The Works of Daniel Webster, Volume 1

If, then, there has been over-trading, the government has 387 encouraged it; if there have been rash speculations in the public lands, the government has furnished the means out of the treasury. These unprecedented sales of the public domain were boasted of as proofs of a happy state of things, and of a wise administration of the government, down to the moment when Congress, in opposition to executive wishes, passed the distribution law, thus withdrawing the surplus revenue from the deposit banks. The success of that measure compelled a change in the executive policy, as the accumulation of a vast amount of money in the treasury was no longer desirable. This is the most favorable motive to which I can ascribe the treasury order of July. It is now said that that order was issued for the purpose of enforcing a strict execution of the law which forbids the allowance of credits upon purchases of the public lands; but there was no such credit allowed before; not an hour was given beyond the time of sale. In this respect, the order produces no difference whatever. Its only effect is to require an immediate payment in specie, whereas, before, an immediate payment in the bills of specie-paying banks was demanded. There is no more credit in the one case than in the other; and the government gets just as much specie in one case as in the other; for no sooner is the specie, which the purchaser is compelled to procure, often at great charge, paid to the receiver, than it is sent to the deposit banks, and the government has credit for it on the books of the bank; but the specie itself is again sold by the bank, or disposed of as it sees fit. It is evident that the government gets nothing by all this, though the purchasers of small tracts are put to great trouble and expense. No one gains any thing but the banks and the brokers. It is, moreover, most true that the art of man could not have devised a plan more effectually to give to the large purchasers or speculators a decided preference and advantage over small purchasers, who bought for actual settlement, than the treasury order of July, 1836. The stoppage of the banks, however, has now placed the actual settler in a still more unfortunate situation. How is he to obtain money to pay for his quarter-section? He must travel three or four times as many miles for it as he has dollars to pay, even if he should be able to obtain it at the end of that journey.

I will not say that other causes, at home and abroad, have not had an agency in bringing about the present derangement. 388 I know that credits have been used beyond all former example. It is probable the spirit of trade has been too highly excited, and that the pursuit of business may have been pressed too fast and too far. All this I am ready to admit. But instead of doing any thing to abate this tendency, the government has been the prime instrument of fostering and encouraging it. It has parted voluntarily, and by advice, with all control over the actual currency of the country. It has given a free and full scope to the spirit of banking; it has aided the spirit of speculation with the public treasures; and it has done all this, in the midst of loud-sounding promises of an exclusive specie medium, and a professed detestation of all banking institutions.

It is vain, therefore, to say that the present state of affairs is owing, not to the acts of government, but to other causes, over which government could exercise no control. Much of it is owing to the course of the national government; and what is not so, is owing to causes the operation of which government was bound in duty to use all its legal powers to control.

Is there an intelligent man in the community, at this moment, who believes that, if the Bank of the United States had been continued, if the deposits had not been removed, if the specie circular had not been issued, the financial affairs of the country would have been in as bad a state as they now are? When certain consequences are repeatedly depicted and foretold from particular causes, when the manner in which these consequences will be produced is precisely pointed out beforehand, and when the consequences come in the manner foretold, who will stand up and declare, that, notwithstanding all this, there is no connection between the cause and the consequence, and that all these effects are attributable to some other causes, nobody knows what?

No doubt but we shall hear every cause but the true one assigned for the present distress. It will be laid to the opposition in and out of Congress; it will be laid to the bank; it will be laid to the merchants; it will be laid to the manufacturers; it will be laid to the tariff; it will be laid to the north star, or to the malign influence of the last comet, whose tail swept near or across the orbit of our earth, before we shall be allowed to ascribe it to its just, main causes, a tampering with the currency, and an attempt to stretch executive power over a subject not constitutionally within its reach.

We have heard, Gentlemen, of the suspension of some of the Eastern banks only; but I fear the same course must be adopted by all the banks throughout the country. The United States Bank, now a mere State institution, with no public deposits, no aid from government, but, on the contrary, long an object of bitter persecution by it, was, at our last advices, still firm. But can we expect of that bank to make sacrifices to continue specie payment? If it continue to do so now that the deposit banks have stopped, the government, if possible, will draw from it its last dollar, in order to keep up a pretence of making its own payments in specie. I shall be glad if this institution find it prudent and proper to hold out;108 but as it owes no more duty to the government than any other bank, and, of course, much less than the deposit banks, I cannot see any ground for demanding from it efforts and sacrifices to favor the government, which those holding the public money, and owing duty to the government, are unwilling or unable to make. Nor do I see how the New England banks can stand alone in the general crash. I believe those in Massachusetts are very sound and entirely solvent; I have every confidence in their ability to pay and I shall rejoice if, amidst the present wreck, we find them able to withstand the storm. At the same time, I confess I shall not be disappointed, if they, seeing no public object to be attained proportioned to the private loss, and individual sacrifice and ruin, which must result from resorting to the means necessary to enable them to hold out, should not be distinguished from their Southern and Western neighbors.

I believe, Gentlemen, the “experiment” must go through. I believe every part and portion of our country will have a satisfactory taste of the “better currency.” I believe we shall be blest again with the currency of 1812, when money was the only uncurrent species of property. We have, amidst all the distress that surrounds us, men in and out of power, who condemn a national bank in every form, maintain the efficacy and efficiency of State banks for domestic exchange, and, amidst all the sufferings and terrors of the “experiment,” cry out, that they are establishing “a better currency.” The “experiment,”—the experiment upon what? The experiment of one man upon the happiness, 390 the well-being, and, I may almost say, upon the lives, of twelve millions of human beings,—an “experiment” that found us in health, that found us with the best currency on the face of the earth, the same from the North to the South, from Boston to St. Louis, equalling silver or gold in any part of our Union, and possessing the unlimited confidence of foreign countries, and which leaves us crushed, ruined, without means at home, and without credit abroad.

This word “experiment” appears likely to get into no enviable notoriety. It may probably be held, in future, to signify any thing which is too excruciating to be borne, like a pang of the rheumatism or an extraordinary twinge of the gout. Indeed, from the experience we now have, we may judge that the bad eminence of the Inquisition itself may be superseded by it, and if one shall be hereafter stretched upon the rack, or broken on the wheel, it may be said, while all his bones are cracking, all his muscles snapping, all his veins are pouring, that he is only passing into a better state through the delightful process of an “experiment.”

Gentlemen, you will naturally ask, Where is this to end, and what is to be the remedy? These are questions of momentous importance; but probably the proper moment has not come for considering this. We are yet in the midst of the whirlwind. Every man’s thoughts are turned to his own immediate preservation. When the blast is over, and we have breathing-time the country must take this subject, this all-important subject of relief for the present and security for the future, into its most serious consideration. It will, undoubtedly, first engage the attention and wisdom of Congress. It will call on public men, intrusted with public affairs, to lay aside party and private preferences and prejudices, and unite in the great work of redeeming the country from this state of disaster and disgrace. All that I mean at present to say is, that the government of the United States stands chargeable, in my opinion, with a gross dereliction from duty, in leaving the currency of the country entirely at the mercy of others, without seeking to exercise over it any control whatever. The means of exercising this control rest in the wisdom of Congress, but the duty I hold to be imperative. It is a power that cannot be yielded to others with safety to itself or to them. It might as well give up to the States 391 the power of making peace or war, and leave the twenty-six independent sovereignties to select their own foes, raise their own troops, and conclude their own terms of peace. It might as well leave the States to impose their own duties and regulate their own terms and treaties of commerce, as to give up control over the currency in which all are interested.

The present government has been in operation forty-eight years. During forty of these forty-eight years we have had a national institution performing the duties of a fiscal agent to the government, and exercising a most useful control over the domestic exchanges and over the currency of the country. The first institution was chartered on the ground that such an institution was necessary to the safe and economical administration of the treasury department in the collection and disbursement of its revenue. The experience of the new government had clearly proved this necessity. At that time, however, there were those who doubted the power of Congress, under the provisions of the Constitution, to incorporate a bank; but a majority of both houses were of a different opinion. President Washington sanctioned the measure, and among those who entertained doubts on the subject, the statesmen of most weight and consideration in the Union, and whose opinions were entitled to the highest respect, yielded to the opinion of Congress and the country, and considered it a settled question. Among those who first doubted of the power of the government to establish a national bank, was one whose name should never be mentioned without respect, one for whom I can say I feel as high a veneration as one man can or ought to feel for another, one who was intimately associated with all the provisions of the Constitution,—Mr. Madison. Yet, when Congress had decided on the measure, by large majorities, when the President had approved it, when the judicial tribunals had sanctioned it, when public opinion had deliberately and decidedly confirmed it, he looked on the subject as definitely and finally settled. The reasoners of our day think otherwise. No decision, no public sanction, no judgment of the tribunals, is allowed to weigh against their respect for their own opinions. They rush to the argument as to that of a new question, despising all lights but that of their own unclouded sagacity, and careless alike of the venerable living and of the mighty dead. They poise this important 392 question upon some small points of their own slender logic, and decide it on the strength of their own unintelligible metaphysics. It never enters into all their thoughts that this is a question to be judged of on broad, comprehensive, and practical grounds; still less does it occur to them that an exposition of the Constitution, contemporaneous with its earliest existence, acted on for nearly half a century, in which the original framers and government officers of the highest note concurred, ought to have any weight in their decision, or inspire them with the least doubt of the accuracy and soundness of their own opinions. They soar so high in the regions of self-respect as to be far beyond the reach of all such considerations.

For sound views upon the subject of a national bank, I would commend you, Gentlemen, to the messages of Mr. Madison, and to his letter on the subject. They are the views of a truly great man and a statesman.

As the first Bank of the United States had its origin in necessity, so had the second; and, although there was something of misfortune, and certainly something of mismanagement, in its early career, no candid and intelligent man can, for a moment, doubt or deny its usefulness, or that it fully accomplished the object for which it was created. Exchanges, during all the later years of its existence, were easily effected, and a currency the most uniform of any in the world existed throughout the country. The opponents of these institutions did not deny that general prosperity and a happy state of things existed at the time they were in operation, but contended that equal prosperity would exist without them, while specie would take the place of their issues as a circulating medium. How have their words been verified? Both in the case of the first bank and that of the last, a general suspension of specie payments has happened in about a year from the time they were suffered to expire, and a universal confusion and distrust prevailed. The charter of the first bank expired in 1811, and all the State banks, south of New England, stopped payment in 1812. The charter of the late bank expired in March, 1836, and in May, 1837, a like distrust, and a like suspension of the State banks, have taken place.

The same results, we may readily suppose, are attributable to the same causes, and we must look to the experience and wisdom 393 of the people and of Congress to apply the requisite remedy. I will not say the only remedy is a national bank; but I will say that, in my opinion the only sure remedy for the evils that now prey upon us is the assumption, by the delegates of the people in the national government, of some lawful control over the finances of the nation, and a power of regulating its currency.

Gentlemen, allow me again to express my thanks for the kindness you have shown me this day, and in conclusion to assure you, that, though a representative in the federal government of but a small section, when compared with the vast territory that acknowledges allegiance to that government, I shall never forget that I am acting for the whole country, and, so far as I am capable, will pledge myself impartially to use every exertion for that country’s welfare.

RECEPTION AT MADISON

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

The following account of Mr. Webster’s visit to Madison, Indiana, is taken from the “Republican Banner,” of the 7th of June, 1837.

“Daniel Webster visited our town on Thursday last. Notice had been given the day previous of the probable time of his arrival. At the hour designated, crowds of citizens from the town and country thronged the quay. A gun from the Ben Franklin, as she swept gracefully round the point, gave notice of his approach, and was answered by a gun from the shore. Gun followed gun in quick succession, from boat and shore, and the last of the old national salute was echoing from hill and glen as the Franklin reached the wharf. Mr. Webster was immediately waited on by the committee appointed to receive him, and, attended by them, a committee of invitation from Cincinnati, and several gentlemen from Louisville, he landed amidst the cheers and acclamations of the assembled multitude. He was seated in an elegant barouche, supported by Governor Hendricks and John King, Esq., and, with the different committees, and a large procession of citizens in barouches, on horseback, and on foot, formed under the direction of Messrs. Wharton and Payne of the committee of arrangements, marshals of the day, proceeded to the place appointed for his reception, an arbor erected at the north end of the market-house, fronting the large area formed by the intersection of Main and Main Cross Streets and the public square, and tastefully decorated with shrubbery, evergreens, and wreaths of flowers. In the background appeared portraits of Washington and Lafayette, the Declaration of Independence, and several other appropriate badges and emblems, while in front a flag floated proudly on the breeze, bearing for its motto the ever-memorable sentiment with which he concluded his immortal speech in defence of the Constitution, ‘Liberty and Union, now and for ever, one and inseparable.’ When the procession arrived, Mr. Webster ascended the stand in the arbor, supported by Governor Hendricks and the committee of arrangements, when he was appropriately and eloquently addressed by J. G. Marshall, Esq., on behalf of the citizens, to which he responded in a speech of an hour’s length.”

The following correspondence preceded Mr. Webster’s visit.

“Louisville, May 30, 1837.

“Hon. Daniel Webster:—

“Sir,—Your fellow-citizens of the town of Madison, Indiana, deeply impressed with a sense of the obligations which they and all the true lovers of constitutional liberty, and friends to our happy and glorious Union, owe you for the many prominent services rendered by you to their beloved, though now much agitated and injured country, having appointed the undersigned a committee through whom to tender you their salutations and the hospitalities of their town, desire us earnestly to request you to partake of a public dinner, or such other expression of the high estimation in which they hold you as may be most acceptable, at such time as you may designate.

“Entertaining the hope that you may find it convenient to comply with this request of our constituents and ourselves, we beg leave, with sentiments of the most profound respect and regard, to subscribe ourselves,

“Your fellow-citizens,

W. Lyle,

W. J. McClure,

Wm. F. Collum,

A. W. Pitcher,

Jas. E. Lewis,

D. L. McClure,

} Committee.”

AnswerLouisville, May 30, 1837.

“Gentlemen,—I feel much honored by the communication which I have received from you, expressing the friendly sentiments of my fellow-citizens of Madison, and desiring that I should pay them a visit.

“Although so kind an invitation, meeting me at so great a distance, was altogether unlooked for, I had yet determined not to pass so interesting a point on the Ohio without making some short stay at it. I shall leave this place on Thursday morning, and will stop at Madison, and shall be most happy to see any of its citizens who may desire to meet me. I must pray to be excused from a formal public dinner, as well from a regard to the time which it will be in my power to pass with you, as from a general wish, whenever it is practicable, to avoid every thing like ceremony or show in my intercourse with my fellow-citizens.

“You truly observe, Gentlemen, that the country at the present moment is agitated. I think, too, that you are right in saying it is injured; that is, I think public measures of a very injurious character and tendency have been unfortunately adopted. But our case is not one that leads us to much despondency. The country, the happy and glorious country in which you and I live, is great, free, and full of resources; and, in the main, an intelligent and patriotic spirit pervades the community. These will bring all things right. Whatsoever has been injudiciously or rashly done may be corrected by wiser counsels. Nothing can, for any great length of time, depress the great interests of the people of the United States, if wisdom and honest good-sense shall prevail in their public measures. Our present point of suffering is the currency. In 399 my opinion, this is an interest with the preservation of which Congress is charged, solemnly and deeply charged. A uniform currency was one of the great objects of the Union. If we fail to maintain it, we so far fail of what was intended by the national Constitution. Let us strive to avert this reproach from that government and that Union, which make us, in so many respects, one people! Be assured, that to the attainment of this end every power and faculty of my mind shall be directed; and may Providence so prosper us, that no one shall be able to say, that in any thing this glorious union of the States has come short of fulfilling either its own duties or the just expectations of the people.

“With sentiments of true regard, Gentlemen, I am your much obliged friend and fellow-citizen,

“Daniel Webster.

“To W. Lyle,

W. J. McClure,

Wm. F. Collum,

A. W. Pitcher,

James E. Lewis,

D. L. McClure,

} Committee.”

The address of Mr. Marshall, above alluded to, was as follows:—

“Sir,—The people now assembled around you, through me, the humble organ of their selection, do most sincerely and cordially welcome you to Madison. In extending to you the most liberal hospitality, they do no more, however, than they would be inclined to do towards the humblest citizen of our common country. But this public and formal manifestation of the feeling of regard which they entertain for you is intended to do more than inform you of the simple fact that here you can find food and shelter, and partake with them of the pleasures of the social circle. If this were all, it might be communicated in a manner more acceptable, by extending to you the hand of friendship and kindly pointing you to the family board; but by this public parade, this assembling of the people around you, it is intended to give you that consolation, (most grateful and cheering to every true American heart,) the people’s approbation of your acts as a public servant. This is done, not with that abject feeling which characterizes the homage of subjects, but with that nobler feeling which prompts freemen to honor and esteem those who have been their country’s benefactors. Prompted by such feeling, the patriots of the Revolution delighted to honor the father of our country. He led his armies to victory, and thus wrested the liberties of his countrymen from the grasp of a tyrant; and may we not from like impulses manifest gratitude towards those who, by the power of their intellects, have effectually rebuked erroneous principles, which were evidently undermining and endangering the very existence of our beloved Union? Yes, Sir, our country has now nothing to fear from external violence. It is a danger which the whole country can see on its first approach, and every arm will be nerved at once to repel it; it can be met at the point of the bayonet, and millions would now, as in days that are past, be ready to shed their blood in defence of their country. 400 But, Sir, in those who artfully excite the passions and prejudices of the people, and, by presenting to them the most plausible pretexts (for their own selfish purposes), lead them thoughtlessly to abandon the sacred principles upon which our government is founded, and to reject the measures which can alone promote the prosperity of the country,—in such we meet an enemy against whom the most daring bravery of the soldier is totally unavailing.

“The injury which is inflicted is not at first felt; time is required to develop it; and when developed, the closest investigation may be necessary to trace it to its cause; this the people may not be able to accomplish. This enemy to the country can only be discerned by the keen eye of the statesman, and met and conquered by the power of his intellect. And he who is successful in thus defending his country may well be held in grateful remembrance by his fellow-citizens. It is for such reasons, Sir, that we have presented to you these testimonials of our approbation. Though personally a stranger to us, your public character, your masterly efforts in defence of the Constitution, the services you have rendered the West, and the principles and measures which you have so ably advocated, are known and approved, and I hope will ever be remembered by us. And although some of your efforts have proved for the time unsuccessful, it is to be hoped they would now have a different effect. When the old and established measures of any government have been abandoned for new ones, simply as an experiment, and when that experiment, if it does not produce, is, to say the least, immediately followed by, ruin and distress in every part of the country, may we not hope that men will at least calmly and dispassionately hear and weigh the reasons why a different policy should be adopted? But if the people’s representatives cannot be convinced of the error into which they have been led, it is high time the people themselves should awake from their slumbers. A dark cloud hangs over the land, so thick, so dark, a ray of hope can hardly penetrate it. But shall the people gird on their armor and march to battle? No, Sir; it is a battle which they must fight through the ballot-box; and perhaps they do not know against what to direct their effort; they are almost in a state of despondency, ready to conclude that they are driven to the verge of ruin by a kind of irresistible destiny. The cause of the evil can be discovered only by investigation; and to their public men they must look for information and for wisdom to direct them. But, Sir, it is not our object to relate to you our grievances, or recount the past services which you have rendered your country. We wish to cheer you on to increased efforts in urging the measures you have heretofore so zealously and ably advocated. May your success be equal to your efforts, and may happiness and prosperity attend you through life.”