Richmond Enquirer

July 23d, 1819

As the information required by the subjoined resolution of the House of Representatives of the Congress of the United States, of the condition of 'the different chartered banks in the several states,' can be correctly obtained only from the officers of those banks, an appeal is necessarily made to their courtesy for that information. To meet fully the requisitions of the resolution, the report should exhibit the state of all the chartered banks of the Union on the same day. It is, therefore, suggested, that such statements as may be forwarded to this Department, in compliance with the foregoing request, may exhibit the state and condition of the respective banks on the 30th day of September next. The same statement of the affairs of those banks on the 30th September, 1813 and 1815, which were in operation prior to those periods, would probably furnish important information in the investigation of the several subjects presented in the resolution.

It is important that the statements should be forwarded immediately after the 30th of September next, in order that the report required by the resolution may be submitted to Congress at the commencement of their next session.

WM. H. CRAWFORD.

"Congress of the United States, House of Representatives, Monday, March 1, 1819.

Resolved, That the Secretary of the Treasury be requested to transmit to Congress, at an early period in the next session, a general statement of the condition of the Bank of the United States and its Offices similar to the return made to him by the Bank; and a statement exhibiting, as nearly as may be practicable, the amount of capital invested in the different chartered banks in the several states and the District of Columbia; the amount of notes issued by those banks, and in circulation; the public and private deposits in them: the amount of loans and discounts made by them, and remaining unpaid; and the total quantity of specie they possess: and that he be requested also to report such measures as in his opinion may be expedient to procure and retain a sufficient quantity of gold and silver coin in the United States, or to supply a circulating medium, in place of specie, adapted to the exigencies of the country, and within the power of the government."

July 27.—The reader will have seen, by a Notice from the Treasury Department, that Mr. Secretary CRAWFORD is preparing, as far as in his power, to comply with the requisitions of a resolution of the House of Representatives of the United States, passed at the last session, requiring him to make a Report on Banks and Currency.

The Secretary could do no less than proceed to the performance of that which he was enjoined to do by a vote of one of the Houses of Congress: even though he was only requested, instead of instructed, as is the usual form of such requisitions on the several Departments of the government. But it happens sometimes, unfortunately, that propositions of this sort, receiving a single reading, and voted on without debate, are adopted out of courtesy to the mover, as calling for information only, when in fact important principles are embraced or implied by them.—The resolution in question was one of these. It was passed at a late period of the session, & we are persuaded, from our own observation, as well as from contemporaneous assurances of some of those who voted for it, its bearing was not understood, in the last clause of it, particularly, in which the Secretary is requested to report such measures as in his opinion may be expedient to procure & retain a 'sufficient quantity of gold and silver coin in the United States, or to supply a circulating medium, in place of specie, adapted to the exigencies of the country, and within the power of the government.'

If there were no other objection to this sweeping commission to the Secretary of the Treasury; if it had been the deliberate intention of the House of Representatives to request the Secretary to devise a paper system in place of specie currency, it would be sufficient evidence of the resolution's not being understood, when agreed to, that it seriously requests the Secretary of the Treasury to inform Congress what measures on a particular subject are in his opinion, 'within the power of the government'—in other words, that he will 'be pleased to inform them what is the extent of their own authority!'

But we hazard nothing in saying, that it was never within the intention of the last Congress, or either branch of it, to entertain a proposition looking to a general suspension of specie payments.

What measures, if any, the Secretary of the Treasury may think adapted to augment the present reduced amount of national currency, we have no idea.—The subject is of great importance, and becomes every day more grave: we feel assured he will neither treat it lightly, nor yet omit any part of his duty in relation to it. But we have thought the explanation which we have given to be necessary, to avert the general impression of a serious design on the part of the last Congress to establish any other than a specie basis for the National Currency. It is an explanation we have always intended to give, should the resolution referred to become a topic of remark, as it is now in a fair way to be: and is one on which the fullest reliance may be placed.

[Nat. Int.