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draw upon; no matter, say the bankers, if your draft is not met, or expected to be met, because you have no funds, that need make no difference; you may pay it here, with the exchange, when the time it has to run is out; so the borrower signs a draft or bill of exchange on somebody in New York, Philadelphia, or Baltimore, and pays the discount for the time it has to run; when that time comes round, the borrower pays into the bank the amount of his draft, with two, four, six, or ten per cent., whatever the rate of exchange may be, and the affair is settled, and he gets a renewal for sixty days, by further paying the discount on the sum bor rowed; and if it is an accommodation loan, it is renewed from time to time by paying the discount and exchange. Very few of the Western banks, he believed, discounted notes; they found it much more profitable to deal in exchange, as it is called; but this dealing in exchange enables the banks to discount as much paper, and to loan as much of their own notes, as the old-fashioned mode of discounting; it is a difference in form merely, with this advantage to the banks, that it enables them to get from their customers ten or twelve per cent. on their loans, instead of six, to which, in discounting notes, they are usually restricted. How then, he asked, could senators say that this bill did not give the power to make loans and discounts? He had shown them how, under this law, both loans and discounts will be made without limi

tation."

Mr. Benton then went on with offering his amendments, and offered one requiring all the stockholders in this corporation Fisc (which was to be the Treasury of the United States), to be citizens of the United States, for the obvious reason of preventing the national treasury from falling under the control of foreigners. M. Berrien considered the amendment unnecessary, as there was already a provision that none but citizens of the United States should take the original stock; and the only effect of the provision would be to lessen the value of the stock. Mr. Benton considered this provision as a fraudulent contrivance to have the appearance of excluding foreigners from being stockholders while not doing so. The prohibition upon them as original subscribers was nothing, when they were allowed to become stockholders by purchase. His amendment was intended to make the charter what it fraudulently pretended to be—a bank owned by American citizens. The word "original" would be a fraud unless the prohibition was extended to assignees. And he argued that the senator from Georgia (Mr. Berrien), had admitted the design of selling to

foreigners by saying that the value of the stock would be diminished by excluding foreigners from its purchase. He considered the answer of the senator double, inconsistent, and contradictory. He first considered the amendment unnecessary, as the charter already confined original subscriptions to our own citizens; and then considered it would injure the price of the stock to be so limited. That was a contradiction. The fact was, he said, that this bill was to resurrect, by smuggling, the old United States Bank, which was a British concern; and that the effect would be to make the British the governors and masters of our treasury: and he asked the yeas and nays on his motion, which was granted, and they stood-19 to 26, and were: YEAS-Messrs. Allen, Benton, Buchanan, Clay of Alabama, Cuthbert, Fulton, King, Linn, McRoberts, Mouton, Nicholson, Pierce, Sevier, Sturgeon, Tappan, Walker, Woodbury, Wright, and Young-19. NAYS-Messrs. Archer, Barrow, Bates, Berrien, Clay of Kentucky, Clayton, Dixon, Evans, Graham, Henderson, Huntington, Kerr, Mangum, Merrick, Miller, Morehead, Phelps, Porter, Prentiss, Preston, Rives, Simmons, Smith, of Indiana, Tallmadge, White, and Woodbridge-26. Considering this a vital question, and one on which no room should be left for the majority to escape the responsi bility of putting the United States Treasury in the hands of foreigners-even alien enemies in time of war, as well as rival commercial competitors in time of peace-Mr. Benton moved the same prohibition in a different form. It was to affix it to the eleventh fundamental rule of the eleventh section of the bill, which clothes the corporation with power to make rules to govern the assignment of stock: his amendment was to limit these assignments to American citizens. That was different from his first proposed amendment, which included both original subscribers and assignees. The senator from Georgia objected to that amendment as unnecessary, because it included a class already prohibited as well as one that was not. Certainly it was unnecessary with respect to one class, but necessary with respect to the othernecessary in the estimation of all who were not willing to see the United States Treasury owned and managed by foreigners. He wished now to hear what the senator from Georgia could say against the proposed amendment, in

declared by the charter to be foreign bills for the mere purpose of covering these local loans.

"Mr. WALKER moved an amendment, requiring that the bills in which the Bank should deal should be drawn at short dates, and on goods already actually shipped. It was negatived by yeas and nays, as follows:-YEASMessrs. Allen, Benton, Buchanan, Calhoun, Clay of Alabama, Fulton, King, Linn, McRoberts, Mouton, Nicholson, Pierce, Rives, Sevier, Smith of Connecticut, Sturgeon, Tappan, Walker, Woodbury, Wright, and Young-21. NAYS Choate, Clay of Kentucky, Clayton, Dixon, -Messrs. Archer, Barrow, Bates, Berrien, Evans, Graham, Henderson, Huntington, Kerr, Mangum, Merrick, Miller, Morehead, Phelps, Porter, Prentiss, Preston, Simmons, Smith of Indiana, Southard, Tallmadge, White, and Woodbridge-27. Mr. ALLEN moved an amendment to make the directors, in case of suspension, personally liable for the debts of the bank. This was negatived as follows: YEAS-Messrs. Allen, Benton, Buchanan, Clay of Alabama, Cuthbert, Fulton, King, Linn, McRoberts, Mouton, Nicholson, Pierce, Sevier, Smith of Connecticut, Sturgeon, Tappan, Walker, Woodbury, Wright, and Young-20. NAYS-Messrs. ArKentucky, Clayton, Dixon, Evans, Graham, cher, Barrow, Bates, Berrien, Choate, Clay of Henderson, Huntington, Kerr, Mangum, Merrick, Miller, Morehead, Phelps, Porter, Prentiss, Preston, Rives, Simmons, Smith of Indiana, Southard, Tallmadge, White, and Woodbridge -28."

this form. Mr. Berrien answered: "He hoped the amendment would not prevail. The original subscribers would be citizens of the United States. To debar them from transferring their stock, would be to lessen the value of the stock, which they rendered valuable by becoming the purchasers of it." Mr. Benton rejoined, that his amendment did not propose to prevent the original subscribers from selling their stock, or any assignee from selling; the only design of the amendment was to limit all these sales to American citizens; and that would be its only effect if adopted. And as to the second objection, a second time given, that it would injure the value of the stock, he said it was a strange argument, that the paltry difference of value in shares to the stockholders should outweigh the danger of confiding the Treasury of the United States to foreigners-subjects of foreign potentates. He asked the yeas, which were granted —and stood-21 to 27: the same as before, with the addition of some senators who had come in. These several proposed amendments, and the manner in which they were rejected, completed the exposure of the design to resuscitate the defunct Bank of the United States, just as it had been, with its foreign stockholders, and extraordinary privileges. It was to be the old bank revived, disguised, and smuggled in. It was to have the same capital as the old one-thirty-five millions: for while it said the capital was to be twenty-one millions, there was a clause enabling Congress to add on four-cratic senators ceased opposition, that the vote teen millions-which it would do as soon as the bill passed. Like the old bank, it was to have the United States for a partner, owning seven millions of the stock. The stock was all to go to the old Bank of the United States; for the subscriptions were to be made with commissioners appointed by the Secretary of the Treasury-who, it was known, would appoint the friends of the old bank; so that the whole subscription would be in her hands; and a charter for her fraudulently and deceptiously obtained. The title of the bill was fraudulent, being limited to the management of the "publie" moneys, while the body of it conferred all the privileges known to the three distinct kinds of banks:—1. Circulation. 2. Exchange. 3. Discount and deposit-the discount being in the most oppressive and usurious form on inland and mere neighborhood bills of exchange,

The character of the bill having been shown by the amendments offered and rejected, there was no need to offer any more, and the demo

might be taken on the bill: it was so; and the bill was passed by the standing majority. Concurred in by the Senate without alteration, it was returned to the House, and thence referred to the President for his approval, or disapproval. It was disapproved, and returned to the House, with a message stating his objections to it; where it gave rise to some violent speaking, more directed to the personal conduct of the President than to the objections to the bill stated in his message. In this debate Mr. Botts, of Virginia, was the chief speaker on one side, inculpating the President: Mr. Gilmer of Virginia, and Mr. Proffit of Indiana, on the other were the chief respondents in his favor. The vote being taken there appeared 103 for the bill, 80 against it—which not being a majority of two-thirds, the bill was rejected: and so ends the public and ostensible history of the

second attempt to establish a national bank at this brief session under the guise, and disguise, of a misnomer and a long one at that.

The negative votes, when rejected on the final vote for want of two-thirds of the House, were: "Messrs. Archibald H. Arrington, Charles G. Atherton, Linn Banks, Benjamin A. Bidlack, Linn Boyd, David P. Brewster, Aaron V. Brown, Charles Brown, William O. Butler, Patrick C. Caldwell, John Campbell, Reuben Chapman, James G. Clinton, Walter Coles, Richard D. Davis, John B. Dawson, Ezra Dean, Andrew W. Doig, Ira A. Eastman, John C. Edwards, Joseph Egbert, Charles G. Ferris, John G. Floyd, Charles A. Floyd, Joseph Fornance, James Gerry, Thomas W. Gilmer, William O. Goode, Amos Gustine, William A. Harris, John Hastings, Samuel L. Hays, Isaac E. Holmes, George W. Hopkins, Jacob Houck, jr., George S. Houston, Edmund W. Hubard, Robert M. T. Hunter, Charles J. Ingersoll, William W. Irwin, William Jack, Cave Johnson, John W. Jones, George M. Keim, Andrew Kennedy, Dixon H. Lewis, Abraham McClellan, Robert McClellan, James J. McKay, John McKeon, Francis Mallory, Albert G. Marchand, John Thompson Mason, James Mathews, William Medill, John Miller, Peter Newhard, William Parmenter, Samuel Patridge, Wm. W. Payne, Arnold Plumer, George H. Proffit, John_Reynolds, R. Barnwell Rhett, Lewis Riggs, James Rogers, Tristram Shaw, Benjamin G. Shields, John Snyder, Lewis Steenrod, George Sweney, Hopkins L. Turney, John Van Buren, Aaron Ward, Harvey M. Watterson, John B. Weller, John Westbrook, James W. Williams, Henry A. Wise, Fernando Wood.

CHAPTER LXXXII.

SECRET HISTORY OF THE SECOND BILL FOR A

FISCAL AGENT, CALLED FISCAL CORPORATION: ITS ORIGIN WITH MR. TYLER: ITS PROGRESS

THROUGH CONGRESS UNDER HIS LEAD: ITS REJECTION UNDER HIS VETO.

SOON after the meeting of Congress in this extra session-in the course of the first week of it -Mr. Gilmer, of Virginia, held a conversation with a whig member of the House, in which he suggested to him that "a couple of gentlemen of about their size," might become important men in this country-leading men—and get the control of the government. An explanation was requested-and given. It was to withdraw Mr. Tyler from the whig party, and make him the head of a third party, in which those

who did it would become chiefs, and have control in the administration. This was the explanation; and the scheme was based, not upon any particular circumstances, but upon a knowledge of Mr. Tyler's character and antecedents: and upon a calculation that he would be dazzled with the idea of being the head of a party, and let the government fall into the hands of those who pleased him-his indolence, and want of business habits disqualifying him for the labors of administration. Democratic doctrines were to be the basis of the new party, especially opposition to a national bank: but recruits from all parties received. The whig member to whom this suggestion for the third party was made, declined to have any thing to do with it: nor was he further consulted. But his eyes were opened, and he had to see; and he saw other whigs do what he would not. And he had received a clue which led to the comprehension of things which he did not see, and had got an insight that would make him observant. But his lips were sealed under an injunction; and remained so, as far as the public was concerned. I never heard him quoted for a word on the subject; but either himself, or some one equally well informed, must have given Mr. Clay exact information; otherwise he could not have hit the nail on the head at every lick, as he did in his replies to Mr. Rives and Mr. Archer in the debate on the first veto message: as shown in the preceding chapter.

The movement went on : Mr. Tyler fell into it the new party germinated, microscopically small; but potent in the President's veto power. A national bank was the touchstone; and that involved a courtship with the democracy-a breach with the whigs. The democracy rejoiced, and patted Mr. Tyler on the shoulder-even those who despised the new party: for they deemed it fair to avail themselves of a treachery of which they were not the authors; and felt it to be a retributive justice to deprive the whigs of the fruits of a victory which they had won by log-cabin, coonskin, and hard cider tactics; and especially to effect the deprivation in the person of one whom they had taken from the democratic camp, and set up against his old friends-the more annoying to them because he could tell of their supposed misdeeds when he was one of them. To break their heads with such a stick had retribution in it, as well as

had been solicited to remain in their placeshad been saluted with expressions of confidence; and cheered with the declaration that their advice and counsel would be often wanted. They felt the slight of the neglected consultation, as well as the disappointment in the rejected bill; but the President consoled them for the disappointment (saying nothing about the slight) by showing himself ready, and even impatient for another bill. This readiness for another bill is thus related by Mr. Ewing, the Secretary of the Treasury, in his letter of resig

gratification: and Mr. Tyler was greatly extolled. To the whigs, it was a galling and mortifying desertion, and ruinous besides. A national bank was their life-the vital principle without which they could not live as a partythe power which was to give them power: which was to beat down their adversaries-uphold themselves-and give them the political and the financial control of the Union. To lose it, was to lose the fruits of the election, with the prospect of losing the party itself. Indignation was their pervading feeling; but the stake was too great to be given up in a pas-nation of his office addressed to the President; sion; and policy required the temporizing ex- dated Sept. 11th, 1841: pedient of conciliation-the proud spirit of Mr. Clay finding it hard to bend to it; but yielding a little at first. The breach with the whigs was resolved on: how to effect it without too much rudeness-without a violence which would show him an aggressor as well as a deserter-was the difficulty; and indirect methods were taken to effect it. Newspapers in his interest-the Madisonian at Washington and Herald at New York-vituperated the whig party, and even his cabinet ministers. Slights and neglects were put upon those ministers: the bank question was to complete the breach; but only after a long management which should have the appearance of keeping faith with the whigs, and throwing the blame of the breach upon them. This brings us to the point of commencing the history of the second fiscal bank bill, ending with a second veto, and an open rupture between the President and the whigs.

called at your chamber, and found you prepar"On the morning of the 16th of August I ing the first veto message, to be despatched to the Senate. The Secretary of War came in also, and you read a portion of the message to us. He observed that though the veto would create a great sensation in Congress, yet he thought the minds of our friends better prepared for it than they were some days ago, and he hoped it would be calmly received, especially as it did replied, that you really thought that there not shut out all hope of a bank. To this you ought to be no difficulty about it; that you had sufficiently indicated the kind of a bank you would approve, and that Congress might, if they saw fit, pass such a bill in three days."

Mr. Bell, the Secretary of War, referred to in the foregoing statement of Mr. Ewing, thus gives his account of the same interview:

"I called on the President on official business on the morning of Monday the 16th of August, found him reading the message to the Secretary before the first veto message was sent in. I of the Treasury. He did me the honor to read the material passages to me. Upon reading that part of it which treats of the superior imlate Bank of the United States in furnishing portance and value of the business done by the exchanges between different States and sections of the Union, I was so strongly impressed with the idea that he meant to intimate that he be restricted to dealing in exchanges, that I inwould have no objection to a bank which should terrupted him in the reading, and asked if I was

The beginning of the second bill was laid in the death of the first one; as the seed of a separation from his cabinet was planted in the same place. The first veto message, in rejecting one bill, gave promise to accept another, and even defined the kind of bill which the President could approve: this was encouraging to the whigs. But that first veto was resolved upon, and the message for it drawn, without consultation with his cabinet-without reference to them; and without their knowledge to understand (by what he had just read) that except from hearsay and accident. They first got wind of it in street rumor, and in paragraphs in the Madisonian, and in letters to the New York Herald: and got the first knowledge of it from coming in upon the President while he was drawing it. This was a great slight to his cabinet, and very unaccountable to ministers who, only two short months before,

he was prepared to give his assent to a bank in cies in the States, having the privilege, without the District of Columbia, with offices or agentheir assent, to deal in exchanges between them, and in foreign bills. He promptly replied that he thought experience had shown the necessity some further remarks favorable to such a bill) of such a power in the government. And (after expressed the opinion that nothing could be more easy than to pass a bill which would an

swer all necessary purposes-that it could be years to run, it might be as well to provide done in three days."

Such are the concurrent statements of two of the cabinet; and Mr. Alexander A. Stuart, a member of the House of Representatives from Virginia, thus gives his statement to the same effect in his account of the readiness of the President, amounting to anxiety, for the introduction and passage of a second bill.

against a contingency which would leave the govenlarge the capital; and to obviate the difficulty, ernment dependent on the bank for permission to I suggested the propriety of giving to Congress the power to increase it as the public exigencies should require. To this he assented; and by his direction I made the note on the margin of the paper; 'capital to be 15 millions of dollars -to be increased at the option of Congress when public interests require.' The President then said: 'Now if you will send me this bill I will the President that there was a statute in Virsign it in twenty-four hours.' (After informing ginia against establishing agencies of foreign banks in the State, he said), This must be provided for:' and he then took the paper and

"After the adjournment of the House (on the 16th of August), Mr. Pearce of Maryland (then a representative in Congress, now a senator) called at my boarding-house, and informed me that he was induced to believe that there was still some hope of compromising the difficulties between Congress and the President, by adopt-wrote on the margin the following words, which ing a bank bill on the basis of a proposition which had been submitted by Mr. Bayard (Richard H.) in the Senate, modified so as to

do so.

leave out the last clause which authorized the conversion of the agencies into offices of discount and deposit on certain contingencies. He produced to me a portion of the Senate journal, containing that proposition, with the obnoxious clause crossed out with ink; and requested me to visit the President and see if we could not adjust the difficulty. At first I declined, but at length yielded to his desire, and promised to About 5 o'clock, I drove to the President's house, but found him engaged with a distinguished democratic senator. This I thought rather a bad omen; but I made known my wish for a private audience; which in a few minutes was granted. This was the first occasion on which I had ventured to approach the President on the subject. I made known to him at once the object of my visit, and expressed the hope that some measure might be adopted to heal the division between himself and the whig party in Congress. I informed him of the existence of the committee to which I referred, and mentioned the names of those who composed it, and relied on their age and known character for prudence and moderation, as the best guarantees of the conciliatory spirit of the whig party in Congress. He seemed to meet me in the proper temper, and expressed the belief that a fair ground of compromise might yet be agreed upon. I then made known what I had heard of his opinions in regard to Mr. Bayard's proposition. He asked me if I had it with me? I replied in the affirmative, and produced the paper, which had been given to me by Mr. Pearce with the clause struck out, as above stated. He read it over carefully, and said it would do, making no objection whatever to the clause in regard to the establishment of agencies in the several States without their assent. But he said the capital was too large, and referred to Mr. Appleton and Mr. Jaudon as authority to prove that ten or fifteen millions would be enough. I objected that it might hereafter be found insufficient; and as the charter had twenty

the word 'bank' in the first line of the proposiwere to come in after the word 'or,' and before tion of Mr. Bayard, (the blank line in this paper), In case such agencies are forbidden by the laws of the State.' I remonstrated against this addition as unnecessary, and not meeting the objection; but he said: 'Let it stand for the present; I will think about it.'-The President then instructed me to go to Mr. Webster, and have the bill prepared at once; and as I rose to him to the charge of dictating to Congress, he leave him, after cautioning me not to expose held my right hand in his left, and raising his right hand upwards, exclaimed with much feeling: Stuart! if you can be instrumental in passing this bill through Congress, I will esteem you the best friend I have on earth."

The original paper of Mr. Bayard, here referred to, with the President's autographic emendations upon it, were in the possession of Mr. Benton, and burnt in the conflagration of his house, books and papers, in February, 1855.

These statements from Messrs. Ewing, Bell, and Stuart are enough (though others might be added) to show that Mr. Tyler, at the time that he sent in the first veto message, was in favor of a second bill-open and earnest in his professions for it-impatient for its advent-and ready to sign it within twenty-four hours. The only question is whether these professions were sincere, or only phrases to deceive the whigs-to calm the commotion which raged in their camp-and of which he was well informed-and to avert the storm which was ready to burst upon him; trusting all the while to the chapter of contingencies to swamp the bill in one of the two Houses, or to furnish pretexts for a second veto if it should come back to his hands. The progress of the narrative must solve the problem; and, therefore, let it proceed.

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