The report makes an elaborate vindication of all the measures for which it had been reprehended, and, in conclusion, proposes a memorial to Congress asking redress for the wrong done' to the institution.

The Legislature of Virginia having expressed, by resolutions, their disapprobation of the removal of the deposits, sent instructions to their Senators to use their best. endeavor to procure the adoption by Congress of proper measures for restoring them to the Bank of the United States, Mr. Rives, who had, on this question, supported the Executive, thought it his duty to resign.

Both Houses of Congress were deluged with petitions and memorials on the subject of the removal of the deposits, setting forth the injury which had been occasioned thereby, and asking for their restoration. The number was so great, that the Speaker could not get through the call of all the States. A committee of ten thousand two hundred and fifty citizens of Philadelphia was appointed to carry to Washington their memorial on this subject. In the interview which took place between the committee and the President, he assumed these several positions:

First. That applications for relief must be made by memorialists to the Bank of the United States, and not to him that the distress was caused by the Bank, which was hoarding its specie, and curtailing its discounts, to crush the State banks, and induce the Government to abandon its policy: that the stockholders might grant relief by electing Directors who would conduct its affairs honestly.

Second. That the present Directors had violated the charter of the Bank, by giving to the President the whole power of the Bank: that the power had been used to destroy the elective franchise: that he regarded

the Bank as "a monster of corruptions," which he was determined to put down.

Third. That the law creating the Bank was unconstitutional.

Fourth. That, having made up his mind on all these points, "Andrew Jackson would never restore the deposits" to the Bank-would never recharter that monster of corruption that persuasion nor coercion, neither the people nor the Legislature, could shake his determination.

Fifth. That he meant to continue the present system of collecting the revenue by the State banks, until the experiment had been fully tried, and he had no doubts of its success: that he would furnish the country with as good, nay a better, currency than the National Bank.

Sixth. He admitted that considerable distress had followed the action of the Government. He had never doubted that brokers and stock speculators, and all who were doing business upon borrowed capital, would suffer severely, and that all such people ought to break.

The Judiciary Committee of the Senate, to whom the President's message respecting the removal of the funds, books and papers connected with the pension agency of the Bank of the United States, was referred, made a report,' in which the acts of Congress on the subject of pensions are fully examined. They say that the pension fund is to be paid by the Bank of the United States, and that the Secretary of War has no power to remove any of the public deposits from the Bank; and they offer, in conclusion, a resolution, that "the Department of War is not warranted in appointing pension agents in any State or Territory where the Bank of the United States, or one of its branches, is established."

1

1 Register of Debates, Vol. X., Part IV., Appendix, page 110.

The Committee of Ways and Means, to whom had been referred the message of the President respecting pensions, condemn the conduct of the Bank, recommend that the payment of the pensions be confined to a responsible officer of the Government, and report a bill accordingly.'

2

A minority of the same Committee, justify the Bank entirely for its course. It consisted of Messrs. Gorham, Binney, and Wilde.

On the seventh of March, Mr. Clay offered four resolutions, on the power of removing officers of the United States, which had long been a question on which men's minds were divided. They were, in substance, as follows:

First. That the power of removal, at the pleasure of the President, from offices established by law, is not vested in him by the Constitution.

Second. That in all such offices in which the tenure is not prescribed by the Constitution, Congress may prescribe the tenure, terins, and conditions on which they are held.

Third. That the Judiciary Committee inquire into the expediency of providing by law, that in all cases of appointment to office by the President, other than diplomatic, the power of removal shall be exercised only in concurrence with the Senate; and when that body is not in session, the President may suspend such officer, and communicate the reason of suspension to the Senate at its next session, when the officer shall be removed or not, as the Senate may or may not concur with the President.

Fourth. That the Post-office Committee inquire into

1

Register of Debates, Vol. X., Part IV., Appendix, page 123. 2 Ibid.

the expediency of providing by law for the appointment, by the advice of the Senate, for all deputy postmasters whose emoluments exceed a certain amount.

According to the views already presented' on the power of removal, these resolutions of Mr. Clay are repugnant to a fair construction of the Federal Constitution.

In the appropriation bill there was an item of 1825, for a series of experiments made by Surgeon Beaumont on the stomach of a wounded soldier, to illustrate the process of digestion. It was opposed as unconstitutional, but it was carried by eighty votes to fifty-three.

On the fourteenth of March, Mr. Webster asked leave to introduce a bill to continue the charter of the Bank for six years from March, 1836, providing for the deposit of the public money in the Bank and its branches: that the Bank shall pay a bonus to the Government of two hundred thousand dollars annually: that Congress may restrain the Bank from issuing any note under twenty dollars after March, 1836: that, within the last three years of the existence of the Bank, the President and Directors may divide among the stockholders such part of the stock as they may think proper: the Bank to signify its acceptance of this continuance of their charter to the President of the United States on or before the first day of the next session of Congress.

Let us now turn to the debates on the removal of the deposits, which proved to be even more, copious and protracted than those on the memorable Missouri question.

1 Vol. I.

2 An aperture had been made in this man's stomach, from which he had recovered, and through which food could be introduced, and its changes seen.

VOL. IV.-12

The discussion commenced in the Senate on two resolutions introduced by Mr. Clay in December: one decla ring that the President, in dismissing the late Secretary of the Treasury, because he would not remove the public deposits, had assumed unconstitutional and dangerous powers and the other, that the reasons assigned by the present Secretary of the Treasury for removing them were unsatisfactory and insufficient.

The discussion was continued irregularly, and under different modifications, until June. But in March, Mr. Clay so modified his first resolution as to charge the President with assuming "authority and power not conferred by the Constitution and laws;" on which it passed the Senate by twenty-six votes to twenty.' The resolution respecting the Secretary of the Treasury passed by twenty-eight votes to eighteen."

In June, Mr. Clay offered two joint resolutions, the first of which declared the reasons given by Mr. Taney to be unsatisfactory and insufficient; and the second required the public deposits to be made in the Bank of the United States after the first of July next. The first resolution passed by twenty-nine votes to sixteen.3 The second by twenty-eight votes to eighteen.*

While the subject was under consideration, resolutions of the Virginia Legislature, condemning the removal of the deposits, having been received, with instructions to the Senators of the State to oppose the measure, Mr. Rives, who had approved of the removal, thought it his duty to resign his seat; and Mr. Leigh, late the Commissioner from Virginia to South Carolina, was appointed to succeed him.

'Register of Debates, Vol. X., Part I., page 1187.

2 Ibid., page 1187.

3 Ibid., Part II., page 1880.

4

Ibid., page 1895.