Southern Marksman

We prepared more editorial this week than we can put in our paper, owing to the great length of the President's message, a part of which we publish to-day. It is a document written in the same happy, clear and lucid style that characterize all the State papers which emanate from that high source. We shall speak more in detail of the Message in our next number.

By referring to our columns our readers will perceive that the Banks of the city of Natchez, and the Commercial and Rail Road Bank of Vicksburg, have determined to resume specie payments on the first of January next. We congratulate our citizens on this important event—an event which affects the interests of every man in this community. The comparative ease with which this very desirable arrangement will have been effected, forms a strong contrast to the disastrous scenes of 1819, and must, we think, forever put to rest the alleged necessity of a great regulator. The majority of the State Banks to resume specie payments without the aid of a National Bank, formed one of the strongest arguments in favor of such an institution; but if we examine the proceedings of the Banks for the last twelve months, we shall find that the assumptions which have already taken place, have been effected, not by the aid, but in spite of Mr. Biddle's institution. It is well known that the Banks of New York were threatened with Mr. Biddle's displeasure for attempting to resume in May last, and it may be well questioned whether the 'Regulator' would now be a specie paying bank, but for Governor Ritten's proclamation. A close observation of the events of the last year has strengthened our conviction that there is no necessity for a violation of the constitution by the charter of a National Bank, and that the people of the respective States best understand their own affairs, and are fully competent to the management of them, and we sincerely hope that the people of this State will be ever ready to resist any foreign interference with her domestic institutions.