The Daily Union

THE UNION.

CITY OF WASHINGTON.

SATURDAY NIGHT, AUG. 15, 1846.

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TREASURY DRAFTS.

The bank-whig and high-tariff press has opened its batteries upon the Secretary of the Treasury for issuing what they are pleased to term illegal drafts, designed to become a circulating medium.

A copy of one of these drafts is given in the whig press of New York, as follows:

WAR WARRANT. No. $100 Treasury of the United States, Washington, 27th June, 1846. Pay to T J Leslie, Paymaster, or order, ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS W. SELDEN, Treasurer of United States No. Registered 27th June, 1846. $100. Canal and Banking Company, New Orleans R. H GILLET, Register of the Treasury

Now, what is this draft? By the law as it stood when this draft issued, the public moneys were deposited, by express direction of law, with the Canal Bank at New Orleans, to the credit of the Treasurer of the United States, by whom payments are expressly authorized by law to be made by his drafts (recorded and countersigned by the register) upon any depository of the public money, upon warrants from the War and other Departments, drawn upon the treasurer for payment of the appropriations made by law.

This draft, then, is in precise conformity with the law, and also with the usage of the Treasury Department from its first organization down to the present period, and no other description of drafts has been authorized or permitted by Mr. Walker; and yet the National Intelligencer, through its correspondent of this morning, and kindred whig presses, with a view to embarrass the government of their country, and injure its credit in time of war, would endeavor to destroy the validity of these drafts. Such was the course of the British whig organs opposed to the war of 1812, and such is the course of the Mexican organs at this period. The object in both cases is the same—to injure the credit of their country in time of war.

The War Department, to pay an appropriation made by law, issues a warrant, as appears by the above form, on the treasurer in favor of a paymaster of the United States; and the treasurer, in perfect conformity to the law and uniform usage, issues his draft for the money on a public depository; and the bank and high-tariff press—the great bank-paper manufacturers—have the audacity to assail the legality of these drafts, and would arrest, if they could, the indispensable operations of the Treasury Department in payment of the public creditors and of the army of the Union. Henceforth let the authors of these falsehoods stand forth in their proper attitude, impaled before the public view as convicted calumniators and enemies of their country.

But it is said these drafts, although issued before the passage of the new constitutional treasury law, are forbidden by that law. The very reverse is the fact. They are in perfect conformity to that law, and directly authorized by it in many sections, but especially in the 20th and 21st sections, as quoted below:

"Sec. 20. And be it further enacted, That no exchange of funds shall be made by any disbursing officers or agents of the government, of any grade or denomination whatsoever, or connected with any branch of the public service, other than an exchange for gold and silver; and every such disbursing officer, when the means for his disbursements are furnished to him in gold and silver, shall make his payments in the money so furnished; or when those means are furnished to him in drafts, shall cause those drafts to be presented at their place of payment, and properly paid according to the law; and shall make his payments in the money so received for the drafts furnished, unless, in either case, he can exchange the means in his hands for gold and silver at par. "And it shall be, and is hereby, made the duty of the head of the proper department immediately to suspend from duty any disbursing officer who shall violate the provisions of this section, and forthwith to report the name of the officer or agent to the President, with the fact of the violation, and all the circumstances accompanying the same and within the knowledge of the said secretary, to the end that such officer or agent may be promptly removed from office, or restored to his trust and the performance of his duties, as to the President may seem just and proper: Provided, however, That those disbursing officers having, at present, credits in the banks shall, until the first day of January next, be allowed to check on the same, allowing the public creditors to receive their pay from the banks either in specie or bank notes.

"Sec. 21. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the duty of the Secretary of the Treasury to issue and publish regulations to enforce the speedy presentation of all government drafts for payment at the place where payable, and to prescribe the time, according to the different distances of the depositories from the seat of government, within which all drafts upon them, respectively, shall be presented for payment; and, in default of such presentation, to direct any other mode and place of payment which he may deem proper; but, in all these regulations and directions, it shall be the duty of the Secretary of the Treasury to guard, as far as may be, against those drafts being used or thrown into circulation as a paper currency, or medium of exchange. And no officer of the United States shall, either directly or indirectly, sell or dispose to any person or persons, or corporations, whatsoever, for a premium, any treasury note, draft, warrant, or other public security, not his private property, or sell or dispose of the avails or proceeds of such note, draft, warrant, or security in his hands for disbursement, without making return of such premium, and accounting therefor by charging the same in his accounts to the credit of the United States; and any officer violating this section shall be forthwith dismissed from office."

In obedience to these provisions, and immediately after the publication of the law, the attention of the proper departments was called by the Secretary of the Treasury to these sections, in order that obedience to them might be enforced by proper instructions to their paymasters and other disbursing agents; and a compliance with the law will be strictly exacted. The Secretary of the Treasury, who is now putting in operation the new warehousing bill, by proper instructions, will also himself very speedily issue the most stringent regulations, under the 20th and 21st sections, as above quoted, to enforce the speedy presentation of all treasury drafts, and prevent their becoming a paper circulation; and the next complaint we expect to hear from the bank-whig press is, that these instructions are too rigid. Mr. Walker believes that one of the great and beneficent designs of the constitutional treasury law is to diminish paper circulation of every description, and increase the circulation of gold and silver. To that end, in recommending the adoption of the constitutional treasury, in his last annual report, Mr. Walker said:

"The Secretary of the Treasury, on coming into office, found the revenue deposited with banks. The law establishing the independent treasury was repealed; and the Secretary had no power to re-establish that system. Congress had not only repealed that law, but, as a substitute, had adopted the present system of deposite banks, and prohibited changing any one of those for another bank, except for specified reasons. No alternative was left but to continue the existing system until Congress should think proper to change it. The change, it is hoped, will now be made by a return to the treasury of the constitution.

"Nor will it be useful to establish a constitutional treasury, if it is to receive, or disburse the paper of banks. Separation from the banks in that case would only be nominal, and no addition would be made to the circulation of gold and silver.

"Various forms of paper credit have been suggested, as connected with the operations of the constitutional treasury; but they are all considered as impairing one of the great objects of such a treasury— namely, an augmented circulation of specie. If paper, in whatever form, or from whatever source it may issue, should be introduced as a circulation by the constitutional treasury, it would, precisely to that extent, diminish its use as a means of circulating gold and silver."