As the Republicans take control of the House of Representatives, their first temptation as upholders of the free market and limited government will be to roll back swaths of the Dodd-Frank financial reform act. They should resist it.
The act’s eponymous authors have been marginalised since their 2,300-page epic was signed by Barack Obama in July. Chris Dodd retired from the Senate at these elections and Barney Frank lost the chairmanship of the House Financial Services Committee, probably to Spencer Bachus, a Republican who thinks their act leaves the way open to a repetition of the 2008 bank bail-outs.
The Republicans, harried by their Tea Party wing, have a choice on financial reform. They can either try fundamentally to rewrite Dodd-Frank, or can settle for ensuring that the regulators implement the act sensibly while they focus on reforming Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored housing entities (GSEs).