State of the Union AddressesPolk, James K. (James Knox)
History
State of the Union Addresses
Polk, James K. (James Knox)
Presidents -- United States -- Messages; United States -- Politics and government -- Sources
By this construction, which the President adopted, he gained another day
for deliberation, and it was not until the 25th of February that he signed
the bill, thus affording conclusive proof that he had at last obtained his
own consent to sign it not without great and almost insuperable difficulty.
Additional light has been recently shed upon the serious doubts which he
had on the subject, amounting at one time to a conviction that it was his
duty to withhold his approval from the bill. This is found among the
manuscript papers of Mr. Madison, authorized to be purchased for the use of
the Government by an act of the last session of Congress, and now for the
first time accessible to the public. From these papers it appears that
President Washington, while he yet held the bank bill in his hands,
actually requested Mr. Madison, at that time a member of the House of
Representatives, to prepare the draft of a veto message for him. Mr.
Madison, at his request, did prepare the draft of such a message, and sent
it to him on the 21st of February, 1791. A copy of this original draft, in
Mr. Madison's own handwriting, was carefully preserved by him, and is among
the papers lately purchased by Congress. It is preceded by a note, written
on the same sheet, which is also in Mr. Madison's handwriting, and is as
follows:
February 21, 1791.--Copy of a paper made out and sent to the President, at
his request, to be ready in case his judgment should finally decide against
the bill for incorporating a national bank, the bill being then before
him.
Among the objections assigned in this paper to the bill, and which were
submitted for the consideration of the President, are the following:
I object to the bill, because it is an essential principle of the
Government that powers not delegated by the Constitution can not be
rightfully exercised; because the power proposed by the bill to be
exercised is not expressly delegated, and because I can not satisfy myself
that it results from any express power by fair and safe rules of
interpretation.
The weight of the precedent of the bank of 1791 and the sanction of the
great name of Washington, which has been so often invoked in its support,
are greatly weakened by the development of these facts.
The experiment of that bank satisfied the country that it ought not to be
continued, and at the end of twenty years Congress refused to recharter it.
It would have been fortunate for the country, and saved thousands from
bankruptcy and ruin, had our public men of 1816 resisted the temporary
pressure of the times upon our financial and pecuniary interests and
refused to charter the second bank. Of this the country became abundantly
satisfied, and at the close of its twenty years' duration, as in the case
of the first bank, it also ceased to exist. Under the repeated blows of
President Jackson it reeled and fell, and a subsequent attempt to charter a
similar institution was arrested by the veto of President Tyler.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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