The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1896-10-21
NATIONAL BANKS AS lEECHES
RESPONSIBLE FOR A CONTIN-
UAL INCREASE OF DEBTS.
A Sufficient Volume of Money Is.
sued Direct by the Government
the Peoples only Safeguard.
A Speech Delivered at Nashville, Tenn, July
IL, 1880, at the Weaver and Chambers
Ratification Meeting by James
Buchanan. Of Indiana.

We only give the closing part of this
grand speech.
There are numerous reasons why banks
of issue should not exist.
l now state among many reasons that
i deem conclusive against the banking sys
tenn of issuing currency:
/. 1t is a despotism.
2. 1t forces into existence this enormous
usury debt that ruins.
First-It is a despotism and the following
facts prove 1t:
l. The government holds the exclusive
power to manufacture money. If you un-
dertake to make money in the sense of
manufacture it, you are counterfeiter,
felon under the law. The government
guards it as an exclusive sovereign prerog-
atve.
2. You each know that you must have
money as a condition precedent to having
food and clothing.
8. Each OF you also know that you must
have food and clothing or die
4. Therefare you must have money or
perish.
s. There are fifty millions of people in
this country whose lives depends upon get
ting possession of portion of this tool of
trade.
6. You do not eat money neither do you
wear it, You use it in making distribution
of the products of industry by parting with
it in exchange for that portion Of them
that you doznot need to eat and wear.
Z. Now the goyernment that holds this
exclusive power over this essential tool
money-loans it out on a pledge Of govern
ment bonds as collateral security to
poration called bank the shareholders Of
which are empowered to use it for their
own private profit. They are under no OBJ
ligaion to let you have a dollar, and you
have no power, as matter of power and
right, to control a dollar of it, and cannot
compel a bank to let you have a farthing.
No matter what security you present, the
bank can say no, and that is the end of it.
You can get 1t only by the consent of the
banker, which consent is obtained by the
subsidy of usury
Here then. we find the corporations hold
ing the lives of fifty millions of people in
their grasp.
Do you know of any more heartless and
infamous despotism than that? many
voices, mo, no') and that too, in this
boasted republic, where you are the sup
posed sovereigns.
VIII you. the sovereigns of Tennessee,
vote for Weaver and Chambers and say
by that vote that this despotism shall be
destroyed and the American system of
finance founded on principles of pure De-
mOcracy, and pure republicanism be INSTALL
ed in its stead in this republic? cloud re-
sponse Yes, we will') Or will you be
but poor animated shadows, of independent
sovereign fathers, and vote for Hancock or
Garfield, and say by your vote, Here,
Belmont and Sherman, are your gentle cat
tie; hitch the chain Of perpetual slavery in
to the bonded yoke now upon our necks?"
(Cries of mo, never
Because our banking system of issuing
currency is heartless despotism it should
be oblterated from the economic system
of this republic.
Second-It forces interest bearing debt in
to existence.
The following extracts prove this state
ment:
1. AS before stated and shown, the gov
ernment has the sole power to manufacture
and issue the money.
2 1t issues it to the bank and its home
is then in the bank vaults: but it is not yet
in the channels of trade where YOU can
get it in exchange for your labor or the
products of your industry.
g. Not a dollar of this currency leaves
the bank vaults unless some one puts in
his private usury bearing note for a larger
amount than the sum of currency that is
thus issued into business channels The
note debit exceeds the amount of the cur
rency, the sum of usury charged called by
the banks discount.
The bank never sells it's currency as YOU
do your wheat, corn and manufactured ar
ticles; 1t only loans it's use for a given time
usually 3O 60 or 80 days; and at the end of
this time you must carry the money called
for by your note back to the bank in pay
ment of your debt, else 1t will send the
sheriff after you through the courts. and
sell your property and force it in. It per-
petually holds control Of this tool, contin-
ually requiring the return of larger
amount than 1t issues, thus operating as a
continual suction; a leech, absorbing. but
never giving forth This increase of debt
made by usury is never paid in the apere-
gate with money issued by the banks. be-
cause it can not be. You see it clearly by
the following demonstrations:
Suppose the people Of the United States
owed no debt, or taxes Of any description: :
also suppose there was no money in exist.
ence in the nation outside the bank vaults
there being 300 banks in the nation with q
million of dollars in each ready to be. is
sued.
You then go to a bank with your 81 .00o
note and discount 1t for year at 10 per
cent. The bank will pass out to you over
the counter $500, while the face of your note
that went In was for thousand When
the whole $500. .0OO. 600 are issued in this mode
the face of the interest bearing debt of the
people that has gone into the banks is ss33.-
323, 3S3 50 1-3. You can readily see that IL
the whole $500. 900 Of currency was to go
back into the banks at the end of the year
In payment Of these discounts it could not
pay them by more than thirty-three million
dollars. This surplus usury part of the
debt is never paid. If one takes his note
out he does it with money that comes to
him through the channels of trade for
which another note is at some other bank.
The debt Is transferred around from one