The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1879-08-18

was Incorporated. 1aper CurreHCyt ~ Hi"y uO
said was authorized by that act, which is un-
doubtedly true; and it is also true that the bills
or notes of the bank were made receivable III
all payments to the United States if the same
were at the time payable on demand, but the
act provided that the corporation should not
refuse under heavy penalty the payment i'll
gold and silver of any of its notes, bills obli-
cations nor of any moneys received upon de-
post i'll the bank or in any OF its Offices OF dis
count and deposit.
Serious attempt is made, strange to say, to
fortify the proposition that the acts in question
are constitutional from the fact that Congress,
in providing for the of the Treasury notes
and in granting the charters to the respective
national banks, made the notes and bills re-
ceivable in payment of duties and taxes, but
the answer to the suggestion is so obvious that
it is hardly necessary to pause to suggest its
refutation. Creditors may exact gold and sill
yer or they may waive the right to require
such money and accept credit currency, or
commodities other than gold and silver, and
the United States as creditors, or in the exer-
else of their express power to lay ana collect
taxes, duties, impostS and excises may, III they
see fit, accept the Treasury notes or bank bills
in such payments as substitutes for the con-
stitutional currency. Further discussion OF
the proposition is unnecessary, as 1t is plainly
destitute of any merit whatever. Resort was
also had to Treasury notes in the revulsion OF
1897 and during the war with Mexico, and al
so in the great revulsion of 1857, but the new
theory that Congress could make Treasury
notes legal tender was not even suggested
even by the President by any member OF
Congress.
WASHINGTON REJECTED PAPER MONEY.
Seventy years are included in this review,
even if the computation is only carried back to
the passage of the act establishing the mint,
and it is clear that there is no trace of any act
executive or legislative, within that period
which affords the slightest support to the new
constitutional theory that Congress can by law
constitute paper emissions tender in payment
of debts. Even Washington, the father OF our
country, refused to accept paper money in pay
ment of debts contracted before the War OF
Independence, and the proof is full to the
point that Hamilton, as well as Jefferson and
Madison, was opposed to paper emissions by
the national authority.
THE FATHERS INTENDED TO DEPRIVE CONGRESS
OF THE POWER TO MAKE PAPER MONEY.
Power as before remarked, was vested i'll
the Congress under the Confederation to bor-
row money and emit bills of credit, and history
shows that the power to emit such bills had
been exercised before the convention which
framed the Constitution assembled, to an
amount exceeding $3.50 100000 Still the draft
of the Constitution, as reported contained the
words "and emit bills appended to the clause
| authorizing Congress to borrow money When
| that clause was reached, says 9lr. Martin, a
| motion was made to strike out the words 'to
| emit bills of credit" and his account of what
| followed affords the most persuasive and con-
| vincing evidence that the convention, and
| nearly every member of it, intended to put an
| end to the exercise of such power. Against
| the motion, he says, we urged that it would fe
;p,p fo 1apriya tho Coppr Of that
er; that it would be novelty unprecedented
to establish Government which should not
have such authority; that it was impossible to
look forward into futurity so far as to decide
that events that might not happen would rem
der the exercise of such a power absolutely
necessary, etc. But ma ajority of the conven-
ton, he said, being wise beyond every event,
and being willing to risk any political evil
rather than admit the idea of paper emission
| in any possible case, refused to trust the au-
| thority to Government ON which they were
| lavishing the most unlimited powers of taxa
| ton and to the mercy of which they were will
| ing blindly to trust the liberty and property of
| the citizens of every state in the Union, ,.and
"they erased that clause from the system
| More forcible vindication of the action of the
| convention could hardly be made than is ex-
pressed in the language of the Federalist and
| the authority of Judge Story warrants the
| statement that the language there employed is
| ''justified by almost every contemporary writ
er," and is ''attested in its truth by facts" be-
| yond the influence of every attempt at contra
| diction Having adverted to those facts the
| commentator proceeds to say that 1.-THE same
| reasons which show the necessity of denying
| to the States the power of regulating coin prove
with equal force that they ought not to be at
| liberty to substitute paper medium instead OF
| coin."
| Emissions of the kind were not declared by
| the Continental Congress to be legal tender.
| but Congress passed resolution declaring that
| they ought to be a tender in payment of all
| private and public debts, and that a refusal to
| receive the tender ought to be an extinguish-
ment of the debt, and recommended the States
| to pass such laws. They even went further
| and declared that whoever should refuse to re-
! ceive the paper as gold and silver should be
| deemed an enemy to the public liberty; but
| our commentator says that these measures of
| violence and terror so far from aiding the
circulation of the paper, led on to still further
depreciation. New emissions followed and
new measures were adopted to give the paper
| credit by pledging the public faith for its re-
| demption. Effort followed effort in that direc-
| ton until the idea of redemption at par was
| abandoned Forty for one was offered and the
| States were required to report the bills under
| that regulation, but few of the old bills were
| ever reported, and of course few only OF the
| contemplated new notes were issued, and the
| in the course of that year quietly died In the
| hands of their possessors.
| Bills of credit were made a tender by the
| States, but all such, as well as those issued by
| the Congress, were dead in the hands OF their
| possessors before the convention assembled to
| frame the Constitution.
Intelligent and impartial belief i'll the the
| ory thatssuch men, instructed, in framing
| government for their posterity as well as for
| themselves, would deliberately vest such a
| power, either in Congress or the States, as
| part of their perpetual system, can never, i'll
my Judgment, be secured in the face of the re-
corded evidences to the contrary which the
political and judicial history of our country
| affords. Such evidence, so persuasive and
convincing as it is, must ultimately bring all to
| the conclusion that neither the Congress nor
the States can make anything but gold or sill
| yer coin tender in payment OF debts. Ex-
| elusive power to coin money is certainly vested
| in Congress, but ''no amount OF reasoning can
| show that executing promissory note and
| ordering it to be taken in payment of public
| and private debts is species of coming
| money"
I CONGRESS MAY BORROW MONEY WITH TREAS
URY NOTES.
| Authority, it is conceded, exists in Congress
to pass laws providing for the issue of Treasury
notes based on the national credit, as necessary
and proper means for fulfilling the end of the
express power to borrow money; nor can it be
doubted at thisday that such notes when issued
by the proper authority may lawfully circulate
as credit currency, and that they may in that
conventional character be lawfully employed,
if the act authorizing their issues SO provides,
to pay duties, taxes, and all the public exac-
tions required to be paid into the National
Treasury. Public creditors may also be paid
in such currency by their consent, and they
| may be used in all other cases where the pay
| ment in such notes comports with the terms OF
| the contract Established usage founded upon
| the practice of the Government, often repeat
| ed, has sanctioned these rules, until it may
| now be said that they are not open to contro-
versy; but the question in the cases before the
| court is whether the Congress may declare
I such notes to be lawful money, make them
| legal tender and impart to such currency
the quality of being standard oil value'
and compel creditors to accept the payment
| of their debts i'll such currency as the equiva-
| lent of the money recognized and established
| by the Constitution as the standard of value
by which the value of all other commodities is