 The frequency of crises and the severity of the 1907 panic added to concern about the outsized role of J.P. Morgan which led to renewed impetus toward a national debate on reform . In May 1908 , Congress passed the Aldrich – Vreeland Act that established the National Monetary Commission to investigate the panic and to propose legislation to regulate banking . Senator Nelson Aldrich ( R – RI ) , the chairman of the National Monetary Commission , went to Europe for almost two years to study that continent 's banking systems . 
