The long strife in Congress over this great fundamental financial question is a matter of history. There appeared to be no national resources to meet such a demand. There was not money enough in the Treasury to pay current expenses, to say nothing of paying a debt of tens of millions. Probably no body of legislators in the world ever represented wisdom, statesmanship, pertinacity of opinion so tried in the fiery crucible of war, poverty and suffering, as did this first Congress; yet it was left to the untried minister of finance of thirty-three to save the national credit against mighty odds, and to foresee and to foretell the future resources of a vast, consolidated people. This inspiration of enthusiasm and faith, combined with practical administrative force, and a broad financial policy, averted the horrors of national bankruptcy, preserved the credit of the government, and gave to the sufferings of Valley Forge and the surrender at Yorktown their final fruition. The young financier, bearing his burden alone, seemed to hold in himself the guarantee of future triumph. He gave to the most despairing a security of success when they remembered that, at the age of nineteen, this same young prophet and patriot was the “right hand” of Washington. The long struggle ended in the adoption of Hamilton’s great financial scheme of funding the domestic debt. When the government was removed to Philadelphia, the Treasury was established in a plain building in Arch street, two doors east from Sixth. Here Morris, Hamilton and Washington were united in the closest bonds of personal friendship. Then followed, in rapid succession, those great state-papers on finance from Hamilton, whose embodiment into laws fixed the duties on all foreign productions, and taxed with just distinction the home luxuries and necessities of life. From these were evolved in gradual development the entire system of the Treasury Department of the United States. Time has proved how perfect were the plans which sprang without precedent from the brain of Alexander Hamilton. First, from his suggestions came the act which established the routine by which customs were to be collected. Then came the acts for the levying of taxes and the accumulation of the revenue. Then the imposition on ships and our commercial marine, foreign and domestic. Next, a bank was established for the depository of collected funds, and their distribution throughout the country. Then was needed the crown of the grand financial structure—a legalized institution for the coinage of gold and silver. To accomplish this great design, Hamilton recommended for the adoption of Congress the establishment of a mint for the purposes of national coinage, and the act was passed April 2, 1792, fixing the establishment at the then seat of government, Philadelphia, from whence, through later legislation, it has never been transferred.