Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1878-09-11
GREEsBAcKs AND NATIONAL BANKS.

GREENBACKs AND NATIONAL BANKS.
Senator Thmrman,s Tfe,rs Further Er-
pomnded-Ho,0 the National Banks Rob
the People.
Senator Thurman made another speech
at Athens, O., On Saturday night, in which
he replied to some of the Republican crit
cisms of his recent speech. Mr.. Thurman
said, on the subject of taxation of the banks:
It is very true that these banks do have an
advantage that no other bondholder has. If
you have bond of the United States you
can Draw your interest upon it. That is all
| right. But these banks do more than that.
They deposit the bond with the treasurer of
| the United States, and then they get 80 per
cent. of bank notes, and they loan them;
and 80 they nearly double their interest, or
more than double it. in fact, because they
loan their money at higher rate of in
terest. So they make their bonds realize
more than twice the interest the bond in
your pocket realizes to you. They have that
advantage. But what am saying about
their drawing these millions from the pockets
of the people would be true if they had not
a single bond on deposit. It results from
the fact that the banks are allowed to lend
their Indebtedness and get interest upon it;
get interest on what they owe, instead of
paying interest on what they owe, as every
body else has to do.
| Now, my friends, from these twenty-one
millions which they thus draw from you
every year, let us deduct the taxes they pay
on their circulation. They pay per cent.
on their circulation as taxes to the govern
ment of the United States. There is
provision that where the circulation of
a bank exceeds certain proportion
of the capital, it shall pay a heavier
amount of taxation; but l am not aware that
there is bank in the United States whose
circulation does exceed that proportion, and
| therefore I assume it to be true-it certainly
is true of the system-that the tax they pay
on their circulation is the per cent. That
would be $3,000,000, and if that were de-
Quoted from the $21, 100000 which they
draw from your pockets, it would leave them
net gain of S1s,Ooo,0oo. But the truth
about that is it is very doubtful whether it
should be deducted, because it will be found
that they put the burden of that taxation on
their customers to whom they loan their
money, and as they put it on their customers
it will, like all other taxation, come down
on the shoulders of the consumers, the peo-
| pie.
The next objection to the greenbacks may
be stated in these words: That Congress
has no constitutional power to make green
backs legal tender. Great stress is laid on
that objection. reply to it: First-Were
this admitted, the rejection would not avail,
for greenbacks without the legal-tender
quality are preferable to bank notes. No
body has ever denied-no judge or lawyer,
or statesman, or private man, has ever de-
MED the right of the government to issue
what are called treasury notes. They never
were made legal tender until the treasury
notes were made a legal tender, but the
| power to issue them never has been denied
at all. Well. now, suppose Congress were
to issue them, or issue the greenback, just as
it is, without the legal-tender quality,
why, then, it woald be exactly on a
par with the bank notes, SO far
as paying debts is concerned; and, pray,
what advantage has the bank note over the
greenback, even If the legal tender quality
did not exist in the greenback? None what
ever. My second answer to the objection is,
that If the constitution does not authorize
Congress to make greenbacks legal tender,
the constitution may be amended SO as to
give Congress that power, if it be desirable
the power should exist Our Republican
friends have had a great love for tinkering
with the constitution. Thew boast as among
the chiefest feathers in their cap, the late
amendments to the constitution. They are
fond of amending the constitution, and every
session of Congress they bring in some more
submitted to the people. Well, now, if this OBJ
of boi,s
us if we try to do little amending of the con-
stltution, and propose to give to Congress
that power which they say Congress does
and the true interests of the people require
that Congress should have the power. Sc
that 1T is sufficient answer to this objection
to say that if Congress does not possess the
power it may be given to it by the people by
an amendment to the constitution. But is
it true that Congress does not possess the
power! Whv, my friends, allow me to tell
you exactly what the state of that matter is
1t is not question of what I think about it.
but it is a question what the courts have de-
cided; and now let me tell you that sixteen
of the highest State courts have decided
this question, and fifteen out OF
the sixteen decided that the acts of Congress
making the greenback legal tender are
constitutional laws that Congress does
possess that power. Then the supreme
court of the United States has decided the
same thing after great deliberation and
great consideration. Sure then, my friends
with the decision of fifteen of the highest
courts of the States, and the decision of the
supreme court of the United States, that
greenbacks may constitutionally be made 6
legal tender, may be excused if do not &C
into the argument of that mere legal ques-
ton. l know it has been said often and
again that the decision of the supreme court
of the United States rests upon the ground
that when those acts were passed the country
was at war, and that it was an exercise Of
the war power IN Congress to make these
notes legal tender. l think I could con.
vince any jurist, if 1 had chance
at him for about half an hour, that that is
not true Interpretation of those decisions
that there is an entire mistake about it, anC
that they do not rest at all upon the conclu
slve war power; that they are not vindicatec
as simply war measure, but that the prin
clples laid down in those decisions make i
constitutional to issue the greenbacks, if il
IS necessary, In time of peace as well as il
time of war, and want to call the attention
to this fact. If any of you Democrats have
any greenbacks in your pocket-but, unfor
tunately, we Democrats don't have many Of
them these hard times-if you will
look at them you will find that three tt
one have been issued since the war
Maybe 1875 or 1873 or 1874 was the date
when the thing was issued. Why, thinl
that more than three-fourths of the green
backs now in circulation were issued since
the war. Well, but some one says, they are
issued simply to replace those that were
issued since the war, and that became mutt
lated and destroyed. If it is a question O
constitutional power, the government has ne
more right to issue a greenback as lega
| tender fO ranlaca an old praophacL fbon =