

==Value==
The authority of the Federal Reserve Banks to issue notes comes from the [[Federal Reserve Act]] of 1913. Legally, they are liabilities of the Federal Reserve Banks and obligations of the United States government. Although not issued by the [[United States Treasury]], Federal Reserve Notes carry the (engraved) signature of the [[Treasurer of the United States]] and the [[United States Secretary of the Treasury]].

At the time of the Federal Reserve's creation, the law provided for notes to be redeemed to the Treasury in gold or "lawful money." The latter category was not explicitly defined, but included [[United States Note]]s, [[National Bank Note]]s, and certain other notes held by banks to meet [[Bank reserves|reserve]] requirements, such as [[Clearing (finance)|clearing]] certificates.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Cross, Ira B.|title=A Note on Lawful Money|journal=The Journal of Political Economy|volume=46|number=3|date=June 1938|pages=409–413|doi=10.1086/255236|s2cid=153434804}}</ref> The [[Emergency Banking Act]] of 1933 removed the gold obligation and authorized the Treasury to satisfy these redemption demands with current notes of equal face value (effectively making change). Under the [[Bretton Woods system]], although citizens could not legally possess gold (except as rare coins, jewelry, for industrial purposes, etc.), the federal government continued to maintain a stable international gold price. This system ended with the [[Nixon Shock]] of 1971. Present-day Federal Reserve Notes are not backed by convertibility to any specific commodity, but only by the collateral assets that Federal Reserve Banks post in order to obtain them.<ref name="USC.12.412">{{USC|12|412}}</ref>