Presidents -- United States -- Messages; United States -- Politics and government -- Sources
I am not able to perceive that any fair and candid objection can be urged
against the plan, the principal outlines of which I have thus presented. I
can not doubt but that the notes which it proposes to furnish at the
voluntary option of the public creditor, issued in lieu of the revenue and
its certificates of deposit, will be maintained at an equality with gold
and silver everywhere. They are redeemable in gold and silver on demand at
the places of issue. They are receivable everywhere in payment of
Government dues. The Treasury notes are limited to an amount of one-fourth
less than the estimated annual receipts of the Treasury, and in addition
they rest upon the faith of the Government for their redemption. If all
these assurances are not sufficient to make them available, then the idea,
as it seems to me, of furnishing a sound paper medium of exchange may be
entirely abandoned.
If a fear be indulged that the Government may be tempted to run into excess
in its issues at any future day, it seems to me that no such apprehension
can reasonably be entertained until all confidence in the representatives
of the States and of the people, as well as of the people themselves, shall
be lost. The weightiest considerations of policy require that the
restraints now proposed to be thrown around the measure should not for
light causes be removed. To argue against any proposed plan its liability
to possible abuse is to reject every expedient, since everything dependent
on human action is liable to abuse. Fifteen millions of Treasury notes may
be issued as the maximum, but a discretionary power is to be given to the
board of control under that sum, and every consideration will unite in
leading them to feel their way with caution. For the first eight years of
the existence of the late Bank of the United States its circulation barely
exceeded $4,000,000, and for five of its most prosperous years it was about
equal to $16,000,000; furthermore, the authority given to receive private
deposits to a limited amount and to issue certificates in such sums as may
be called for by the depositors may so far fill up the channels of
circulation as greatly to diminish the necessity of any considerable issue
of Treasury notes. A restraint upon the amount of private deposits has
seemed to be indispensably necessary from an apprehension, thought to be
well founded, that in any emergency of trade confidence might be so far
shaken in the banks as to induce a withdrawal from them of private deposits
with a view to insure their unquestionable safety when deposited with the
Government, which might prove eminently disastrous to the State banks. Is
it objected that it is proposed to authorize the agencies to deal in bills
of exchange? It is answered that such dealings are to be carried on at the
lowest possible premium, are made to rest on an unquestionably sound basis,
are designed to reimburse merely the expenses which would otherwise devolve
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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