Back in February 2009, Congress had the opportunity to pass sweeping bankruptcy reform that would have allowed judges to modify the terms of mortgages on home residences.  The House passed the legislation, but the Senate never took up the debate and the amendments died!  At the same time, the financial industry was bailed out, along with the insurance and auto industries; all in the name of too big to fail.  But, millions of Americans have seen their lives and families destroyed in the interim.  All in the name of preserving the financial industry.

Jefferson's words are as true today as they were in 1802: "I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.  If the American people even allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered."  Thomas Jefferson, 1802.

They are that much more prophetic as it relates to the power of banks today upon our elected officials through lobbying and political contribution, and when coupled with those of the Founding Fathers in the Declaration of Independence, should give each of us cause to be concerned that: "Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, – That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”

There is a Constitutional mandate that Congress enact uniform laws on Bankruptcy (and Immigration).  The first bankruptcy laws were enacted in 1800 and repealed in 1803, coincidentally during Jefferson's term in office.  Several other enactments followed in response to interim economic panics prior to the enactment of the 1898 Act, followed by the 1978 Code, and the 2005 BAPCPA.

Now that the financial industry seems to be bouncing back nicely, is it time to revisit bankruptcy reform to give the average American family an equal break?