[3]P. 334, l. 20. 1. In the session of 1831-1832 the bank applied for a new charter, and here began the great struggle with President Jackson. The bill to recharter the bank passed both Houses in 1832, and was vetoed by the President. Mr. Webster made a notable speech against the veto, and at once took the lead as an authority on questions of finance. The following year the President struck his hardest blow against the bank, by ordering the removal of the deposits. The Senate passed resolutions condemning the act, and Mr. Webster, on presenting resolutions to the same effect from Boston, made a most powerful speech in which he depicted the great commercial distress resulting from the removal and from the institution of State banks. Between the time of this speech and the close of the session he spoke on the subject of the bank and national finance over sixty times. No other such exhibition of intellectual power and grasp of intricate problems, united with commanding eloquence, has ever been made in our history. As a result of the censure by the Senate, the President sent a protest in which he argued that the Senate had exceeded its power. Mr. Webster replied to this in what is now considered the greatest of all his speeches during the great struggle. [4]P. 335, l. 26. 1. After the removal of the deposits, effected by Jackson, State banks were formed in large numbers, and certain of these became deposit banks. The notes of State banks were used for the purchase of public lands from the United States, and the treasury was thus accumulating paper currency of doubtful value. The Secretary of the Treasury (1836) issued the so-called "Specie Circular," ordering the government agents to receive in future only gold and silver. Only those banks which held government revenue deposits could furnish coin, and widespread bankruptcy was the result. [5]P. 337, l. 17. 1. Cf. Gay's _Life of James Madison_. [6]P. 339, l. 9, 1. Jackson had never questioned the right of the government to regulate the currency, but had asserted it when he made certain State banks banks of deposit. Van Buren was obliged either to return to the policy of a national bank, or to renounce all rights of the Government to regulate the currency. He chose the latter, and by means of the "Sub-Treasury Scheme" completed the separation of "bank and State." The speech of Mr. Webster on the "Sub-Treasury" is the most complete and convincing of all his speeches on the right of the Government to regulate the currency. [7]P. 346, l. 24. 1. Mr. Webster was living at this time at Marshfield, Massachusetts. Cf. Curtis's _Life of Webster_, Chs. XIX.-XXIII.; Lodge's _Webster_, Ch. VII.; _Works of Daniel Webster_, Vols. III., IV.; _Private Correspondence of Daniel Webster_, Vol. II., p. 83. * * * * * _MR. JUSTICE STORY_. September, 1845.