applied to me to know what security there was, that the American debts would be finally paid, and the interest, in the mean time, regularly discharged. I told them they might rely on the plighted faith of the States, and their ability to redeem their obligations. Nobody asked me whether there could be a United States guaranty to that effect, nor did I suggest such an idea to any one. Gentlemen came to me to ask about the Massachusetts bonds. They liked the offer of five per cent. interest very much, as this was high for an English capitalist; but they wanted to know what assurance I could give that the investment would be a safe one. I went to my trunk, and took out an abstract of the official return of the amount of the productive labor of Massachusetts. I put this into the hand of one of those inquirers, and told him to take it home and study it. He did so, and in two days returned, and invested forty thousand pounds sterling in Massachusetts stock. Others came, and made similar inquiries as to New York securities. I gave them a copy of the very able and admirable report made by your townsman, Mr. Ruggles, in 1838, and they came back satisfied. But to none did I suggest, or in the remotest manner hint, that they could look to the United States to secure the debt. I endeavored to uphold the credit of all the States. I remembered that they were all my countrymen, and I stated facts in relation to each as favorably as truth would allow. And what happened then? Gentlemen, it is fit that you should know that there exists a certain clique in London, who are animated by an inextinguishable hate of American credit. You may set it down as a fact, that it is their daily, their incessant vocation, to endeavor to impair the credit of every one of the States, and to represent the purchase of their bonds as an unwise and dangerous investment of money. On this subject their ferocity knows no mitigation; it is deaf to all justice, and proof against all reason. The more you show them it is wrong, the more tenacity of purpose do they exhibit. That part of the public press over which they have control is furnished, I am ashamed to say, with matter drawn from publications which originate in this city, and the object of which is to prove that State bonds are so much waste paper, the State having no right to issue any such obligations, and their holders being, therefore, utterly destitute of any security. And these miserable and contemptible speculations are

put into the papers of the largest circulation in Europe, and enforced by all the aid they can derive from editorial sanction. It was under circumstances like these that a large banking-house in London put to me, as a lawyer, the professional question, whether the States were empowered to issue evidences of debt payable by the State. I answered that, for this purpose, they were as completely sovereign as any State in Europe; that they had a public faith to pledge, and did pledge it. This entire correspondence was published (though you might as well get any administration editor in this country to take hold of a pair of hot tongs as to insert it in his columns), in the face of those who have been shouting in all quarters, that I had a personal agency in attempting to bring about an assumption of State debts by the general government.

It so happened, that, in the latter part of October, the house of Barings issued a circular to foreign houses on this subject, which circular I never saw till I returned to America. In this paper they speak of such an assumption or guaranty; but as it went to foreign houses, I never saw nor heard of it till last December, when I also heard of the proceedings of Mr. Benton. But I here wish again to repeat, that, during the whole time I was in Europe, no English banker or foreign bondholder ever suggested an idea of such an assumption. The first I heard of it was from an American citizen there, and not again till my return to this country. I have said that, owing to the bad news which was constantly received from this country, the pleasure of my visit was much diminished. I will now say, that, during the whole time of my absence, I had the lowest hopes, as to the political state of the country, which I ever indulged. I saw the fatal workings of the experiment, and I saw that nothing wiser or better was in the mind of the administration. I knew that a vast majority of my countrymen were opposed to the existing policy, but I did not see them sufficiently roused, nor had I confidence that they would ever come to that cordial union in relation to any one candidate for the Presidency, which would enable them, as a party, to take the field with any rational hope of success.

Such were the gloomy feelings which possessed my mind when I first learned the result of the Harrisburg Convention. But when I saw a nomination which, though unwelcome at first

to many, I thought the best that could possibly have been made, and learned that it was fast gaining the approbation of all who thought with me; and above all, when I beheld the warm enthusiasm and the heartfelt union which soon animated their ranks and concentrated their movements, I then began to entertain a confidence that the hour of deliverance was at hand, and that my long-suffering country would yet relieve herself from the disastrous condition to which she had been reduced.

I hope, Gentlemen, you will not be alarmed, if I take from my notes one more paper. I will detain you but a few moments in briefly expressing the opinions I entertain in regard to the sub-treasury. It appears to me to be a scheme entirely new to our history, and foreign to our habits, and to be the last of a series of baffled experiments, into which the representatives of the people have been lashed and driven by the continued exercise of executive power, through four mortal sessions of Congress.

I will say a word or two in relation to the system, under the various aspects in which its friends have supported it. What are the arguments in its favor? The leading argument was that of safety to the government. This was a plan to keep the public money where rogues could not run away with it. Now I think there is a way to prevent that, which would be much more effectual; and that is, not to trust rogues with the keeping of the public money. But as to the notion of vaults better and more secure than those of the banks, is it not the most ridiculous of all humbugs? I do not know in which of the bank vaults around me the receiver-general keeps his funds. If they are in a vault different from that which belongs to the bank, I will venture to say it is no better and no safer. It is said, however, that by this means government is to keep its own money. What does this mean? Who is that government? Who is that individual "I," who is to keep our money in his own pocket? Is not government a mere collection of agencies? Is not every dollar it possesses placed in trust with somebody? It may be put in vaults under a key, but the key is given to somebody to keep. Government is not a person with pockets.

The only question is, whether the government agents under the sub-treasury are any safer than the government agents be

fore it was adopted? Mr. Wright, indeed, has assured us, that the agents under the sub-treasury are made responsible to the people. But how? In what respect? The receiver-general gives bonds; but how is he more responsible on that account than the collector in another street, who, like him, receives the public money, and like him gives bonds for its safe-keeping? It is just the same thing. One of these officers is just as far from the people, and just as near to the people, as the other. How, then, is the receiver-general more directly responsible? There is not a particle of truth or reason in the whole matter. If the vaults are not better, is the security better? I have no manner of doubt that the receiver-general in this city is a highly respect able man; but where is the proof that the government money is any safer in his vault than in the bank where he has his office? Suppose Mr. Allen had a private office of his own, at a distance from the bank, and should give the same bonds he now does for the safe-keeping of all moneys intrusted to him; how many of you would deposit your private funds in his office, rather than in a bank having half a million or a million of dollars capital, under the government of directors whose own fortunes were deposited in its vaults? Try the experiment, and see how many would resort to Mr. Allen, and how many to the banks.

So far from being safer, I maintain, on the contrary, that this sub-treasury scheme jeopards the public money, because it multiplies the hands through which it is to pass, and thereby multiplies the chances of corruption or of loss. Your collector, Mr. Hoyt, receives the money on duty bonds. He holds it subject to the draft or order of the Secretary of the Treasury, or else is to pay it over to Mr. Allen. If Mr. Hoyt were dishonest, might he not have shared the money before the receiver-general could get at it? The scheme doubles the chances of loss, by doubling the hands which are to keep the money.

But this scheme is to encourage the circulation of specie. I certainly shall not detain you on a matter with which you are more familiar than I am; but let me ask you a few questions. By one clause of the sub-treasury law, one fourth of all the duties bonded is to be paid in specie, and the residue according to the resolution of 1816. Now I want to know one thing: if one of you has a custom-house bond to pay, you go to the collector with a certified check, purporting to be payable in specie, for one

fourth of the amount, and another check, in common form, for the other three fourths. Does not the collector receive these checks? That is the question I ask you. (Loud cries of "Yes! yes!" "He does! he does!") Well, then, is not all that part of the law which requires the payment of one fourth in specie a mere sham? If you go to him with a draft and demand specie, he will, no doubt, give it to you if you request it; but if not, he gives you good notes. Where, then, is all this marching and countermarching of specie, which was to gladden our eyes? Is it not all humbug? What does the collector do with the money when he gets it? Does he not deposit it in a bank of a very unsavory name? I do not certainly know, but I believe he deposits it in the Bank of the United States. He afterwards pays it over to the receiver-general, and gives him all the specie he wants; and yet, after all, there is no general use of specie in the matter.

They speak about a divorce between bank and state; and what does it amount to? I ask you, Is not the great amount of government funds at this moment in safe keeping in some bank? I believe it is. Then there is no separation. The government gives the money to individuals to keep, and they, like sensible men, put it into bank. Is this separation? If any change is made in the connection, it is to render it more close; and, like other illicit connections, the closer it is, the more secret it is kept.

It is called the "Independent Treasury," and some of its friends have called it "a second Declaration of Independence." Independence! how? of what? It is dependent on individuals, who immediately go to the bank; and is it to be tolerated that there should be this outcry about the use of specie, when here, in the heart of the commercial community, you see and know that there is no such thing?

But though at present this is all sham, yet that power to demand specie which the law contains, when its requirements shall cover the whole revenue of the government, and when that revenue shall be large, may, in its exercise, become a most dangerous instrument. When government shall have in the banks of this city from twelve to fifteen millions of dollars on deposit, as it has had, it will be in the power of the government to break down, at its pleasure, one, if not all, of these institutions. And