Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856.

DEBATES OF CONGRESS. 225 JANUARY, 1834.] Removal of the Deposits. [SENATE. Mr. B. said he had now finished the view withheld from the bank, and has reported his which he proposed to take of the reasons as- reasons, in conformity with the provisions of signed by the Secretary of the Treasury for the the section. The Senate is now called upon to removal of the public deposits. He trusted consider his reasons, in order to determine that the facts and reasons which he had brought whether the Secretary is justified or not. I to bear upon the question, in addition to the have examined them with care and deliberaintrinsic weight and palpable force of the Sec- tion, without the slightest bias, as far as I am retary's reasoning, were sufficient to show conscious, personal or political. I have but a that the reasons assigned by him were sufficient slight acquaintance with the Secretary, and that to justify the act that he had done; at all little is not unfavorable to him. I stand wholly events, that they ought not to be condemned as disconnected with the two great political parties insufficient, without a rigorous investigation now contending for ascendency. My political into their truth. This investigation was what connections are with that small and denounced he demanded; he did not want a verdict, party which has voluntarily wholly retired either for or against the bank, without a trial. from the party strifes of the day, with a view He believed that all those opposed to the bank of saving, if possible, the liberty and the conwere in favor of investigation. He considered stitution of the country, in this great crisis of the House of Representatives, as being the our affairs. grand inquest of the nation, the appropriate Having maturely considered, with these imbranch of the Legislature for originating accu- partial feelings, the reasons of the Secretary, sations, and particularly charged with the I am constrained to say that he has entirely moneyed concerns of the people, to be the failed to make out his justification. At the proper place for investigating the truth of the very commencement, he has placed his right charges against the institution. He would pre- to remove the deposits on an assumption resting fer that the whole matter should be left in on a misconception of the case. In the progress that House, which was now fully occupied with of his argument he has entirely abandoned the. the subject; but the control of this subject was first, and assumed a new and greatly enlarged in the hands of the friends of the bank, and, if ground, utterly inconsistent with the first, and they would prosecute it here, he must demand equally untenable; and yet, as broad as his investigation into the truth of the Secretary's assumptions are, there is an important part of reasons before they were conidemned. the transaction which he does not attempt to Mr. B. concluded with moving to strike out vindicate, and to which he has not even alluded. the second resolution, and insert " That Nicho- I shall now (said Mr. C.) proceed, without las Biddle, president of the Bank of the United further remark, to make good these assertions. States, and -- be summoned to appear at the The Secretary, at the commencement of his bar of the Senate on the -- day of —, then argument, assumes the position that, in the and there to be examined on oath, touching the absence of all legal provision, he, as the head causes of the late large curtailment of debts due of the financial department, had the right, in to the Bank of the United States, and the man- virtue of his office, to designate the agent and ner of conducting the said curtailment; also, to place for the safe keeping of the public deposits. be then and there examined touching the appli- He then contends that the 16th section does cation of the moneys of the bank to electioneer- not restrict his power, which stands, he says, on ing and political objects." the same ground that it did before the passing of the act incorporating the bank. It is unnecessary to inquire into the correctness of the iMONDAY, January 13. position assumed by the Secretary; but, if it The Depos8it Question. were, it would not be difficult to show that when an agent, with general powers, assumes, The Senate resumed the consideration of the in the execution of his agency a power not report of the Secretary of the Treasury, and delegated, the assumption rests on the necessity the resolutions of Mr. CLAY, on the subject of of the case; and that no power, in such case, the removal of the public deposits from the can be lawfully exercised which was not necesBank of the United States, as the special order sary to effect the object intended. Nor would of the day: it be difficult to show that, in- this case, the Mr. CALHOUN said that the statement of this power assumed by the Secretary would belong, case might be given in a very few words. The not to him, but to the Treasurer, who, under 16th section of the act incorporating the bank the act organizing the Treasury Department, is provides that, wherever there is a bank or expressly charged with the safe keeping of the branch of the United States Bank, the public public funds, for which he is responsible under moneys should be deposited therein, unless bonds in heavy penalties. otherwise ordered by the Secretary of the Treas- But, strongly and directly as these consideraury; and that, in that case, he should report tions bear on the question of the power of the to Congress, if in session, immediately; and, Secretary, I do not think it necessary to pursue if not, at the commencement of the next session. them, for the plain reason that the Secretary The Secretary, acting under the provisions of has entirely mistaken the case. It is not a this section, has ordered the deposits to be case, as he supposes, where there is no legal VoL. XII.-15

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Title: Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856.
Author: United States. Congress.
Canvas: Page 225
Publication: New York, [etc.]: D. Appleton and company [etc.]; 1857-61.
Subject terms: United States -- Politics and government

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Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856.

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