SPEECH 
 
 JOSEPH R. INGERSOLL, 
 
 THE SUBTREASURY BILL: 
 
 delivebed 
 
 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNFfED STATES, 
 
 MARCH 31, 1846. 
 
 ■WASHINGTON: 
 
 PRINTED BY GALES AND SEATON. 
 
 1846. 
 
SPEECH. 
 
 Mr. INGERSOLL said that, when this subject of a Subtreasury was 
 about to be brought forward for the present consideration of Congress, he 
 did not suppose that it possessed a single claim to merit. Reflecting, how¬ 
 ever, upon the source from which, in its present shape, it has sprung, and 
 coupling it, as he was bound to do, in some measure, with the reporter of 
 the plan before the House, he could not fail to admit that the bill had one 
 item in its favor, namely, its individual authorship. Freely conceding the 
 existence and influence of this single item ou one side of the account, 
 where it stood alone, he believed it to be greatly overbalanced by a long 
 list of per contras ou the other. Entertaining honestly this conviction, 
 (said Mr. I.,) I shall not only cast my humble vote against it, but will pro¬ 
 ceed to suggest a few practical objections. Plato is my friend, but truth 
 is much more so. I do not love Ctesar less, but I love Rome much more. 
 
 It is not necessary to dwell upon that part of the question which is 
 made to assume a mere party aspect. A minority will generally suffer by 
 tendering such an issue. It substitutes at once for rules of reason the 
 force of numbers. The end may be reached with greater simplicity of 
 argument and less effort of reflection ; but justice is discarded as an in¬ 
 gredient in the mass of motive, and the great interests of the country are 
 exposed to risk by mingling the chances of an accidental majority with 
 the pride of power and the devotion of party allegiance. I would only 
 add a word or two to the explanations given by gentlemen who were here 
 in the special session of 1841, when I was not a member. The argument 
 has been mistaken which justifies complaint on account of the precipitancy 
 with which the measure of re-enactment is now borne through the House, 
 notwithstanding the acceleration which characterized the repeal of the 
 original law. It is one thing to build up a system, as this has sometimes 
 been called, and it is another thing to put it aside when it has proved in¬ 
 competent for its purposes or otherwise unworthy of support. Great trees, 
 it is said, are long in growing to their height, but they are cut down in an 
 hour. The repeal of a law, in the nature of the thing, embraces neither 
 complexity nor details. It is a simple proposition, which requires nothing 
 but a single operation of the mind. An ehactment implies combination 
 as well as reflection—a harmonious union of different and distinct, and 
 sometimes dissimilar, ingredients, making together one consistent whole. 
 
 Neither is it sufficient as an argument that the present course is, in its 
 rapidity of completion, more or less retaliatory. Our antagonists com¬ 
 plained, they say with justice, at least plausibly, of the “hot haste” with 
 which measures were despatched during the brief period of whig as¬ 
 cendency in 1841. They went with those complaints upon their lips be¬ 
 fore the people. They profited and they prevailed by the use of them. 
 Let them beware how they fall themselves into the same errors. Retri¬ 
 bution may await them, as they say it did vs. Should such be the case, 
 they will have the mortification of defeat aggravated by the conscious- 
 
4 
 
 ness that they sinned with the light of experience shining before their 
 eyes and the lessons of practical instruction sounding in their ears. 
 
 Supposing the question fairly open, and free to ample discussion, it is 
 an argument in the threshold against the measure, that it has been hereto¬ 
 fore weighed in the balance, with a steady and impartial hand, and found 
 wanting. I do not refer to a decision of the people in the memorable con¬ 
 test of 1840, although that might be no unimportant circumstance in de¬ 
 termining the present result. I do not even refer for any personal impu¬ 
 tation of inconsistency to the fact of a Subtreasury having been at an 
 earlier period opposed by those who are now its warmest friends. But I 
 refer to that transaction of an earlier period as an expression of opinion 
 by an unbiased body of Representatives, when reason alone was permit¬ 
 ted to influence their judgments, without the agency of party feeling. 
 With every opportunity to examine, and nothing to prevent a correct de¬ 
 termination, this House then came to the conclusion—circumstances being 
 in no respect less favorable to the measure than they are at the present 
 moment—that it was not desirable, and it was rejected and renounced by 
 a large majority. Separate from it now its party influences, let the toc¬ 
 sin cease to sound, and let the rallying word be no longer given out, and 
 the precedent of 1835 will be adopted at once as authoritative and per¬ 
 suasive upon all impartial minds. 
 
 An obvious practical objection to the scheme is found in its being unne¬ 
 cessary. All the essential objects of the present complicated and volumin¬ 
 ous bill, consisting of seven-and-twenty sections, may be accomplished 
 under the few and simple provisions of the act of 2d September, 1789. 
 That enduring and comprehensive statute is, in relation to its own objects, 
 a tyye of the Federal Constitution in its wider scope. Distinguished by 
 great simplicity of language and arrangement, both of those instruments— 
 fruits as they are of the golden age of the nation—are at the same time 
 precise and deflnite to all co-existing purposes, and yet so expansive as to 
 meet the exigences of many after generations. All that can and ought to 
 be done, ascording to the proposed scheme, may be done more directly, and 
 with far less complex machinery, under the act of ’89. Every thing now 
 proposed, that concerns the receiving, disbursing, and keeping of the 
 moneys of the United States, is contained in the classic provisions which 
 have been in force for nearly sixty years. The difierence is simply this— 
 that now, as heretofore, the money may be kept in safes and vaults, if in 
 safes and vaults it can be kept to greater advantage; but no compulsion is 
 imposed, to prefer the mephitic vapors of a cavern to every other place of 
 deposite, however in all respects more eligible. From this time forth all 
 option is denied. An inexorable imprisonment is the doom of the Treas- 
 sury, and to the fens upon which its buildings are erected the practice of 
 keeping the Government funds must be confined. When this new deposi¬ 
 tory was half built, such were the doubts even of its superterranean capaci¬ 
 ties that it was proposed to stop the work and take it down. Within a 
 few days past one of the heads of bureaus has shown me a book of records, 
 fished up from the Serbonian bogs of oblivion that abound below, which 
 was already much injured, and threatened with entire destruction. All this 
 mischief will be entailed by the Subtreasury scheme, without substantially 
 creating any convenience, security, economy, or strength, beyond those 
 which already exist. As the law stands, money is received and kept by 
 the Treasurer, without any allusion whatever to banks. It is disbursed by 
 
6 
 
 .him upon warrants drawn by the Secretary of the Treasury, countersigned 
 by the Comptroller, and recorded by the Register. Hi& accounts are ren¬ 
 dered quarterly to the Comptroller, or oftener if required, and a copy, when 
 settled, is transmitted to the Secretary. At the commencement of every 
 session he is obliged to render to Congress fair and accurate copies of all 
 his accounts, as also a true and perfect account of the state of the Treas¬ 
 ury. He must submit, not once a week, but at all times, to the Secretary 
 and the Comptroller, or to either of them, the inspection of the moneys in 
 his hands. All these duties are performed under the sanction of a bond, 
 with sufficient approved sureties, conditioned for the faithful performance 
 of the duties of his office, and for the fidelity of the persons whom he may 
 employ. Add to these well-conceived arrangements, which are peculiar 
 to the Treasurer, the comprehensive provisions which apply to other and 
 all persons appointed to any office instituted by the act, and you have a 
 broad outline which requites no further legislation. None of the officers 
 are permitted to be concerned or interested, directly or indirectly, in carry¬ 
 ing on the business of trade or commerce, or to be the owner in whole or 
 in part of any sea vessel, or to purchase by himself, or another in trust for 
 him, any public lands or other public property, or to be concerned in the 
 purchase or disposal of any public securities of any State or of the United 
 States, or to take or apply to his own use any emolument or gain for nego¬ 
 tiating or transacting any business in the Department, other than such as 
 should be allowed by law. These are the barriers set up against the dan¬ 
 gers of temptation, in aid of the sound principles which fortify the pure 
 and honorable mind. 
 
 It will be observed that, independently of the bill reported, no particular 
 place of deposite is contemplated for the funds of the Government. They 
 are every where that they may be needed, and where they may be made 
 available. They are the right of the nation in all places, and by whomso¬ 
 ever for greater convenience kept. They constitute its fiscal power, and 
 may be wielded at will in the shape of credit, as well as of gold in hand. 
 They are in the pockets of solvent debtors, or in the agreements by individ¬ 
 uals or corporations to accept of drafts, at the remotest corners of our own 
 or a foreign country, as well as in the iron chambers of the edifice at the 
 other end of the avenue. The word Treasury is twice mentioned in the 
 Constitution: first, to indicate that the compensation for members of Con¬ 
 gress is to be paid, not by the States, as had formerly been the case, but 
 with the moneys of the United States; and again, when appropriations 
 made by law are declared, in effect, to be the only competent sources of 
 public expenditure. Neither the Constitution, nor the law, nor the prac¬ 
 tice of fifty-six years of successful administration of the revenue, with the 
 brief exception of one year, one month, and nine days, hints at a necessary 
 local habitation, or even a preferred place of deposite for the public funds. 
 Safes and vaults and hollow significancies were reserved for a time and an 
 occasion long distant from the era and the purposes of the Constitution and 
 the almost contemporary law. 
 
 The next practical objection that I would suggest to the plan is, that it 
 has no aim to promote the great ends of Government. It contains no cre¬ 
 ative good; it pretends to none. At the best, nothing more than a mere 
 incident is proposed to the performance of some of its functions. Fruitful, 
 indeed, is it in patronage and in means of interference with the character¬ 
 istic simplicity of the original design, but it has no view to an enlargement 
 
6 
 
 of the resources, a promotion of the dignity, or an advancement of the in¬ 
 terest, happiness, extent, or glory of the Republic. It involves no leading 
 purposes of legislation, it attempts no practical or positive good. It is at 
 best a small contrivance to do familiar things in a new way. It brings 
 with it in possession no sunshine for a smiling land; it promises in the 
 future and in hope no refreshing dews or fertilizing showers for a season 
 when they may be required by a thirsting soil. 
 
 This compound system, when resolved into its original elements, consists 
 of two essential parts. It professes to indtice an employment of the pre¬ 
 cious metals, to the exclusion of all other currency. This is its popular and 
 captivating feature. This is the dazzling lure which, like the forty ducats 
 held up to the longing eyes of the apothecary, wrung from his poverty, and 
 not his will, consent to folly and to crime. It misleads the miser, by en¬ 
 couraging the hope of a more solid and substantial hoard of imperishable 
 wealth; and it deludes the spendthrift, by promising him counters for his 
 play and glittering agents for his prodigality. The other cardinal virtue 
 counterfeited by the plan is the security which it affects to afford: the 
 means of safe keeping of the treasures of the Government. It addresses 
 itself to the vulgar senses by presenting visible bars and locks and walls, 
 the mere physical impediments to invasion—barriers which ingenuity and 
 skill can easily make, and equal ingenuity and skill can as easily burst 
 asunder—for the moral force and multiplied checks of mutual responsibil¬ 
 ity ; for actual, sufficient, and always available pledges of punctuality and 
 fidelity, rendered inaccessible to the remotest possibility of accident, negli¬ 
 gence, or fraud. 
 
 Now, gold and silver are, in their proper place, e.xcellent things. Like 
 fire and water, they are good servants, but bad masters. As a basis of cir¬ 
 culation, they are the best that ever has been suggested. As a sole and 
 exclusive currency, they would be found just as inconvenient and impracti¬ 
 cable as was the iron of ancient Sparta, or tobacco in the revolutionary 
 history of Virginia. In the ordinary retail haberdashery of life, they are, 
 perhaps, indispensable. In the large concerns of wholesale business, either 
 connected with the domestic commerce of the inhabitants of an extensive 
 country, or the commerce of those inhabitants with distant nations, they 
 are in practice never resorted to but as an exception, and from mere neces¬ 
 sity. They are, it is true, more or less generally used even in small aflairs, 
 according to the more or less absolutely commercial character and habits 
 of the particular people; but a resort to them, and to them alone, on occa¬ 
 sions when any thing like extensive transactions of trade are carried on, 
 would be an anomaly that is yet without a precedent. Hence a right to 
 require specie in payment of Government dues is too important a one to 
 have been overlooked for a moment, and the States are constitutionally 
 disabled from making any thing else a legal tender. But an obligation to 
 require it at all times and under every possible contingency might be attended 
 with serious inconvenience. A receiver of public money, for example, 
 might be under instructions to remit the first that should come to his hands 
 to a distant part of the country. It is offered to him in the shape of ex¬ 
 actly such a draft as he desires. He must refuse the draft, and pay a pre¬ 
 mium for a similar one to the broker next door, with the specie which he 
 has reluctantly but necessarily received. It is the option that I contend he 
 should have. Treat the affairs of the Government in this respect as a pru¬ 
 dent man does his own, and there will be no danger. Let specie, or the 
 
7 
 
 representative of specie of equal value and (if it be so) of greater use, be 
 taken in payment according to circumstances, and as either may be most 
 desired, and you will have no occasion for the stringent rule proposed. You 
 have, probably,, Mr. Chairman, never been sworn at Highgate. If you 
 have, you would know that the clearest powers of preference are not ob¬ 
 ligatory in the face of interest and inclination. You are only bound not to 
 walk a journey when you can ride; not to eat brown bread when you can 
 get white; and not to kiss the maid when you can kiss the mistress; pro¬ 
 vided always, nevertheless, as the statutes say, unless you like the maid, 
 the brown bread, and the walk, respectively, better than the mistress, the 
 white bread, and the ride. , 
 
 Look into the history of our own country ; compare its moneyed condi¬ 
 tion at the different periods, when it possessed the option of specie or its 
 equivalent for all business purposes, with its condition when there was no 
 such option, because there was no such equivalent. From the peace of 
 1783 until the year 1791, specie was the legal currency. A feebler frame 
 of Government, notwithstanding the robust and vigorous population of 
 which it was composed, never existed. It dissolved, after a few short years 
 of disastrous experiment, in its own weakness. It ended with a public 
 debt of eighty millions, which it bequeathed as a sad legacy to the Govern¬ 
 ment of the Constitution. An early and a wise act of the new Govern¬ 
 ment, in its first Congress, was to establish a Bank of the United States. It 
 was established because it was believed that it would be very conducive to 
 the successful conducting of the national finances; would tend to give fa¬ 
 cility to the obtaining of loans for the use of the Government in sudden 
 emergencies, and would be productive of considerable advantages to trade 
 and industry in general.—[Preamble to the act to incorporate the subscri¬ 
 bers to the Bank of the United States, February 25, 1791.] Before the 
 expiration of the time fixed for the end of the charter, every farthing of 
 the heavy national debt was paid, although the prosperity of the country 
 was assailed during portions of it by calamities in the shape of depreda¬ 
 tions upon commerce, non-intercourse, and embargo of indefinite extent, 
 quasi war with one powerful belligerent nation, and threats of war with 
 another. 
 
 I am not contending for a Bank of the United States, or for any other 
 bank. I am contending for the propriety and necessity of a medium of 
 exchange of equal value and greater facility of remittance and transporta¬ 
 tion than gold and silver. The war of 1812 found the nation without a 
 Bank of the United States, and it left it without any such currency as I have 
 described. It left it, however, somewhat the wiser for its disastrous neg¬ 
 lect or wilful omission to provide for such an emergency. An early effort 
 after the restoration of peace was to guard against a similar calamity, and 
 to lay the foundation in another fiscal scheme, of which a new Bank of 
 the United States, with a greatly augmented capital, was the principal in¬ 
 gredient, of the discharge of another heavy debt, and the establishment 
 of a sound alternative currency. On the 30th of April, 1816, a joint 
 resolution of Congress was approved, which ran thus: 
 
 “ A RESOLUTION relative to the more effectual collection of the public revenue. 
 
 “ Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in 
 Congress assembled^ That the Secretary of the Treasury be, and he hereby is, required and directed 
 to adopt such measures as he may deem necessary to cause, as soon as may be, all duties, taxes, 
 debts, or sums of money, accruing or becoming payable to the United States, to be collected and 
 
paid in the legal currency of the United States, or Treasury notes, or notes of the Bank of the 
 United States, as by law provided and declared, or in notes of banks which are payable or paid on 
 demand in the said legal currency of the United States; and that from and after the 20th day of 
 February next, no such duties, taxes, debts, or sums of money, accruing or becoming payable to the 
 United States as aforesaid, ought to be collected or received otherwise than in the legal currency of 
 the United States, or Treasury notes, or notes of the Bank of the Uiiited States, or in notes of 
 banks which are payable and paid on demand in the said legal currency of theUiiited States.” 
 
 On the 12th of September, 1816 , Mr. Secretary Dallas issued his notice, 
 that from and after the 20th day of February, 1817, all duties, taxe.s, debts, 
 or sums of money, accruing or becoming payable to the United States, must 
 be paid, not in gold and silver only, but in the legal currency of the United 
 States, or Treasury notes, or notes of the Bank of the United States, or in 
 notes of banks which are payable and paid on demand in the legal cur¬ 
 rency of the United States, and not otherwise. Under this alternative 
 arrangement the finances again prospered. Under it the national debt 
 was again extinguished. The celebrated “specie circular” of 5th No¬ 
 vember, 1834, written at the period of General Jacksonis active war with 
 the Bank of the United States, authorizes the collectors of customs and 
 all receivers of public money to regard the legal currency of the United 
 States, Treasury notes, notes of the Bank of the United States, and notes 
 of banks which are payable and paid in the legal currency of the United 
 States, as equal in merit and in the estimation of the Treasury. Pros¬ 
 perity accompanied the effectual continuance of this arrangement, and the 
 power to comply with it. When it ceased once more, as it did in 1837, 
 from a variety of causes, (the Bank of the United States had ceased by 
 the expiration of its charter, and other banks had suspended specie pay¬ 
 ments,) disaster spread over the land, and involved in its wide vortex Gov¬ 
 ernment and people. That crisis, too, has passed a way; and while a bright 
 sky shines above us, and plenty and prosperity smile before us, and beckon 
 us onward in the smooth path of general contentment, these happy pros¬ 
 pects are to be darkened with the interposition of a needless and pernicious 
 mystery; with elements enough of official power and corruption; with 
 temptation enough to fraud and embezzlement; with complexity enough 
 to embarrass and confuse, and with more than enough departure from the 
 diffusive and beneficial spirit of the age, but without one principle of prac¬ 
 tical or positive good. If you will insist upon one currency for the Gov¬ 
 ernment, and another for the people, why not have it without locking it 
 up from the uses of both, and destroying it as a currency altogether It 
 is a mistake to suppose that this Subtreasury scheme will have any such 
 efiect as is boldly promised for it, in the introduction of an exclusive me¬ 
 tallic circulation. To the extent of what is in Government possession, it 
 will withdraw exactly so much from all circulation. It is no longer cur¬ 
 rency when it is hoarded in inactive masses in the coffers of penurious 
 men, or no less penurious public treasuries. At this very moment there 
 are about eleven millions on hand, fortunately for the people, and in active 
 use among them, while it is safe beyond peradventure in the National 
 Treasury. But change the system, adopt the plan of the bill before you, 
 and considerably more than one-seventh of the specie in the country is, to 
 all beneficial purposes, extinguished. I have lately seen a calculation, that 
 the due proportion for the United States of all the gold and silver coined and 
 in existence in Europe and America is two hundred and fifty-seven mil¬ 
 lions of dollars. While we have already scarcely more than a quarter of 
 
this desired amount, you are about to inflict upon the people an intolerable 
 loss of nearly a sixth part of what they have. If indeed this be the cur¬ 
 rency of the Constitution, you strangely violate that venerated instrument, 
 by interfering to the utmost of your power Avith its beneficial designs in 
 diminishing and virtually destroying its chosen representative of value. 
 
 Let the advocates of exclusive metallic currency do what they may, they 
 must at last fail in their attempts to attain that avowed and ostensible ob¬ 
 ject. Commercial transactions are not and cannot be conducted without 
 something else. Solvent and prudently conducted banks are now used, 
 and they answer the purpose perfectly well wherever they are tried. If 
 they were not accessible, the Treasurer and other disbursers of money of 
 the United States would at once avail themselves of some other local, cor¬ 
 porate, or individual agency. Private bankers, whose business is exten¬ 
 sive, and whose arrangements are of a corresponding character, are ex¬ 
 actly as serviceable. In this place all are private bankers. Not a char¬ 
 tered institution exists. The selected depositaries of the fund for paying 
 all of the expenses of this House of Representatives, including the com¬ 
 pensation of its members, are individuals of Washington—men of great 
 respectability, having their private banking house, and conducting its affairs 
 with errtire satisfaction to all who deal with them. The manner of deal¬ 
 ing is at once a living proof of the uselessness of a Subtreasury, and the 
 advantage of paper currency along with that of gold. The Sergeant-at- 
 Arms hands you for endorsement, by way of receipt, a check upon Messrs. 
 Corcoran St Riggs, with whom the money is deposited, and presents you 
 the option of gold or paper, or both. He most be fonder than I am of 
 burdening his pockets who does not altogether, or in a great degree, prefer 
 paper, which he knows to be represented to its full extent either by precious 
 metals, or by other substantial effects which render it convertible into them 
 at the pleasure of the holder. 
 
 The late Stephen Girard, rvho was the most extensive private banker 
 that this country has known, died with outstanding discounts and circulat¬ 
 ing notes, and sums upon his books to the credit of actual daily depositors, 
 amounting to several millions, and yet the aggregate of specie in his vaults 
 Avas between sixteen and seventeen thousand dollars. Who was unsafe 
 or Avho Avas uneasy from any such circumstance ? His treasury, always 
 replenished, always overfloAving, Avas everyAvhere. It was in rows of ten¬ 
 anted dAvelling-houses, in lots of established and improving value, in 
 meadoAVs and rich pastures, in coal mines, in stocks, in ships and merchan¬ 
 dise, in daily recurring expirations of the terms of credit of solvent debtors, 
 in his universal command of means founded upon anupproved knoAvledge 
 of his sterling resources, punctuality, industry, and sagacity. This should 
 be the never failing treasury of the Government, not the damp dungeons 
 of an ill-constructed edifice. The gentleman Avho reported this bill did not 
 design to banish paper circulation, or that there should be an exclusive 
 resort to metallic currency. He so acknoAvledges in the candid report 
 Avhich he made upon the subject at the last Congress. “ It is expected 
 ‘ and desired,” says he in that document, “that the States Avill perceive the 
 ‘ necessity and advantage in reference to the acting of the Federal Govern- 
 ‘ ment, to prevent a depreciated paper circulation, and to preserve the cir- 
 ‘ culation of the precious metals and such paper medium as rests on a firm 
 ‘ and sufficient specie basis, and Avhich may at all times be converted into 
 ‘ gold and silver on demand, at the option of the holder,” 
 
iO 
 
 Even on the spot where the great reservoir is dug, paper must and will 
 divide with the precious metals the favor and the preference of those who 
 have the power to choose. In business operations between distant places— 
 how distant, let the long line from Rouse’s Point to the Rio Grande tell— 
 paper alone will be used. The great collections of revenue are made at a > 
 few principal custom-houses and land agencies. But money may be re- ' 
 quired for disbursement any where, in whole States where neither an avail¬ 
 able custom-house nor a land agency exists. Money is remitted from and 
 to these points of collection and disbursement by the paper agency of bills 
 of exchange. 
 
 What are the advantages proposed by this plan, over and beyond the 
 advantage of signalizing the strength and triumph of party ? Dismiss 
 for a moment the delusion of constitutional currency, which is a name and 
 a thing upwards of fifty years later in birth than the Constitution itself, and- 
 let us look the object in the face, mystified by no reverend titles or theo¬ 
 retic arguments. Is there convenience in a Subtreasury ? What other 
 agencies of the Government arc conducted in a similar manner } There 
 is nothing analogous to it. If a Government of any country desires to 
 transport materials for its buildings, or stores for its magazines, hospitals, 
 navy yards, armories, or arsenals; it does not build wagons, construct roads, 
 purchase liorses, and grow provender, to meet the various exigencies; it 
 employs common carriers, known to the common law better than the Con¬ 
 stitution, when they are to be had, and intrusts them, upon the ordinary 
 principles of bailment, with the duty in all its details. Even the prodigious 
 expenditures for conveying the mail, rich with every kind of treasure, 
 money and money’s worth, clandestine correspondence. State secrets, 
 which, if divulged, might set the nation in a flame, are acquiesced in with¬ 
 out hesitation. Expensive and vexations as might be the difficulties, with 
 railroad or steamboat companies, in arranging the transportation of the 
 mail, no Postmaster General thinks of procuring a special outfit of locomo¬ 
 tives, cars, tenders, steamers, with the appurtenances of engineers, fuel, &c., 
 at Government cost. He uses thoise already adapted alike to private and 
 to public convenience. Yet he has no security, not a particle, except what 
 the general principles of law afford for protection against carelessness of 
 property and lives. State prisons hold your Government offenders. State 
 court-houses are occupied by your administrators of the law; all the ima¬ 
 ginable functions of Federal policy arc performed through the instrument¬ 
 ality of State engines, of whatever description. Why withhold from sim¬ 
 ilar custodiers that which more than all the rest requires habitual exercise 
 and experienced hands.? All the conveniences of keeping and aiding as 
 the medium of disbursement are found eminently out of the limits of the 
 Subtreasury walls. 
 
 Is there greater safety in the proposed plan ? It is admitted by the re¬ 
 port already alluded to that one delalcation occurred during the brief ex¬ 
 istence of the late Subtreasury law. “ Suit was instituted and judgment 
 obtained against the defaulting officer and his securities.” I am desired 
 to read on, and I do so cheerfully: “ And if the pica of the officer is held 
 ‘ insufficient on an appeal taken to the Supreme Court, and the judgment 
 ‘of the inferior court affirmed, it is believed that the security is ample, 
 
 ‘ and that the Government will ultimately sustain no loss in its finances.” 
 
 So clear, then, is the evidence of the fact of fraud, that on an affirmance 
 of the judgment a belief is entertained that recovery may be had from the 
 
11 
 
 ‘■'securityunless, indeed, the ordinary appeal to Congress in such cases 
 should obtain relief! Granting, for the sake of the argument, however, su¬ 
 perhuman honesty in all subordinate agents, and super-brazen strength in 
 the chained doors and vaulted roofs, which are to be prepared anew, I 
 maintain that the safety guarantied by them all is far short of that secu¬ 
 rity which is now habitually provided. Government stock, corresponding 
 dollar for dollar with the sum to be deposited, is, we are told, now pledged 
 by the depositories of money, and is received by the hands of the Treasurer. 
 If stolen, or accidentally lost, it cannot be used by the wrong-doer or the 
 finder. If destroyed in the hands of the Government, no injury is done to 
 any body; for, at the worst, exactly so much of the public debt is paid off 
 at par. 
 
 Possibly there may be found greater economy in the literal custody of 
 the public officer in the form prescribed. This is an age of alleged fru¬ 
 gality. The dominant party thrives by its reputation for that virtue. It 
 professes to be eminently economical. This par excellence a. saving Con¬ 
 gress ! By their fritits shall ye know them. An estimate is given on the 
 
 thirteenth page of the report which omits the necessarily principal item_ 
 
 officer’s salaries, and the vast incidents which the friends of the measure 
 contemplate as indispensable. One gentleman before me is panting for an 
 opportunity to insert by way of amendment in this very bill provision for 
 a magnificent Subtreasury building at New York, under the guise of a 
 branch mint. Another gentleman near him, with equal anxiety, desires to 
 construct under a like name an edifice at Charleston. Half a million of 
 dollars for each building, and from fifty to seventy thousand dollars annual 
 expenditure on their superfluous operations as extra mints, will serve to 
 show the rate at which we are to suffer for an economical administration 
 of the Government in the particular department of the safe keeping of its 
 funds. On the other hand, the present perfectly convenient, well-tried, and 
 absolutely safe mode of keeping the public money does not cost, I believe, 
 one single farthing. Truly, this is an economical democracy! 
 
 A fair test of the fidelity of an agent is found in his giving equal care 
 to the property of others with his own. The rule applies as well to great 
 trusts as to small ones—to Government ageney as to individual agency. 
 How does one of the sternest advocates of a Subtreasury in private life 
 keep hi.s own money when it accumulates largely ? Which of them hesi¬ 
 tates to place it in the hands of those whose business it is, and whose ar¬ 
 rangements are made at great cost, to take care of money, and to draw it 
 out from time to time by checks as he wants it ? Who ventures to trust 
 large sums to his own necessarily honest custody, aided though it be by 
 adamantine bars ? 
 
 The Government employs without hesitation banking establishments as 
 agents and depositories abroad. Has it more confidence in them than in 
 its own citizens ? Foreign bankers employed by the United States give no 
 security I believe, deposite no stock, furnish no pledges of indemnity. 
 They would probably throw up the agency if they were desired to do so. 
 Yet they are trusted, deservedly trusted, without an inquiry into the mode 
 of safe keeping which they may chance or choose to adopt, much more with¬ 
 out insisting that they shall provide safes and vaults and all the machinery 
 of imaginary or ostentatious domestic apprehension. 
 
 Driven, as it must be, from other motives, the Subtreasury seeks refuge 
 behind the argument, not less plausible, if well founded, than the cunsti- 
 
tulional protection which is sought for il, that it is republican in its ten¬ 
 dencies. This is one of the errors found in the report to which I am con¬ 
 strained repeatedly to allude. More than once within the limits of a page 
 it is asserted to be in accordance with “ the nature and character,” or “ the 
 genius and spirit” of republican Government. Lessons of history have 
 been studied in vain, if the reverse has not been found legibly written 
 among them. Ancient Persia—the most absolute of despotisms—exhib¬ 
 ited an early specimen of this description of popular institutions. China, 
 at this time, and, as far as knowledge is permitted to penetrate the myste¬ 
 ries of that inscrutable empire, at all times, has abounded in these deposi¬ 
 tories of silver coins. Napoleon is said, when his downfall was imminent, 
 to have developed, from the recesses beneath the palace of the Tuileries, 
 millions of secreted wealth. In the petty but arbitrary sovereignties of 
 interior India, a simpler method of preservation is resorted to, than the 
 artificial caverns of palaces, either republican or monarchical, will aS’ord. 
 A hole is dug in the ground, in which the treasure is deposited, and a ven¬ 
 omous serpent is dropped into it, with entire confidence in the vigilance and 
 disinterested integrity of the reptile guardian. These are favorable spe¬ 
 cimens of despotic subtreasuries. Very different establishments have been 
 found elsewhere. An institution of the Republic of Genoa was one of the 
 most ancient and celebrated banks of circulation as well as deposits in 
 Europe. It was broken up by the ruthless and predatory bands of in¬ 
 vaders which issued from the volcano of revolutionary France, and spread 
 like burning lava over the fertile fields of Italy. England has, as an ema¬ 
 nation of the popular part of her system, not only a great national bank, 
 the advantages of the large capital and the treasury deposites of which are 
 shared alike by Govertnnent and people, but she has hundreds of banking 
 institutions, almost all of which issue notes, forming, with specie, the equiv¬ 
 alent circulation of the kingdom. Republican Holland had her bank from 
 a distant period, established, we arc told, “ to obviate the inconvenience 
 ‘ and uncertainty arising from the circulation of the coins imported into 
 ‘ Amsterdam from all parts of the world. The merchants, who carried coin 
 ‘ or bullioti to the bank, obtained credit for tut equal value on its books. 
 ‘ This is called bank money; and all considerable payments were effected by 
 ‘ writing it off from the account of one individual to that of another. This 
 ‘ establishment continued to flourish till the invasion ofthe French in 1795.” 
 [McCulloch.] If our own country can be considered a type of republi¬ 
 canism, it must disprove the notion that such a principle is inharmonious 
 with paper circulation; for paper circulation, whether for good or evil, has 
 here found its especial home. 
 
 I am not called on for a scheme as a substitute for the Subtreasury. 
 Neither the thing itself nor a substitute is now desirable. The one is a 
 mere miscotiception ; the other would meet no responsive popular senti¬ 
 ment. Enough is found in existing law for all the present exigencies of the 
 country. When a day of war or any other great national crisis’shall arrive, 
 a very different system will be required for the aid of the Government and 
 the accommodation of the people from any thing that now exists or is now 
 proposed. Until then, let us in humble thankfulness cherish the good things 
 we possess, and rejoice that they require no peculiar exertion, while 
 we trust that the emergency may be far distant which will demand a 
 change. While thus I disclaith the advocacy of a national bank, I am bound 
 to demur to that part of the report which rests its argument in favor of a 
 
13 
 
 Subtreasury upon the comparative demerits of such an institution, as they 
 are supposed to be manifested in its past history. “ Solemn warning” is 
 discovered by the report “ against the repetition of a like plan” in the ca¬ 
 reer of the last Government bank—in its imaginary “embarrassments,” its 
 fancied “ depreciation,” and, finally, “ its ruinous explosion and its annihi¬ 
 lation of its vast capital.” It is altogether a mistake to suppose that these 
 disasters ever occurred to “ the United States Hank,” as the report styles it, 
 or to any Government institution of that or any other name. On the con¬ 
 trary, for forty years a Bank of the United States has lived in unquestioned 
 freedom from them. The last of those institutions, which was chartered by 
 Congress in 1816 for a period of twenty years, expired by original limita¬ 
 tion on the 4th March, 1836. It expired in great prosperity. No better proof 
 can be required of this circumstance than the estimate which was put upon 
 the Government portion of its stock by commissioners appointed for the 
 purpose by the Treasury, one of whom had been familiar with its opera¬ 
 tions as a Government director. Its stock stood in the market at about 
 fifteen per cent, above par, and the Secretary of the Treasury refused to 
 receive less than that price for it. At that price, or thereabouts, it was 
 actually sold, to the entire satisfaction of the Government, which thus 
 parted with its interest at a large profit, after having received, during nearly 
 the whole of its existence, besides great accommodation, steady and large 
 dividends. At a very early period it floated for a while upon a troubled 
 sea of speculation. But it soon reached a port of safety, and continued to 
 be prosperous to the end of its charter. No “ ruinous explosion,” no “ an¬ 
 nihilation “ of its vast capital” ever took place. It is extraordinary that a 
 gentleman, experienced as the one who made the report, should have fallen 
 into the palpable error of supposing that it did. The Bank of the United 
 States ceased, as I have said, on the 4th March, 1836. A State institution 
 was chartered by the Legislature of Pennsylvania, having no possible con¬ 
 nexion with the Government of the United States. The same stockhold¬ 
 ers, (except the Treasury of the United States,) and, unhappily, the same 
 capital, were continued, in the vain hope that the shadow of a name would 
 preserve the extended circulation which the Government Bank had en¬ 
 joyed. In the short space of eighteen months the circulation fell from some¬ 
 thing more than three-and-twenty millions to a fraction beyond one million 
 of new issues. The capital thus throwm upon the bank must be employed 
 somehow, and various investments were made from one end of the country 
 to the other. If the institutions which were the recipients of them had 
 turned out well, the investments might have verified the best expectations 
 that had been indulged in relation to them. But disaster succeeded disas¬ 
 ter in a long train of unfortunate miscalculations; and the stocks and secu¬ 
 rities, which in their first condition seemed to be satisfactory, finally col¬ 
 lapsed, and left the Bank of the State of Pennsylvania penniless. Whether, 
 during the whole career of the Government institution, it would have been 
 able to stand without the friendship and co-operation of the Treasury, I 
 will not undertake to say. That would at best be conjecture, which must 
 avail little. That it did stand in great credit and prosperity as long as it 
 was a federal corporation, I aver without the fear of contradiction, and in 
 disproof of the positions of the report. Its credit was substituted for specie 
 in the China market, which until that time had responded to the calls of 
 our merchants only when they appeared with Spanish dollars in their 
 
 I 
 
hands. Its notes were received in payment of the Indian annuities in j 
 preference to gold. Its credit was coextensive with the commercial world. I 
 
 Practical objections to the bill, in principle and in detail, gather round | 
 me as I advance in the argument. Penalties are provided for divers acts, i 
 which are declared to be felonies and misdemeanors, and are made punish- i 
 able under the laws of the United States. If there be any part of the \ 
 Federal system which lacks vigor, and fails for the want of it in practical | 
 enforcement, it is its penal jurisprudence. This may be possibly an inevi- i 
 table evil. Certain it is, that an experience of nearly sixty years has not i 
 failed to afford numerous illustrations of the deficiency. An absence : 
 of control over domestic and municipal concerns, which are reserved 
 necessarily for State policy, limits the sphere of the criminal jurisdiction of , 
 the General Government. It looks to a few objects only. Unlike the cor¬ 
 responding laws of other countries and of the several States, it does not 
 form an entire code. Links are wanting to make the whole chain com- | 
 plete. Omissions are occasionally discovered and supplied. Still there is 
 no entire system of criminal law, and, from the nature of things, there 
 never will be. The nation was threatened with war by reason of one of 
 these deficiencies, at the time of the arrest and trial before a State tribunal 
 of Alexander McLeod. A recurrence of the particular danger was wisely 
 obviated by the passage of an act of Congress, approved August 29,1S42, 
 “to provide further remedial justice in the courts of the United States.” 
 Other cases, already crying loudly for a remedy, have not been provided 
 for. The courts of the United States sit at longer intervals than those tri¬ 
 bunals of the States which are devoted to the administration of the penal 
 law. Witnesses are often not to be found at the day of trial, and the 
 guilty, on this account, e.'cape. A memorable instance of the deficiency 
 of power to punish crimes occurred some years ago in the District of Co¬ 
 lumbia, under the eye of the National Legislature, where, if any where, it 
 might be supposed that justice would be provided for and maintained. 
 We must all remember with what a glow of shame our cheeks as citizens 
 were tinged, when a popular and powerful President, surrounded by the 
 public and his friends, was openly and in the face of day assaulted in the 
 cabin of a steamboat, and the offender escaped with entire impunity, from 
 the imperfection of the law. The distinguished head of a foreign Govern¬ 
 ment dwelt upon this circumstance, in conversation with the representative 
 of our country, with mingled astonishment, indignation, and regret. As 
 the moneys of the United States are now kept, ordinary felonies with re¬ 
 gard to them would be investigated by the tribunals of the State, while a 
 loss to the Government, after they have reached the condition when a Sub¬ 
 treasury is to commence its operations, would be utterly impossible. Gov¬ 
 ernment stock is a never-failing pledge. 
 
 Some of the penal provisions of the bill are liable to other and graver- 
 objections than these. The sixth section interdicts the loan or use of all 
 public moneys. The seventeenth section provides that, if any of the cus¬ 
 todiers shall loan, with or rvithout interest, any portion of the public moneys 
 intrusted to him, every such act shall be deemed and adjudged to be an 
 embezzlement, and it is declared a felony, and all persons advising or par¬ 
 ticipating in such act, being convicted before any court of the United States 
 of competent jurisdiction, shall be sentenced to imprisonment for a term of 
 not less than six months nor more than ten years, and to a fine equal to the 
 amount of the money embezzled. It not unfrequently happens that a 
 
15 
 
 course of State policy is changed. In the progressive improvement of 
 knowledge, new views are unfolded; trade and commerce shift their 
 grounds; legislation must be modified in order to conform to them. Every 
 day’s experience demonstrates the necessity of a wise conformity to cir¬ 
 cumstances ; and he is a stubborn rather than a sagacious statesman that 
 does not open the eyes of his mind to emergencies as they arise. All this 
 is far short of what is now proposed. Rather, let me say, it is directly the 
 reverse of it. What sort of legislative policy is that which suddenly, and 
 without any change of circumstances, converts that which is not only 
 innocent but laudable to day into a heinous and infamous crime to-morrow? 
 Which encourages, facilitates, and invites to a course of action; pronounces 
 it salutary, beneficial, and virtuous ; furnishes the means and sees to the 
 employment of them at one moment; and punishes eondisniy and to the 
 utmost extremity of the law; disqualifies from posts of honor; holds up to 
 shame ; makes an outlaw of a citizen who pursues exactly the same course 
 of action, at the next ? At this hour the Government moneys, perfectly 
 secure in their returii, and subject to call by the Treasurer at any moment, 
 are yet beneficially extended to the uses of the people. 1’he Secretary of 
 the Treasury, in great wisdom, thirty year.s ago, urged this circumstance 
 as a leading inducement for the establishment of a system of finance of 
 which it was a part. It is practised without the possibility of harm, and 
 with the most prolific good. You may talk about undue expansions and 
 contractions as you will. These are abuses to which a thing, useful and 
 proper in itself, is liable in the nature of things. If being obnoxious to 
 abuse were a reason for abstaining from the use of blessings, all that is 
 beneficial in friendship, true in morals, faithful in affection, loyal in patriot¬ 
 ism, or pious, fervent, and devoted, in religion, must be discarded from the 
 bosoms and the business of men. While the moneys of a Government, 
 which is noihing more than a concentrated essence of popular will—while, 
 therefore, the moneys of the pnople are placed, with due care and in full 
 protection from loss, in the xisc. of the people, there can be no danger, 
 except that which attends every action of our lives. My object, however, 
 is to show the error of suddenly, or even tardily, by party legislation, con¬ 
 verting virtue into crime. Inconsistency is not die word that properly 
 applies. It is positive and enormous wrong. 
 
 A few practical objections have tints been ofl'ered to a scheme which is 
 patronized by a powerful party. 'I’iiey are presented, I will not say in the 
 hope, but certainly in the honest wish, that they may fall upon some not 
 reluctant ears, upon minds not absolutely sealed against conviction. In 
 any event, the attempt, however I'eeble, will have been made to rescue 
 vital interests of the country from a threatened sacrifice of them to the 
 Bloloch of party, the fiercest and most ntirelenting tyrant of the age.