payments; and advantage had been taken of that suspension to issue still greater floods of it. The banks had undertaken to do a new business, uncongenial with the nature of such institutions: they undertook to make long loans to government, not as brokers, but as stockholdersa practice wholly inconsistent with the system of specie payments. After showing the difference between the ordinary business of a bank in discounts, and the making loans for twelve years, Mr. C. said, indisputably the latter practice was a great and leading cause of the suspension of specie payments. Of this species of property (public stock) the banks in the United States held on the 30th day of September last, about eighteen and a half millions, and a nearly equal amount of Treasury Notes, besides stock for long loans made to the state governments, amounting altogether to within a small amount of forty millions, being a large proportion of their actual capital. This, he said, was the great cause of the suspension of specie payments. Had the banks (he now discussed the question) the capacity to resume specie payments? If they have the disposition, he said, they may resume specie payments. The banks are not insolvent, he said: they never were more solvent. If so, the term itself implies, that, if time be allowed them, they may before long be in a condition to resume payment of specie. If the banks would regularly and consentaneously begin to dispose of their stock, to call in their notes for the Treasury Notes they have, and moderately curtail their private discounts; if they would act in concert in this manner, they might resume specie payments. If they were to withdraw by the sale of a partonly of their stock and Treasury Notes, twenty-five millions of their notes from circulation, the rest would be appreciated to par, or nearly, and they would still have fifteen millions of stock disposable to send to Europe for specie, &c. With thirty millions of dollars in their banks, and so much of their paper withdrawn from circulation, they would be in a condition to resume payments in specie. The only difficulty, that of producing concert, was one which it belonged to Congress to surmount. The indisposition of the banks, from motives of interest, obviously growing out of the vast profits most of them have lately realized, by which the stockholders have realized from twelve to twenty per cent. on their stock, would be, he showed, the greatest obstacle. What, he asked, was a bank? An institution, under present uses, to make money. What was the instinct of such an institution? Gain, gain; nothing but gain: and they would not willingly relinquish their gain from the present state of things, which was profitable to them,

acting as they did without restraint, and without hazard. Those who believe that the present state of things would ever cure itself, Mr. C. said, must believe what is impossible: banks must change their nature, lay aside their instinct, before they will aid in doing what it is not their interest to do. By this process of reasoning, he came to the conclusion, that it rested with Congress to make them return to specie payments, by making it their interest to do so. This introduced the subject of the National Bank.

A national bank, he said, paying specie itself, would have a tendency to make specie payments general, as well by its influence as by its example. It will be the interest of the national bank to produce this state of things, because otherwise its operations will be greatly circumscribed, as it must pay out specie or national bank notes: for he presumed one of the first rules of such a bank would be to take the notes of no bank which did not pay in gold and silver. A national bank of thirtyfive millions, with the aid of those banks which are at once ready to pay specie, would produce a powerful effect all over the Union. Further, a national bank would enable the government to resort to measures which would make it unprofitable to banks to continue the violation of their contracts, and advantageous to return to the observation of them. The leading measure of this character would be to strip the banks refusing to pay specie of all the profits arising from the business of the government, to prohibit deposits with them, and to refuse to receive their notes in payment of dues to the government. How far such measures would be efficacious in producing a return to specie payments, he was unable to say-but it was as far as he would be willing to go at the present session. If they persisted in refusing to resume payments in specie, Congress must resort to measures of a deeper tone, which they had in their power.

The restoration of specie payments, Mr. C. argued, would remove the embarrassments on the industry of the country, and the stains from its public and private faith. It remained to see whether this house, without whose aid it was in vain to expect success in this object, would have the fortitude to apply the remedy. If this was not the proper remedy, he hoped it would be shown by the proposition of a proper substitute, and not opposed by vague and general declamation against banks. The disease, he said, was deep; it affected public opinion-and whatever affects public opinion touches the vitals of the government. Hereafter, he said, Congress would never stand in the same relation to this meas

ure in which they now did. The disease arose in time of war-the war had subsided, but left the disease, which it was now in the power of Congress to eradicate-but, if they did not now exercise the power, they would become abettors of a state of things which was of vital consequence to public morality, as he showed by various illustrations. He called upon the house, as guardians of the public weal, of the health of the body politic which depended on the public morals, to interpose against a state of things which was inconsistent with either. He appealed to the house, too, as the guardians of public and private faith. In what manner, he asked, were the public contracts fulfilled? In gold and silver, in which the government had stipulated to pay? No; in paper issued by these institutions; in paper greatly depreciated; in paper depreciated from five to twenty per cent. below the currency in which the government had contracted to pay, &c. He added another argument the inequality of taxation, in consequence of the state of the circulating medium, which, notwithstanding the taxes were laid with strict regard to the constitutional provision for their equality, made the people in one section of the Union pay perhaps one fifth more of the same tax than those in another. The constitution having given Congress the power to remedy these evils, they were, he contended, deeply responsible for their continuance.

The evil he desired to remedy, Mr. C. said, was a deep one; almost incurable, because connected with public opinion, over which banks have a great control-they have, in a great measure, a control over the press; for proof of which he referred to the fact, that the present wretched state of the circulating medium had scarcely been denounced by a single paper within the United States. The derangement of a circulating medium, he said, was a joint thrown out of its socket; let it remain for a short time in that state, and the sinews will be so knit, that it cannot be replaced-apply the remedy soon, and it is an operation easy though painful. The evil grows, whilst the resistance to it becomes weak; and, unless checked at once, will become irresistible. Mr. C. concluded the speech of which the above is a mere outline, which the imagination of the reader must fill up, by observing, that he could have said much more on this important subject, but he knew how difficult it was to gain the attention of the house to long addresses.

The foregoing is, indeed, but a meagre sketch of

Mr. Calhoun's speech, yet it will suffice to show his position at that period. The question of the constitutionality of a national bank he did not consider. He seems to have regarded it as a settled one, and advocated the incorporation of a bank as a matter of necessity and expediency,—as "the only adequate resource," in the language of President Madison, "to relieve the country and the government from the present embarrassment.' It was necessary, to enable the government to provide a constitutional currency for the people, and highly expedient as one of the features in a general system of preparation against the manifold evils arising out of a state of war from which the country had just escaped.

Mr. Calhoun defended the bill throughout the whole debate with great ability, and it finally passed the House on the 14th of March, 1816, by a vote of 80 to 71, his name being recorded in favor of its passage The bill likewise received a favorable vote in the Senate, and being approved by the President, became the law of the land.

CHAPTER V.

Changes in Politics-Consistency of Mr. Calhoun-Resolution of 1816The Direct Tax-Speech-Tariff Act of 1816-Views of Mr. Calhoun -Principle of the Law-The Military Academy-The Compensation Act-Temporary Displeasure of his Constituents Internal Improvements-Veto of Mr. Madison,

How true is it that there are no absolute rules in politics, that the occasion often serves to establish the principle, rather than the principle to govern the occasion.

Truth has no attribute-not her simplicity nor her beauty-more lovely than her consistency with herself. Her principles are unchanging and unchangeable,—

"The eternal years of God are hers!"

The great laws of Nature endure forever; they are permanent and as immovable as He who established them. The earth and its sister orbs, although ages have elapsed since the period of their creation, continue to move on in the courses to which they have been accustomed from the beginning. The bow of promise displays the same gorgeous colors, as when it first broke, like some blessed vision, on the raptured gaze of Noah and his family. One season is succeeded by another, in the appointed order. The storm alternates with the sunshine, the flower blossoms and per