Litchfield Enquirer

WASHINGTON, June 10, 1834.

The proposition of Mr. McKim, to authorize, by bill, the Secretary of the Treasury to lend treasury notes, to the amount of fifteen millions, to individuals, at five per cent. on good security, is considered as the great project of the government to extricate the people from the pangs of that cruel monster the Bank, to put an end to the public distress, to restore the soundness of the currency, and last, not least, to bring back the wandering people to the Jackson faith. The proposition has caused some merriment, and it is not impossible that a spirit of waggery, a desire to hear what Mr. McKim can say for and about his scheme, may induce a majority of the House to take up the subject for consideration. Mr. McKim may be a very good merchant, and a fortunate man as regards his personal means, but he has as little of the statesman in his composition, as is to be found in the meanest mind in creation. He has none of the orator about him, and no man, of any party, imagines that Mr. McKim is serious in offering his proposition as a real, bona fide, practical measure, or as any more than a bone thrown out to his clamorous constituents, to prevent them from tearing him to pieces.

One great question which is now asked, as the day of adjournment draws near, and uttered with increasing emphasis at every repetition, is—what is to become of the public money? Is it to be left at the sole disposal of General Jackson? Is there to be no guard, no check imposed by Congress, for its security and economical disbursement? It appears as if history will have to answer these questions in a manner which the founders of our system of government could never have conjectured. There are some, even of the Jackson men themselves, who, feeling that these are the questions which will be propounded to him by his constituents, on his return home, begin to fear that they will be unable to give a satisfactory reply; and that they will have to submit to severe censure or breaking up the session, without taking some step to make the money of the people safe, by taking it from under the Executive grasp, and placing it under the control of the law. There will be no step taken of this kind, and if the public revenue be abundant, so much the more danger will threaten the liberties of the people; because so much the greater will be the means in the hands of General Jackson of subverting those liberties, and perpetuating their own power, or giving power such direction as he may think fit.

[U. S. Gaz.