Lincoln's election produced Southern secession, war, and abolition. Using a new dataset on slave sales, we examine connections between news and slave prices for the period 1856–1861. By August 1861, slave prices had declined by roughly one-third from their 1860 peak. That decline was similar for all age and sex cohorts and thus did not reflect expected emancipation without compensation. The decision to secede reflected beliefs that the North would not invade and that emancipation without compensation was unlikely. Both were encouraged by Lincoln's conciliatory tone before the attack on Fort Sumter, and subsequently dashed by Lincoln's willingness to wage all-out war. (JEL D72, D74, D83, G14, H77, N31, N41)

This paper offers a historical perspective on the evolution of central banks as lenders of last resort (LOLR). Countries differ in the statutory powers of the LOLR, which is the outcome of a political bargain. Collateralized LOLR lending as envisioned by Bagehot (1873) requires five key legal and institutional preconditions, all of which required political agreement. LOLR mechanisms evolved to include more than collateralized lending. LOLRs established prior to World War II, with few exceptions, followed policies that can be broadly characterized as implementing “Bagehot's Principles”: seeking to preserve systemic financial stability rather than preventing the failure of particular banks, and limiting the amount of risk absorbed by the LOLR as much as possible when providing financial assistance. After World War II, and especially after the 1970s, generous deposit insurance and ad hoc bank bailouts became the norm. The focus of bank safety net policy changed from targeting systemic stability to preventing depositor loss and the failure of banks. Statutory powers of central banks do not change much over time, or correlate with country characteristics, instead reflecting idiosyncratic political histories.

We examine bank governance and risk choices from the 1890s, a period without distortions from deposit insurance or other government assistance to banks. We link differences in managerial ownership to different corporate governance policies, risk, and methods of risk management. Formal corporate governance and high manager ownership are negatively correlated. Managerial salaries and self-lending are greater when managerial ownership is higher and lower when formal governance is employed. Banks with high managerial ownership (low formal governance) target lower default risk. High managerial ownership, not formal governance, is associated with greater reliance on cash instead of equity to limit risk.