ting aside of gold and then held by them, or oftener, he shall call in, redeem, and cancel such greenbacks so held that are in excess of the total amount of such notes issued to banking associations and held by them, previous to the setting aside of gold, and in amounts of one hundred dollars or any multiple thereof. He shall first reduce the amount of such greenbacks to those associations which hold the largest amount of greenbacks in proportion to their capital, if requested by them so to do, and until the holdings of such greenbacks by all associations have been reduced to the sum required to be taken out by them; and he may require any association to increase its holdings of greenbacks in sums of one hundred dollars or any multiple thereof when the increase of its capital makes its holdings of greenbacks less in percentage than is required by this Act. Thereafter the taking out and the holdings of greenbacks by any association shall be reduced so as to keep the total amount of greenbacks held by the aggregate of all associations as near as may be at the aggregate amount of greenbacks so held by all associations at the time of the setting aside of gold herein mentioned.

Two years from the day of the setting aside of the gold in the Treasury to redeem certain legal-tender notes any gold so set aside then remaining shall be free money in the Treasury.

SEC. 5. That upon the expiration of the corporate term of any association, if its corporate existence is not extended by the Comptroller of the Currency, or upon the insolvency of an association, or by the order or with the consent of the Comptroller, approved by the Secretary of the Treasury, the Treasurer shall redeem the greenbacks issued to the association, out of any moneys in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated.

Any association may reduce its currency by surrendering it for destruction to the Comptroller of the Currency, who shall destroy the currency so surrendered in the manner prescribed by law. The liability of any association for its currency shall neither be canceled nor reduced in any other manner.

SEC. 6. That each association shall keep good with the Treasurer of the United States and he shall at all times keep and have on deposit in the Treasury of the United States, in lawful money, except as hereinafter provided, for the current redemption fund of each association during its solvency, a sum equal to the five per centum before mentioned of the greenbacks and average outstanding currency of the association, to be held and used for the current redemption of its greenbacks and currency; and no part of such redemption fund shall be counted as a part of the reserve of any bank; and when the notes of any association, assorted or unassorted, shall be presented for such redemption to the Treasurer of the United States, in sums of five hundred dollars, or any multiple thereof, or in sums equaling not less than one per centum of the total circulation of any association having less than fifty thousand dollars in greenbacks and currency, the same shall be redeemed.

Each association shall redeem in lawful money its greenbacks and currency at its own banking house and at an agency approved by the Comptroller in some reserve city.

The right to confer the duties and responsibilities of executing the provisions of this Act, or any part thereof, relating to the current redemption fund or the redemption of greenbacks and currency upon any reserve bank or other suitable agent, under such regulations as he may deem safe and proper, and to deposit any part of the current redemption fund or funds in any place he may deem proper, with the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, is hereby conferred upon the Treasurer of the United States.

SEC. 7. That from and after thirty days from the setting aside of gold by the Treasurer of the United States to redeem and cancel certain legal-tender notes as aforesaid the cash reserve required by law to be kept by banking associations shall be kept as near as may be in equal parts in greenbacks of other associations in silver coin and in gold coin of the United States.

Each banking association may keep its coin and its bonds in such place and under such circumstances as the Comptroller of the Currency may approve, but the gold coin required to be kept in the cash reserve by each association shall be kept in a clearing house organized under this act.

Any association that fails to so keep, use, and pay out its silver coin, gold coin, greenbacks, and currency as to keep each one and all four kinds of money at a parity each with all the others from and after the setting aside of gold herein mentioned shall be deemed to have failed to pay on demand in coin or in United States legal-tender notes issued to other associations its greenbacks and currency.

No association shall plead in defense, in any action brought against it, that any greenback or currency note signed by its officers and paid out by it is a United States legal-tender note.

SEC. 8. That hereafter no certificates shall be issued or reissued by the Treasury of the United States upon the deposit of gold coin, silver coin, or any other money, and that all existing coin certificates and money certificates shall be canceled and destroyed upon being received into the Treasury, and the coin or money remaining upon which they were issued shall be free coin or money in the Treasury; and no circulating note authorized under existing law shall be issued or reissued to any banking association of a less denomination than three dollars,* and all such notes of less denomination than three dollars hereafter received for redemption shall be canceled when received in the Treasury, and like notes in blank of a larger denomination shall be returned in place of them; and no United States legal-tender notes, including Treasury notes, of a less denomination than three dollars shall be hereafter issued or reissued, but those of a larger denomination shall be issued or reissued in place of them.

SEC. 9. That there is hereby constituted and appointed a board of advisers to the Comptroller of the Currency, consisting of seven experts, to consult and advise with the Comptroller upon methods of executing existing law concerning banking, and changes desirable therein, over which board the Comptroller of the Currency shall preside.

The president of the chief reserve bank in San Francisco, New Orleans, and each of the other five chief reserve cities in the country, or such substitute as any one of them shall from time to time appoint, shall be a member of the board of advisers, which board shall meet once a year, or oftener if the Comptroller of the Currency or a majority of the board so determines, and at such time and place as the Comptroller shall appoint.

The recommendations of the board of advisers, or a synopsis thereof, and all votes, shall be entered in the records of the board. The decision of the Secretary of the Treasury from time to time as to what

*Treasury report, February 28, 1898:

$1 notes in circulation.

$2 notes in circulation..

Total outstanding notes under $5.

$5 notes in circulation.....

$107, 730, 205 31, 144, 000

138, 874, 205 273, 971, 710

person or persons are entitled to act as members of the board of advisers shall be final.

Any association aggrieved by any action taken in its case by the Comptroller of the Currency may appeal to the board of expert advisers, and the decision of such board in such case by a yea and nay vote if no member votes in the negative, or when approved by the Secretary of the Treasury, shall be final.

SEC. 10. That any five or more national banking associations are hereby authorized to unite in forming a clearing-house association. By adopting a constitution and by-laws not inconsistent with the provisions of this Act, the banking associations uniting to do so and certifying to the Comptroller of the Currency that fact shall in that act become a clearing-house association body corporate, upon such constitution and by-laws being approved in writing by the Comptroller of the Currency. An incorporated banking association may be admitted to membership in any clearing-house association incorporated under this Act; and the membership of any banking association of such clearing-house association may be terminated by any action of the clearing-house association approved by the Comptroller of the Currency.

Any banking association may withdraw from any clearing-house association and any clearing-house association may withdraw from the national clearing-house association upon such conditions as the Comptroller of the Treasury may approve.

Each member of such clearing-house association shall share in its fees and other income, and in its assessments, expenses, and losses in the proportion that the amount of its capital bears to the total amount of all the capital of all the associations composing the clearing-house association and as shown by the annual report of the Comptroller of the Currency last made previous to the apportionment of the same, when the items of its capital are given in such report.

Each clearing-house association may make sales or loans to or buy or borrow from other clearing-house associations, and banking associa tions may make sales or loans to or buy or borrow from clearing-house associations. In all such buying, selling, loaning and borrowing clearinghouse and banking associations shall be exempt from the usury laws of the States in which they are located.

Any clearing-house association organized under this Act may establish a department for the clearing of the greenbacks and currency of banking associations in the current redemption thereof.

Any changes in the constitution or by-laws of any clearing-house association, to become valid, must be consistent with this Act and must be approved in writing by the Comptroller of the Currency, and the Comptroller may annul any part of the same at any time after a hearing thereon, with the concurrence of a majority of the board of advisers. Five or more clearing-house associations organized under this Act may form a national clearing-house association and any clearing house organized under this Act may be admitted to and remain a member of the national clearing-house association upon the same terms and conditions as those governing in the case of associations constituting clearinghouse associations composed of banking associations, and the persons who constitute the board of advisers to the Comptroller of the Currency provided for in section nine of this Act, shall constitute the board of directors of the national clearing-house association: Provided, however, That national clearing house associations may make sales or loans to and may buy or borrow from clearing-house associations and may buy and sell such bonds as are necessary or desirable to the conduct of its

legitimate business to any amount and of any kind approved of by the Comptroller of the Currency, and may provide for the coin redemption of circulating notes of banking associations, and may take and issue, under the provisions of this Act, the greenbacks described in this Act, but in denominations of not less than one thousand dollars.*

Any clearing-house association organized under this Act may be desig nated by the Secretary of the Treasury as a depository of public moneys, and may also be employed as a financial agent of the Government.

Any clearing-house or banking association organized under this Act. may, with the approval of the Secretary of the Treasury, deliver to the Treasurer of the United States or to any assistant treasurer of the United States, for safe-keeping, any kind of money or bonds, and receive such a statement of the fact of their being in the Treasury of the United States as the Secretary of the Treasury may approve.

Clearing-house associations shall be subject to like examination by national-bank examiners as national-banking associations, and shall make such reports to the Comptroller of the Currency as he may request.

The meeting together of any persons who are officers, agents, or employees of any five or more associations in any one or more places once in ten days or oftener for the purpose of exchanging, paying, or in any other way satisfying any obligations used in commerce among the several States by any two or more of such associations, shall constitute such associations represented in such meeting a clearing-house association for the purpose of the taxation herein imposed, and such associations represented shall be jointly and severally liable to pay, and shall pay, into the Treasury of the United States a tax in amount equal to one-fiftieth of one per centum on the aggregate amount of all such exchanging, paying, or in any way satisfying such obligations, at each and every meeting of persons acting for such associations: Provided, however, That in case any such association pays one-half of the tax herein imposed on or before the day it is due and payable, the other half shall be, and is hereby, remitted: And provided further, That the tax herein imposed on associations herein described shall be wholly remitted to each one and all associations that are members of clearing houses incorporated under this Act.

SEC. 11. That the Comptroller of the Currency may issue to the National Clearing-House Association or other clearing-house association organized under this Act, or to any national-banking association, greenbacks to any amount approved of in writing by the Secretary of the Treasury, in addition to the amount of greenbacks herein before

* The financial and banking system of the United States, as of every other nation, must be built from the top down, having a great national bank with myriads of branches, as are those of Europe, like European governments, or it must be built from the bottom up. The independent individual bank, while retaining its independence, will be united with all other banks to form a democratic but strong and symmetrical system, as our institutions are built up from the individual. There is no escape from it. This section accomplishes that purpose. It makes a solid union of all the banks in the country into practically one bank, with all the advantages of a United States national bank, with 8,000 branches, now State and national, leaving each bank as free as now and with none of the disadvantages of a United States national bank. It also gives to every country bank all the assistance and support it could receive were it a branch of a United States national bank

authorized: Provided, That the association applying for such additional greenbacks shall deliver to the Treasurer of the United States or to any assistant treasurer bonds* in kind and amount acceptable to the Secretary of the Treasury, as security for such greenbacks, and shall pay interest on the amount of such greenbacks so issued at the rate of six per cent per annum, such interest on such greenbacks to be paid at such time and in such manner as the Comptroller of the Currency may determine; but no more in amount than ninety per cent of the par value of any bond shall be issued in such greenbacks, and no bonds other than bonds of the United States shall be accepted by the Secretary of the Treasury as security when there are three hundred millions or more of United States bonds outstanding.

Any association depositing bonds and receiving greenbacks secured thereby may withdraw such bonds so deposited, after thirty days from the date of such deposit, upon paying the accumulated interest on the amount of greenbacks issued upon the deposits of such bonds and up to the date of their withdrawal, and in addition to such interest shall deposit with the Treasurer greenbacks or other lawful money to an amount equal to the greenbacks issued to the association as security for which the bonds were deposited; but no more than five per centum of the greenbacks issued to any association other than the one receiving such greenbacks shall be accepted as a deposit for the withdrawal of such bonds.

The money so deposited for the withdrawal of such bonds shall be immediately put in redemption, and the money received for it shall be kept as a special fund with which to redeem the amount of greenbacks issued to the association; and such greenbacks shall be redeemed, and when redeemed shall be destroyed to an amount equal to the greenbacks issued to the association for the security of which the bonds hereinbefore mentioned were deposited.

The Secretary of the Treasury shall publish once in seven days, or oftener, in the "Statement of the condition of the United States Treasury and the receipts and expenditures," a list of the securities and the amount of each kind accepted by him to secure greenbacks issued or proposed to be issued upon the deposit of bonds, or of bonds to secure any deposits of money made in any association.

SEC. 12. That in order to enable the Secretary of the Treasury to carry into effect the provisions of the Act of January fourteenth, eighteen hundred and seventy-five, entitled "An Act to provide for the resumption of specie payments," and of this Act, the Secretary of the Treasury is hereby authorized to issue and sell from time to time, for the period of four years, bonds as described in the Act of July fourteenth, eighteen hundred and seventy, entitled "An Act to authorize the refunding of the national debt," such bonds to be payable at the pleasure of the United States after one year from the date of their issue and upon the

* United States bonds in national banks to secure circulation..

Other United States bonds in national

$227, 484, 000

banks....

$17,576, 925

Other bonds held by national banks (estimated)

125, 000, 000

Total bonds held in 1895..

The total securities, aside from United States bonds,

held by national banks, most of which are bonds...... 148, 569, 950

142, 576, 950