The deposits of the money of the United States in places in which the
said bank and branches thereof may be established shall be made in said
bank or branches thereof unless the Secretary of the Treasury shall at
any time otherwise order and direct, in which case the Secretary of the
Treasury shall immediately lay before Congress, if in session, and, if
not, immediately after the commencement of the next session, the reasons
of such order or direction.
The power of the Secretary of the Treasury over the deposits is
_unqualified_. The provision that he shall report his reasons to
Congress is no limitation. Had it not been inserted he would have been
responsible to Congress had he made a removal for any other than good
reasons, and his responsibility now ceases upon the rendition of
sufficient ones to Congress. The only object of the provision is to make
his reasons accessible to Congress and enable that body the more readily
to judge of their soundness and purity, and thereupon to make such
further provision by law as the legislative power may think proper in
relation to the deposit of the public money. Those reasons may be very
diversified. It was asserted by the Secretary of the Treasury, without
contradiction, as early as 1817, that he had power "to control the
proceedings" of the Bank of the United States at any moment "by changing
the deposits to the State banks" should it pursue an illiberal course
toward those institutions; that "the Secretary of the Treasury will
always be disposed to support the credit of the State banks, and will
invariably direct transfers from the deposits of the public money in aid
of their legitimate exertions to maintain their credit;" and he asserted
a right to employ the State banks when the Bank of the United States
should refuse to receive on deposit the notes of such State banks as the
public interest required should be received in payment of the public
dues. In several instances he did transfer the public deposits to State
banks in the immediate vicinity of branches, for reasons connected only
with the safety of those banks, the public convenience, and the
interests of the Treasury.
If it was lawful for Mr. Crawford, the Secretary of the Treasury at that
time, to act on these principles, it will be difficult to discover any
sound reason against the application of similar principles in still
stronger cases. And it is a matter of surprise that a power which in
the infancy of the bank was freely asserted as one of the ordinary and
familiar duties of the Secretary of the Treasury should now be gravely
questioned, and attempts made to excite and alarm the public mind as if
some new and unheard-of power was about to be usurped by the executive
branch of the Government.
It is but a little more than two and a half years to the termination of
the charter of the present bank. It is considered as the decision of the
country that it shall then cease to exist, and no man, the President
believes, has reasonable ground for expectation that any other Bank of
the United States will be created by Congress.
To the Treasury Department is intrusted the safe-keeping and faithful
application of the public moneys. A plan of collection different from
the present must therefore be introduced and put in complete operation
before the dissolution of the present bank. When shall it be commenced?
Shall no step be taken in this essential concern until the charter
expires and the Treasury finds itself without an agent, its accounts in
confusion, with no depository for its funds, and the whole business of
the Government deranged, or shall it be delayed until six months, or a
year, or two years before the expiration of the charter? It is obvious
that any new system which may be substituted in the place of the Bank
of the United States could not be suddenly carried into effect on the
termination of its existence without serious inconvenience to the
Government and the people. Its vast amount of notes are then to be
redeemed and withdrawn-from circulation and its immense debt collected.
These operations must be gradual, otherwise much suffering and distress
will be brought upon the community.
It ought to be not a work of months only, but of years, and the
President thinks it can not, with due attention to the interests of the
people, be longer postponed. It is safer to begin it too soon than to
delay it too long.
It is for the wisdom of Congress to decide upon the best substitute
to be adopted in the place of the Bank of the United States, and the
President would have felt himself relieved from a heavy and painful
responsibility if in the charter to the bank Congress had reserved to
itself the power of directing at its pleasure the public money to be
elsewhere deposited, and had not devolved that power exclusively on one
of the Executive Departments. It is useless now to inquire why this high
and important power was surrendered by those who are peculiarly and
appropriately the guardians of the public money. Perhaps it was an
oversight. But as the President presumes that the charter to the bank is
to be considered as a contract on the part of the Government, it is not
now in the power of Congress to disregard its stipulations; and by the
terms of that contract the public money is to be deposited in the bank
during the continuance of its charter unless the Secretary of the
Treasury shall otherwise direct. Unless, therefore, the Secretary of the
Treasury first acts, Congress have no power over the subject, for they
can not add a new clause to the charter or strike one out of it without
the consent of the bank, and consequently the public money must remain
in that institution to the last hour of its existence unless the
Secretary of the Treasury shall remove it at an earlier day. The
responsibility is thus thrown upon the executive branch of the
Government of deciding how long before the expiration of the charter the
public interest will require the deposits to be placed elsewhere; and
although according to the frame and principle of our Government this
decision would seem more properly to belong to the legislative power,
yet as the law has imposed it upon the executive department the duty
ought to be faithfully and firmly met, and the decision made and
executed upon the best lights that can be obtained and the best judgment
that can be formed. It would ill become the executive branch of the
Government to shrink from any duty which the law imposes on it, to fix
upon others the responsibility which justly belongs to itself. And while
the President anxiously wishes to abstain from the exercise of doubtful
powers and to avoid all interference with the rights and duties
of others, he must yet with unshaken constancy discharge his own
obligations, and can not allow himself to turn aside in order to avoid
any responsibility which the high trust with which he has been honored
requires him to encounter; and it being the duty of one of the Executive
Departments to decide in the first instance, subject to the future
action of the legislative power, whether the public deposits shall
remain in the Bank of the United States until the end of its existence
or be withdrawn some time before, the President has felt himself bound
to examine the question carefully and deliberately in order to make up
his judgment on the subject, and in his opinion the near approach of
the termination of the charter and the public considerations heretofore
mentioned are of themselves amply sufficient to justify the removal of
the deposits, without reference to the conduct of the bank or their
safety in its keeping.
But in the conduct of the bank may be found other reasons, very
imperative in their character, and which require prompt action.
Developments have been made from time to time of its faithlessness as
a public agent, its misapplication of public funds, its interference in
elections, its efforts by the machinery of committees to deprive the
Government directors of a full knowledge of its concerns, and, above
all, its flagrant misconduct as recently and unexpectedly disclosed
in placing all the funds of the bank, including the money of the
Government, at the disposition of the president of the bank as means
of operating upon public opinion and procuring a new charter, without
requiring him to render a voucher for their disbursement. A brief
recapitulation of the facts which justify these charges, and which have
come to the knowledge of the public and the President, will, he thinks,
remove every reasonable doubt as to the course which it is now the duty
of the President to pursue.
We have seen that in sixteen months ending in May, 1832, the bank
had extended its loans more than $28,000,000, although it knew the
Government intended to appropriate most of its large deposit during that
year in payment of the public debt. It was in May, 1832, that its loans
arrived at the maximum, and in the preceding March so sensible was the
bank that it would not be able to pay over the public deposit when
it would be required by the Government that it commenced a secret
negotiation, without the approbation or knowledge of the Government,
with the agents for about $2,700,000 of the 3 per cent stocks held in
Holland, with a view of inducing them not to come forward for payment
for one or more years after notice should be given by the Treasury
Department. This arrangement would have enabled the bank to keep and use
during time the public money set apart for the payment of these stocks.
After this negotiation had commenced, the Secretary of the Treasury
informed the bank that it was his intention to pay off one-half of the
3 percents on the 1st of the succeeding July, which amounted to about
$6,500,000. The president of the bank, although the committee of
investigation was then looking into its affairs at Philadelphia, came
immediately to Washington, and upon representing that the bank was
desirous of accommodating the importing merchants at New York (which it
failed to do) and undertaking to pay the interest itself, procured the
consent of the Secretary, after consultation with the President, to
postpone the payment until the succeeding 1st of October.
Conscious that at the end of that quarter the bank would not be able
to pay over the deposits, and that further indulgence was not to be
expected of the Government, an agent was dispatched to England secretly
to negotiate with the holders of the public debt in Europe and induce
them by the offer of an equal or higher interest than that paid by the
Government to hold back their claims for one year, during which the bank
expected thus to retain the use of $5,000,000 of the public money, which
the Government should set apart for the payment of that debt. The agent
made an arrangement on terms, in part, which were in direct violation
of the charter of the bank, and when some incidents connected with this
secret negotiation accidentally came to the knowledge of the public and
the Government, then, and not before, so much of it as was palpably in
violation of the charter was disavowed. A modification of the rest was
attempted with the view of getting the certificates without payment of
the money, and thus absolving the Government from its liability to the
holders. In this scheme the bank was partially successful, but to this
day the certificates of a portion of these stocks have not been paid and
the bank retains the use of the money.
This effort to thwart the Government in the payment of the public debt
that it might retain the public money to be used for their private
interests, palliated by pretenses notoriously unfounded and insincere,
would have justified the instant withdrawal of the public deposits.
The negotiation itself rendered doubtful the ability of the bank to meet
the demands of the Treasury, and the misrepresentations by which it was
attempted to be justified proved that no reliance could be placed upon
its allegations.
If the question of a removal of the deposits presented itself to the
Executive in the same attitude that it appeared before the House of
Representatives at their last session, their resolution in relation to
the safety of the deposits would be entitled to more weight, although
the decision of the question of removal has been confided by law to
another department of the Government. But the question now occurs
attended by other circumstances and new disclosures of the most serious
import. It is true that in the message of the President which produced
this inquiry and resolution on the part of the House of Representatives
it was his object to obtain the aid of that body in making a thorough
examination into the conduct and condition of the bank and its branches
in order to enable the executive department to decide whether the public
money was longer safe in its hands. The limited power of the Secretary
of the Treasury over the subject disabled him from making the
investigation as fully and satisfactorily as it could be done by a
committee of the House of Representatives, and hence the President
desired the assistance of Congress to obtain for the Treasury Department
a full knowledge of all the facts which were necessary to guide his
judgment. But it was not his purpose, as the language of his message
will show, to ask the representatives of the people to assume a
responsibility which did not belong to them and relieve the executive
branch of the Government from the duty which the law had imposed upon
it. It is due to the President that his object in that proceeding should
be distinctly understood, and that he should acquit himself of all
suspicion of seeking to escape from the performance of his own duties or
of desiring to interpose another body between himself and the people in
order to avoid a measure which he is called upon to meet. But although
as an act of justice to himself he disclaims any design of soliciting
the opinion of the House of Representatives in relation to his own
duties in order to shelter himself from responsibility under the
sanction of their counsel, yet he is at all times ready to listen to
the suggestions of the representatives of the people, whether given
voluntarily or upon solicitation, and to consider them with the profound
respect to which all will admit that they are justly entitled. Whatever
may be the consequences, however, to himself, he must finally form his
own judgment where the Constitution and the law make it his duty to
decide, and must act accordingly; and he is bound to suppose that such
a course on his part will never be regarded by that elevated body as a
mark of disrespect to itself, but that they will, on the contrary,
esteem it the strongest evidence he can give of his fixed resolution
conscientiously to discharge his duty to them and the country.
A new state of things has, however, arisen since the close of the
last session of Congress, and evidence has since been laid before
the President which he is persuaded would have led the House of
Representatives to a different conclusion if it had come to their
knowledge. The fact that the bank controls, and in some cases
substantially _owns_, and by its money _supports_ some of the leading
presses of the country is now more clearly established. Editors to
whom it loaned extravagant sums in 1831 and 1832, on unusual time and
nominal security, have since turned out to be insolvent, and to others
apparently in no better condition accommodations still more extravagant,
on terms more unusual, and some without any security, have also been
heedlessly granted.
The allegation which has so often circulated through these channels that
the Treasury was bankrupt and the bank was sustaining it, when for many
years there has not been less, on an average, than six millions of
public money in that institution, might be passed over as a harmless
misrepresentation; but when it is attempted by substantial acts to
impair the credit of the Government and tarnish the honor of the
country, such charges require more serious attention. With six millions
of public money in its vaults, after having had the use of from five to
twelve millions for nine years without interest, it became the purchaser
of a bill drawn by our Government on that of France for about $900,000,
being the first installment of the French indemnity. The purchase money
was left in the use of the bank, being simply added to the Treasury
deposit. The bank sold the bill in England, and the holder sent it to
France for collection, and arrangements not having been made by the
French Government for its payment, it was taken up by the agents of the
bank in Paris with the funds of the bank in their hands. Under these
circumstances it has through its organs openly assailed the credit of
the Government, and has actually made and persists in a demand of 15 per
cent, or $158,842.77, as damages, when no damage, or none beyond some
trifling expense, has in fact been sustained, and when the bank had
in its own possession on deposit several millions of the public money
which it was then using for its own profit. Is a fiscal agent of the
Government which thus seeks to enrich itself at the expense of the
public worthy of further trust?
There are other important facts not in the contemplation of the House
of Representatives or not known to the members at the time they voted
for the resolution.
Although the charter and the rules of the bank both declare that "not
less than seven directors" shall be necessary to the transaction of
business, yet the most important business, even that of granting
discounts to any extent, is intrusted to a committee of five members,
who do not report to the board.
To cut off all means of communication with the Government in relation
to its most important acts at the commencement of the present year, not
one of the Government directors was placed on any one committee; and
although since, by an unusual remodeling of those bodies, some of those
directors have been placed on some of the committees, they are yet
entirely excluded from the committee of exchange, through which the
greatest and most objectionable loans have been made.
When the Government directors made an effort to bring back the business
of the bank to the board in obedience to the charter and the existing
regulations, the board not only overruled their attempt, but altered the
rule so as to make it conform to the practice, in direct violation of
one of the most important provisions of the charter which gave them
existence.
It has long been known that the president of the bank, by his single
will, originates and executes many of the most important measures
connected with the management and credit of the bank, and that the
committee as well as the board of directors are left in entire ignorance
of many acts done and correspondence carried on in their names, and
apparently under their authority. The fact has been recently disclosed
that an unlimited discretion has been and is now vested in the president
of the bank to expend its funds in payment for preparing and circulating
articles and purchasing pamphlets and newspapers, calculated by their
contents to operate on elections and secure a renewal of its charter.
It appears from the official report of the public directors that on the
30th November, 1830, the president submitted to the board an article
published in the American Quarterly Review containing favorable notices
of the bank, and suggested the expediency of giving it a wider
circulation at the expense of the bank; whereupon the board passed the
following resolution, viz:
_Resolved_, That the president be authorized to take such measures in
regard to the circulation of the contents of the said article, either
in whole or in part, as he may deem most for the interest of the bank.
By an entry in the minutes of the bank dated March 11, 1831, it appears
that the president had not only caused a large edition of that article
to be issued, but had also, before the resolution of 30th November was
adopted, procured to be printed and widely circulated numerous copies of
the reports of General Smith and Mr. McDuffie in favor of the bank; and
on that day he suggested the expediency of extending his power to the
printing of other articles which might subserve the purposes of the
institution, whereupon the following resolution was adopted, viz--
_Resolved_, That the president is hereby authorized to cause to be
prepared and circulated such documents and papers as may communicate
to the people information in regard to the nature and operations of
the bank.
The expenditures purporting to have been made under authority of these
resolutions during the years 1831 and 1832 were about $80,000. For a
portion of these expenditures vouchers were rendered, from which it
appears that they were incurred in the purchase of some hundred thousand
copies of newspapers, reports and speeches made in Congress, reviews
of the veto message and reviews of speeches against the bank, etc.
For another large portion no vouchers whatever were rendered, but the
various sums were paid on orders of the president of the bank, making
reference to the resolution of the 11th of March, 1831.
On ascertaining these facts and perceiving that expenditures of a
similar character were still continued, the Government directors a few
weeks ago offered a resolution in the board calling for a specific
account of these expenditures, showing the objects to which they had
been applied and the persons to whom the money had been paid. This
reasonable proposition was voted down.
They also offered a resolution rescinding the resolutions of November,
1830, and March, 1831. This also was rejected.
Not content with thus refusing to recall the obnoxious power or even to
require such an account of the expenditure as would show whether the
money of the bank had in fact been applied to the objects contemplated
by these resolutions, as obnoxious as they were, the board renewed the
power already conferred, and even enjoined renewed attention to its
exercise by adopting the following in lieu of the propositions submitted
by the Government directors, viz:
_Resolved_, That the board have confidence in the wisdom and integrity
of the president and in the propriety of the resolutions of 30th
November, 1830, and 11th March, 1831, and entertain a full conviction
of the necessity of a renewed attention to the object of those
resolutions, and that the president be authorized and requested to
continue his exertions for the promotion of said object.
Taken in connection with the nature of the expenditures heretofore made,
as recently disclosed, which the board not only tolerate, but approve,
this resolution puts the funds of the bank at the disposition of the
president for the purpose of employing the whole press of the country in
the service of the bank, to hire writers and newspapers, and to pay out
such sums as he pleases to what person and for what services he pleases
without the responsibility of rendering any specific account. The bank
is thus converted into a vast electioneering engine, with means to
embroil the country in deadly feuds, and, under cover of expenditures in
themselves improper, extend its corruption through all the ramifications
of society.
Some of the items for which accounts have been rendered show the
construction which has been given to the resolutions and the way in
which the power it confers has been exerted. The money has not been
expended merely in the publication and distribution of speeches, reports
of committees, or articles written for the purpose of showing the
constitutionality or usefulness of the bank, but publications have been
prepared and extensively circulated containing the grossest invectives
against the officers of the Government, and the money which belongs to
the stockholders and to the public has been freely applied in efforts to
degrade in public estimation those who were supposed to be instrumental
in resisting the wishes of this grasping and dangerous institution. As
the president of the bank has not been required to settle his accounts,
no one but himself knows how much more than the sum already mentioned
may have been squandered, and for which a credit may hereafter be
claimed in his account under this most extraordinary resolution. With
these facts before us can we be surprised at the torrent of abuse
incessantly poured out against all who are supposed to stand in the way
of the cupidity or ambition of the Bank of the United States? Can we be
surprised at sudden and unexpected changes of opinion in favor of an
institution which has millions to lavish and avows its determination not
to spare its means when they are necessary to accomplish its purposes?
The refusal to render an account of the manner in which a part of the
money expended has been applied gives just cause for the suspicion that
it has been used for purposes which it is not deemed prudent to expose
to the eyes of an intelligent and virtuous people. Those who act justly
do not shun the light, nor do they refuse explanations when the
propriety of their conduct is brought into question.
With these facts before him in an official report from the Government
directors, the President would feel that he was not only responsible for
all the abuses and corruptions the bank has committed or may commit, but
almost an accomplice in a conspiracy against that Government which he
has sworn honestly to administer, if he did not take every step within
his constitutional and legal power likely to be efficient in putting an
end to these enormities. If it be possible within the scope of human
affairs to find a reason for removing the Government deposits and
leaving the bank to its own resource for the means of effecting its
criminal designs, we have it here. Was it expected when the moneys of
the United States were directed to be placed in that bank that they
would be put under the control of one man empowered to spend millions
without rendering a voucher or specifying the object? Can they be
considered safe with the evidence before us that tens of thousands have
been spent for highly improper, if not corrupt, purposes, and that the
same motive may lead to the expenditure of hundreds of thousands, and
even millions, more? And can we justify ourselves to the people by
longer lending to it the money and power of the Government to be
employed for such purposes?
It has been alleged by some as an objection to the removal of the
deposits that the bank has the power, and in that event will have the
disposition, to destroy the State banks employed by the Government,
and bring distress upon the country. It has been the fortune of the
President to encounter dangers which were represented as equally
alarming, and he has seen them vanish before resolution and energy.
Pictures equally appalling were paraded before him when this bank came
to demand a new charter. But what was the result? Has the country been
ruined, or even distressed? Was it ever more prosperous than since that
act? The President verily believes the bank has not the power to produce
the calamities its friends threaten. The funds of the Government will
not be annihilated by being transferred. They will immediately be issued
for the benefit of trade, and if the Bank of the United States curtails
its loans the State banks, strengthened by the public deposits, will
extend theirs. What comes in through one bank will go out through
others, and the equilibrium will be preserved. Should the bank, for the
mere purpose of producing distress, press its debtors more heavily than
some of them can bear, the consequences will recoil upon itself, and in
the attempts to embarrass the country it will only bring loss and ruin
upon the holders of its own stock. But if the President believed the
bank possessed all the power which has been attributed to it, his
determination would only be rendered the more inflexible. If, indeed,
this corporation now holds in its hands the happiness and prosperity of
the American people, it is high time to take the alarm. If the despotism
be already upon us and our only safety is in the mercy of the despot,
recent developments in relation to his designs and the means he employs
show how necessary it is to shake it off. The struggle can never come
with less distress to the people or under more favorable auspices than
at the present moment.
All doubt as to the willingness of the State banks to undertake the
service of the Government to the same extent and on the same terms as it
is now performed by the Bank of the United States is put to rest by the
report of the agent recently employed to collect information, and from
that willingness their own safety in the operation may be confidently
inferred. Knowing their own resources better than they can be known by
others, it is not to be supposed that they would be willing to place
themselves in a situation which they can not occupy without danger of
annihilation or embarrassment. The only consideration applies to the
safety of the public funds if deposited in those institutions, and when
it is seen that the directors of many of them are not only willing
to pledge the character and capital of the corporations in giving
success to this measure, but also their own property and reputation, we
can not doubt that they at least believe the public deposits would be
safe in their management. The President thinks that these facts and
circumstances afford as strong a guaranty as can be had in human
affairs for the safety of the public funds and the practicability of
a new system of collection and disbursement through the agency of the
State banks.
From all these considerations the President thinks that the State banks
ought immediately to be employed in the collection and disbursement of
the public revenue, and the funds now in the Bank of the United States
drawn out with all convenient dispatch. The safety of the public moneys
if deposited in the State banks must be secured beyond all reasonable
doubts; but the extent and nature of the security, in addition to their
capital, if any be deemed necessary, is a subject of detail to which the
Treasury Department will undoubtedly give its anxious attention. The
banks to be employed must remit the moneys of the Government without
charge, as the Bank of the United States now does; must render all the
services which that bank now performs; must keep the Government advised
of their situation by periodical returns; in fine, in any arrangement
with the State banks the Government must not in any respect be placed on
a worse footing than it now is. The President is happy to perceive by
the report of the agent that the banks which he has consulted have, in
general, consented to perform the service on these terms, and that those
in New York have further agreed to make payments in London without other
charge than the mere cost of the bills of exchange.
It should also be enjoined upon any banks which may be employed that
it will be expected of them to facilitate domestic exchanges for the
benefit of internal commerce; to grant all reasonable facilities to the
payers of the revenue; to exercise the utmost liberality toward the
other State banks, and do nothing uselessly to embarrass the Bank of
the United States.
As one of the most serious objections to the Bank of the United States
is the power which it concentrates, care must be taken in finding other
agents for the service of the Treasury not to raise up another power
equally formidable. Although it would probably be impossible to produce
such a result by any organization of the State banks which could be
devised, yet it is desirable to avoid even the appearance. To this end
it would be expedient to assume no more power over them and interfere no
more in their affairs than might be absolutely necessary to the security
of the public deposit and the faithful performance of their duties
as agents of the Treasury. Any interference by them in the political
contests of the country with a view to influence elections ought, in the
opinion of the President, to be followed by an immediate discharge from
the public service.
It is the desire of the President that the control of the banks and
the currency shall, as far as possible, be entirely separated from the
political power of the country as well as wrested from an institution
which has already attempted to subject the Government to its will.
In his opinion the action of the General Government on this subject
ought not to extend beyond the grant in the Constitution, which only
authorizes Congress "to coin money and regulate the value thereof;"
all else belongs to the States and the people, and must be regulated
by public opinion and the interests of trade.
In conclusion, the President must be permitted to remark that he looks
upon the pending question as of higher consideration than the mere
transfer of a sum of money from one bank to another. Its decision may
affect the character of our Government for ages to come. Should the bank
be suffered longer to use the public moneys in the accomplishment of its
purposes, with the proofs of its faithlessness and corruption before
our eyes, the patriotic among our citizens will despair of success in
struggling against its power, and we shall be responsible for entailing
it upon our country forever. Viewing it as a question of transcendent
importance, both in the principles and consequences it involves, the
President could not, in justice to the responsibility which he owes to
the country, refrain from pressing upon the Secretary of the Treasury
his view of the considerations which impel to immediate action. Upon him
has been devolved by the Constitution and the suffrages of the American
people the duty of superintending the operation of the Executive
Departments of the Government and seeing that the laws are faithfully
executed. In the performance of this high trust it is his undoubted
right to express to those whom the laws and his own choice have made his
associates in the administration of the Government his opinion of their
duties under circumstances as they arise. It is this right which he now
exercises. Far be it from him to expect or require that any member of
the Cabinet should at his request, order, or dictation do any act which
he believes unlawful or in his conscience condemns. From them and from
his fellow-citizens in general he desires only that aid and support
which their reason approves and their conscience sanctions.
In the remarks he has made on this all-important question he trusts
the Secretary of the Treasury will see only the frank and respectful
declarations of the opinions which the President has formed on a measure
of great national interest deeply affecting the character and usefulness
of his Administration, and not a spirit of dictation, which the
President would be as careful to avoid as ready to resist. Happy will he
be if the facts now disclosed produce uniformity of opinion and unity of
action among the members of the Administration.
The President again repeats that he begs his Cabinet to consider the
proposed measure as his own, in the support of which he shall require
no one of them to make a sacrifice of opinion or principle. Its
responsibility has been assumed after the most mature deliberation
and reflection as necessary to preserve the morals of the people, the
freedom of the press, and the purity of the elective franchise, without
which all will unite in saying that the blood and treasure expended by
our forefathers in the establishment of our happy system of government
will have been vain and fruitless. Under these convictions he feels that
a measure so important to the American people can not be commenced too
soon, and he therefore names the 1st day of October next as a period
proper for the change of the deposits, or sooner, provided the necessary
arrangements with the State banks can be made.