Noah, po loss or damage has occurred to the

twenty thousand dollars. The president and directors considered it as it had been viewed in stockholders, nor is any to be apprehended. In the recommendation of the Mayor of New York -as a business transaction. Yet, it did not es. cape their attention that a political coloring might, and probably would, be given to it by the inveterate enemies of the bank. They were aware, that if the loan was granted, it would be liable to the charge of a favor dispensed, to purchase the aid and support of the newspaper in behalf of the bank; and if it should be denied, it would be charged as proof of hostility to the Administration of the General Govern ment and its chief. Sure that they could in no event escape the censure of enemies predispos. ed to blame, they granted the loan, to which, afterwards, in December, an addition of fifteen thousand dollars was made. Notes of Mr. Webb, endorsed by Mr. Noah, and payable to Silas E. Burrows, had been previously discounted for Mr. Burrows, but without the knowledge of Webb or Noah, as they testify, to the amount of seventeen thousand dollars. Of these sums so much has been paid, that there now remains due from Messrs. Webb and Noah, to the bank, a sum of about eighteen thousand dollars, payable in semi-annual instalments, and from the statements laid before the committee, believed by the subscriber to be as safe as any other debt upon the books of the bank.

the original charges presented to the House by the chairman of the committee, there was one of subsidizing the press; and these accommodations to Messrs. Webb and Noah were understood to be among the most prominent exemplifications of that nameless crime which an investigation of the affairs of the bank would disclose to the world. It would happily be a fruitless search to find, in the criminal code of this Union, or of any one of its constituent States, such a crime as subsidizing the press. When the charge was first brought forward by the chairman of the committee in the House, it was impossible to ascertain of what overt or covert acts this offence, thus novel and undefined, consisted; nor, except in the proceedings of the majority of the committee, can the subscriber yet comprehend what are the elements of this new and still undefined offence. The majority of the committee, immediately after entering upon the discharge of their duties at Philadelphia, commenced a search into all the accounts with the bank of editors of newspapers. In the returns to this demand, it was found that Webb and Noab, far from being solitary culprits in this unheard-of transgression, were in the very respectable company of the editors of the National Intelligencer, of the National Gazette, of the United States Telegraph, of the Globe, and of The transactions of James Watson Webb and the Richmond Enquirer. This information was of Mordecai M. Noah with the Bank of the scarcely in the possession of the committee, beUnited States, formed, in the opinion of the fore it found its way into the public journals, subscriber, no proper subject of examination and thus all, the editors of those well known by the committee, or of investigation to the prints stand, by an exhibition of their private House, further than to ascertain whether, in accounts, charged before the public as conductthose transactions, there had been any violation ors of presses subsidized by the bank. The comof the law of the land. Within the pale of the mittee did in no other instance than that of the law, if this be a government of laws, and not of New York Courier and Enquirer, go into an inmen, Webb and Noah were not amenable for vestigation of the reasons or motives for which their conduct, or their opinions, to the House the discounts or the loans had been granted. of Representatives of the United States, or to Political motives were unequivocally and expliany committee by them appointed. citly disclaimed by the president and directors who assented to the loans; and while in this, as in all other banks, the practice is uniform of never assigning the reasons either for discounts or rejection, they are not, and cannot, be made subjects of testimony. Every member of the board has his own reasons, which may not be

In behalf of the United States, as large stock holders in the bank, a general superintendence over the proceedings of the president and directors of the bank is no doubt vested in the Congress. But the s bscriber does not believe that the president, or any director of the bank, is or can be accountable to a committee of ei-known to any other member. One member, ther House of Congress, or to the House itself, for the motives or reasons upon which he acce. ded or objected to any one discount. The practice of all well-regulated banks, is, and must be, that declared by the testimony of the presi dents of the two banks in New York to be theirs. The reasons or motives for accepting or rejecting a note offered for discount, are not The subscriber believes all inquiry into the subjects of inquiry at the board itself. The motives of bank facilities or accommodations, to reasons of each director are in his own breast. be not only pregnant with injustice to indiviHis own colleagues at the board have no right duals, but utterly beneath the dignity of the to inquire into them-they are in his own dis-legislature. Their rights of inquiry are com

cretion.

It is indeed within the bounds of possibility that this discretion should be abused to the in jury and damage of the stockholders. But in the transactions of the bank with Webb and

therefore, is not responsible for the reasons of any other member, nor is the board responsible for the reasons of any one of its members. Motives can then be made a subject of scrutiny only upon suspicions-political suspicions, sharpened by the collisions of personal pecuniary interests.

mensurate with the law. For actions within the bounds of laws, to scrutinize motives, is tantamount to an inquisition of religious opinions—a species of moral and intellectual torture, fitted more to the age of Tiberius Cæsar at Rome,

than to the liberal spirit of the present time. The discount of notes at a bank, whether to a large or small amount, can in no case be considered as donations or gratuities. They are con tracts of mutual equivalents for the benefit of both parties, in which the bank is no more the benefactor of the customer than the customer of the bank.

or imagination can invent, to invoke popular resentment and indignation against the Bank of the United States, to prevent the renewal of heir charter, the president and directors of the Bank of the United States are forbidden all use of the public press, for the defence and vindication of their own institution, they stand indeed in fearful inequality of condition with As the period of time is approximating at their adversaries before the tribunal of public which the present charter of the Bank of the opinion. The local banks of New York, for United States is to expire, the question, with example, grant, with lavish hand, bank accomregard to the renewal of its charter, has be-modations and facilities to the editor of a daily come an object of great and increasing public newspaper, who fills his columns with all the interest. The duties of the president and di commonplaces of vituperation against the Bank rectors of the bank to protect and promote of the United States. They deny all facility the interests of the stockholders naturally and accommodation to an other editor, who admake it an object of intense and earnest de-mits into his papers essays or communications sire to them. Independent of all personal and favorable to that bank. Does the editorial voindividual interests of their own, these obliga-tary of State banks, and seven per cent. intertions to the company require of them to use all est, slacken in his fervor? his discounts at the fair and lawful means to obtain a renewal of State banks are curtailed. Does he falter in the charter. Were it even true that under his zeal? a pressure for money comes upon the these circumstances they should indulge a dis- State banks, and his notes are called in. Does position to the utmost bounds of liberality, con- he dare to admit into his paper a communicasistent with justice and discretion, to one or tion favorable to the mammoth bank? he loses more eminent editors of public journals, but all credit with his old bankers. Does he preextending only to discounts of their papers at sume to hint, in an editorial article, that, after the regular remunerating interest at the rate of all, a bank bound to discount at the rate of six six per cent. interest by the year, is this to be per cent. interest may be of some advantage to construed into corruption, or converted into a borrowers in a community where the establishbribe? In every State in the Union there is a ed legal rate of interest is seven? he becomes large capital of its citizens invested in stocks of at once, in the estimation of the local bank dimultiplied State banks. Most of these are rectors, insolvent, and blasted in credit; and, if rivals in business with the Bank of the United he offers for discount a note of a hundred dolStates, and they have all boards of directors, lars, with the best endorser in the city, it is reand most of them are colleagued with newspa- jected by the silent vote of one or two direcpers, all eager for the destruction of the Bank tors, because the editor's newspaper did forof the United States, An institution doubly merly oppose, and now ceases to oppose, the obnoxious to the system of safety fund banks rechartering of the Bank of the United States. in the State of New York, inasmuch as their And then if the editor, cramped and crippled discounts, at the rate of six per cent. a year, in his business by the screw thus put upon his curtail' one per cent. of the dividends which press, to save himself and his establishment otherwise, by the laws of New York, they from ruin, applies to the president and direcwould be enabled to levy upon the community. tors of the bank of the United States for an acIt is, therefore, not surprising, that in the city, commodation loan! No; they too must regard and even in the State of New York, that ani-him as insolvent, and blasted in credit; they too mosity against the Bank of the United States must withhold all banking accommodation and of almost all the local banks should have been facility from him, though recommended by the so great as even to spread its influence into the Chief Magistrate of the City of New York himLegislature of the State. The same operation self, or they will be guilty of the attrocious ofis active under feebler excitements in many fence of subsidizing the p ess. other States. These are not bribes. But the The statement of facts is here hypothetically concert of opposition from State banks in al-put-it is not intended to charge the presidents most every quarter of the Union organized with and directors of the New York city banks with harmonious energy, in concert with public any such motives for granting or withholding journals perhaps as numerous, and constantly their discounts. The subscriber not only ap operating upon the public mind unfavorably proves, but was gratified, at their refusal to asby means of the press, made it indispensably sign their reasons for declining to discount the necessary for those to whom the welfare of the corporation was intrusted, to defend themselves occasionally, and from time to time, in the same

manner.

notes offered by Mr. Webb. Had the question been asked them why they had discounted the notes of the same person before, their answer must have been the same. The acceptance of If, while hundreds and thousands of the con. an offered note is by unanimous and tacit asductors of State banks, impelled by private sent, without assignment of reasons, and for and personal interests, are filling the popular which the reasons of one director are not nepublic journals under their influence, by means cessarily the reasons of another. They are not of discounts and facilities granted or withdrawn, proper subjects of inquiry, so long as the diswith every charge that suspicion can conceive, count is in violation of no law. And this prin

-

ciple is equally applicable to the president and by Congress, or either of its Houses, of the directors of the Bank of the United States principle that the accounts of editors of newsThey are amenable to authority only tor con-papers, as a separate class of men, with the formity to the law. To the stockholders they bank, are to be scrutinized by a committee of are further accountable for the pruden and dis- Congress as tests of the political opinions or doccreet employment of their funds. But, while trines of their editorial columns; or indications he result of that management has been, for a of the candidate for the presidency to whose series of years, to yield to the stockholders banners they adhere; or to defeat the re-char half-yearly dividends of three and a half per tering of the bank by deducing from the same cent. upon their investments, while the stock of naked fact of existing loans, large or small, the the bank is at twenty-five per cent. advance dishonorable conclusion, that the motives of the upon its original cost in the market; and whils president and directors of the bank, for grantthe heaviest of all the complaints against the ing these loans, were to purchase the support bank is the extensiveness and universality of its of the borrowers, by bribery and corruption. credit, the subscriber believes that the stock- But let it, for argument's sake, be admitted, holders, and the most vigilant guardians of their that the accommodation of a loan to the editor in'erest, may wait until an actual loss shall have of a newspaper, by the president and directors happened upon any one loan or discount, be- of the Bank of the United States, is, on their fore they shall be justified in imputing either part, an act of corruption of which the Congress thriftless improvidence or sordid corruption to of the United States, without doing injustice, the president and directors of the bank for hav ing granted it.

and without derogation from the dignity of their duties, can take cognizance; the subscriber be ieves that it cannot justly have any bearing whatever upon the question whether the Bank of the United States shall or shall not be rechartered.

The constitution of the United States denies to Congress itself the power of passing any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law abridging the freedom of the press. But here is a new fangled offence created ex post facto, under the Admit that, in a country where the freedom denomination of subsidizing the press to ope of the press is among the first elements of the rate as a bill of attainder upon the bank, and liberty of the people, a committtee of one as a disfranchisement to every editor of a pub House of Congress has a right to constitute ex lic journal who may happen to be obnoxious to post facto, a crime under the name of subsidiza political party in power. The fact constituting the press, of that, which in the eyes of thet ing this most extraordinary crime, is the mere law of the land, is, and always has been, innoexistence of a loan, or discount of the proscrib. cent. Admit that they have power to search ed editor at the bank: a transaction entirely into the hearts of the president and directors warranted by law, but in the consummation of of the bank, for dishonest motives to lawful acwhich a committee of one branch of the legis tions. Admit that they have a right to interlature first assumes the right of scrutinizing and rogate them for reasons which no director of then of passing sentence of condemnation upon any bank is ever bound to give. Admit that the motives of both parties to the con ract. As after the president and directors have submitted there is no law constituting the offence, the de- to these insuling interrogatories, and assigned gree of malignity has no rule of proportion but the reasons by which they were actuated, the that of the temper by which it is prosecuted- committee should still feel themselves justified it will be aggravated by every stimulant of pri- in groping, day after day, for circumstantial evivate pique, of classting interest, of political dence to falsify the frank and explict declaraprejudice, or of morbid suspicion, which can be tions of men without a slur upon their fame.— enlisted in the prosecution. A committee man, That piles of folio volumes, of bank accounts, being a large stockholder in a State bank, to be should be rummaged over, nights and days, for deeply benefitted by the extinguishment of the a variety in the color of ink, in entries made Bank of the United States; another, linked in by different clerks, with different ink stands, connexion with a newspaper establishment in for errors in the spelling of a name, for intercompetition with the editor to be attainted; a lineations and erasures in a waste book or a profound political economist, wedded to a sys-tickler, and all to substitute trifles light as air of tem of coin, currency, and credit, propitious to suspicion, in the place of fact, and to impute one banking interest, and unfavorable to ano- fraud, forgery, and perjury where they cannot ther; a mere partisan hanging upon the skirt of be proved. Admit that the unsullied charac a political candidate, and following the camp to ters of men, long known among their fellow share in the spoils of the victory, might all club citizens, for lives without fear and without retheir inventive faculties to swell this imaginary proach, may thus be breathed and whispered trespass into felony-and seldom would there into disgrace. What has all this to do with the lack, as an ingredient in the composition, the question, whether the Bank of the United States corrosive sublimate of a malicious temper, with shall receive a new charter or not? If the instinctive hatred of all honor and integrity, president and any number of directors, have prone always to infer actual fraud and villainy been guilty of malversation in their offices, the from the mere possibility of its existence, and remedy for their offence, is removal from office. even to insinuate cur:uption, without daring They may be further responsible to the stockopenly to affirm it. These are consequence holders in their persons and property. The which must and would follow from the sanction directors, appointed by the President and Se

nate, are, at all times, removeable by the Presi-jection of the subscriber is to all inquisition indent of the United States alone. The presi-to motives, for actions unforbidden by law. dent of the bank is every year liable to re But in each of these four cases-in those of the moval, both as president and as director, by accounts of every editor of a newspaper, of evfailure of re-election as a director by the stockery member of Congress, and of every person holders, or as president by the directors. No connected with the Executive Government-if other director can be re-elected more than the fact of the individual account is exhibited three successive years in four. If the board of to the public, it is, upon the plainest principle directors have been guilty of neglect or viola- of justice, the right of the individual to have tion of their duties, the punishment of their dealike exhibited to the public, all the circumlinquency is to appoint another set of directors stances connected with the transactions which in their place; not to punish the innocent and he may deem essential to his justification. But injured stockholders by refusal to renew the what is that justification? Is it justification limcharter. By the rotation prescribed in the ted by the boundaries of the law? No: that is charter itself, not one of the present board of not sufficient. The account in bank must be directors can remain in office at the time of the coupled with the conduct and opinions of the expiration of the charter, nor can the present individual, to point the finger at him and at the president of the board ever be president of the bank as for dishonorable conduct and corrupt bank under the renewed charter, but by the purposes. So it was in the case of James Watsuffrages of the stockholders, according to their son Webb and Mordecai M. Noah. Why was respective privileges of voting. If, therefore, it not so in other cases? Why are the names any misconduct had been discoverable in the of other printers, and the amount and aspect of official conduct of the president of the bank, their debts to the bank, as principals or endorthe proper punishment for it would have been sers, withheld? Why are other editors, having his removal from office; and the same may be large accommodations in the bank, the names said of any other of the directors. But for of their endorsers, the character of their settletheir fault, to punish the stockholders who had ments, the present state of their engagements, no communion or privity with them; for their and a cotemporaneous exposition of their edi errors, to deprive the great mass of the com-torial friendship or hostility to the bank not set munity of the benefits and advantages secured forth in all the developments of the bank debts to them, and enjoyed by them through the in- and editorial speculations of James Watson Webb strumentality of this great institution over this and Mordecai M. Noah? Why are not the day whole Union, would proceed from a theory of of an editorial discount and the day of an editocrimes and punishments unrivalled by the po- rial puff or panegyric, or blast of abuse upon litical Inquisition of Venice, or the religious the bank, brought in juxtaposition to each othInquisition of Spain. A theory by which the er, so that suspicion may yoke them together in crime would be committed by one set of per- the relation of cause and effect in any other case sons and the punishment inflicted upon another; than theirs? The subscriber believed that there a theory by which the stockholders would be were other accounts of editors and printers with mulcted in their property, because the direc- the bank, exhibited to the committee, which, tors had been faithless to their trust, and the compared with editorial lucubrations in the people bereft of public blessings, because their newspapers, of the same editors at the same confidence in the integrity of their agents had times with the discounts, or at the present day, been betrayed. would suggest reflections quite as edifying to . At the close of the long commentary of the the spirit of reform, as the debts and dissertamajority report, upon the transactions between tions of James Watson Webb and Mordecai M. the editors of the New York Courier and En-Noah. The majority report has buried them in quirer, it is observed, that among the docu-oblivion. There let them remain. The subments exhibited to the committee, and reported scriber will not disturb their repose. But he to the House, are four other cases of loans at asks of the candor of the community, and of the long credit, made by the bank. The report self-respect of the House, representing the feelneither mentions the names of the individu Is, ings of the people, that no more legislative inparties to these contracts, nor the correspond-vestigations may be instituted at the expense of ence and testimony relating to them, which the nation, under color of an examination into were laid before the committee. The sub. the books and proceedings of the Bank of the scriber, approving the discretion of the majori. United States, into the political purity and unty in this particular, will not deviate from the devia ing consistency of the conductors of the example set in the report. He will barely tak public press. occasion from it to remark, that the names of It is with great satisfaction that the subscrithose individuals, and of their accounts and ber declares his entire and undoubting convictransactions with the bank, cannot be brought tion, as to the result of all the examination, before the public, by the committee, without which, under the resolution of the House, and gross injustice. Those transactions, he is bound he unbounded range of inquiry sanctioned by to believe, were perfectly justifiable in all the the majority of the committee, he was able to parties to the contract; but he was under a give the books and proceedings of the bank, that full conviction that neither he nor the commit- no misconduct, whatever, is imputable to the pretee had the right to inquire into them, whe-sident, or to any of the present directors of the ther for justification or for censure. The ob-bank. That in the management of the affairs

of this immense institution, now for a series of ter of the president of the bank, and yet withnearly ten years, occasional errors of judgment, held from the committee the name of his inforand possibly of inadvertance, may have been mant. The subpoena to Mr. Thomas Wilson committed, is doubtless true-in the vast mul- was, nevertheless, issued. The charges against titude of relations of the bank with the proper the president of the bank were, that Thomas ty of the whole community, the board of direc- Biddle, a distant relative of his, and one of the tors of the parent bank, or of some of its branch-most eminent brokers of Philadelphia, had been es, have sometimes mistaken the law, and some- in the habit, by permission of the president, of times have suffered by misplaced confidence.— taking money out of the first teller's drawer, A spirit of predetermined hostility, uncontrol- leaving in its place certificates of stock; keepled by a liberal sense of justice, prying for ing the money an idefinite number of days, and flaws, and hunting for exceptions, may gratify then replacing the money, and taking back his itself, and swell with exultation at its own saga- certificates of stock, without payment of intecity, in discovering an error, or arguing a mis- rest upon the moneys of which he had had the construction of powers In the conduct of the use. The quintessence of the charge was, the present president and directors of the Bank use by Mr. Thomas Biddle of the moneys of the of the United States, no intentional wrong and bank without interest. And there was another no important or voluntary error has been com- charge, that the president had also been in the mitted. He deems this declaration due from habit of making large discounts upon notes of him to those worthy and respectable citizens, in Thomas Biddle without consulting the directors, the face of this House, and of this nation, will-between the discount days, and that the notes ing as he is able to abide upon it the deliberate were entered as of the previous discount day. judgment of after times. He deems it the more Mr. Wilson's testimony completely disproved, imperiously required of him as a signal vindica so far as his knowledge went, both these chargtion of the honor and integrity of injured and es. He had never known a single instance in persecuted men. It has been impossible for which Mr. Thomas Biddle, or any other person, him to observe, without deep concern, the spi- had ever been permitted by the president of the rit and temper with which the investigation has bank to use the moneys of the bank without been prosecuted, particularly with regard to payment of interest. He had never known a the president of the bank. As one example of discount of a note of Thomas Biddle, by order of which, he would call the attention of the House the president of the bank, without consulting the to the testimony of Reuben M. Whitney, to the board of directors, or the committee duly authorimanner in which it was produced, and to the zed to discount. Mr. Wilson had been removed catastrophe in which it terminated.

in a manner as inoffensive to his feelings as possiOn the 2d of April, the chairman of the com- ble, from his office of cashier of the parent bank mittee asked of them authority to issue a sub- in 1824, by being first transferred to the branch pœna to summon the attendance before them of at New Orleans, from which he was also afterThomas Wilson, heretofore, in the year 1824, wards removed. Previous to his removal from a cashier of the bank, to testify as a witness.- the bank at Philadelphia, the personal interThe subscriber inquired what it was expected course between the president of the bank and Mr. Wilson would prove, which question the him had not been altogether harmonious. He chairman declined to answer. The subscriber had hinted to Mr. Rueben M. Whitney, a direcobjected, therefore, to the issuing of the sub- tor then secretly unfriendly to the president, and pœna, and the motion for it was, for that day, withdrawn.

Mr. Paul Beck, a director particularly friendly to himsetf, that he thought the president had. The next day it was renewed, with a state- too much influence over the board of directors, ment in writing by the chairman of several al and had spoken with disapprobation of the fact legations, as the subscriber conceived, amount- that Mr. Thomas Biddle had, occasionally, reing to charges against the president of the bank, ceived discounts upon transferred stock, with of embezzlement of the moneys of the institu checks, which, at the end of an indefinite numtion. The subscriber inquired from whom ber of days, were taken up and the cash returnthese charges had been received, which the ed, with regular payment of interest, as upon Chairman declined to state. The subscribe" discounted notes. The checks being entered moved that a copy of the charges should be tur, in the books under the head of Bills Receivable. nished to the president of the bank. But the Several cases of this kind had occured in the paper was withdrawn by the chairman, and a re-months of May and June, 1824. Mr. Wilson's solution was substituted in its place, which was testimony was very clear and explicit as to the entered on the journal of the committee. The integrity of the president of the bank, and it was objection of the subscriber to this course of pro-totally contradictory to the statements which the ceeding was, at his request, entered upon the chairman had framed into charges from the prijournal, and at the request of the chairman an vate information which he had received, and the entry was also made of the grounds upon which name of the informer of which he declined givhe deemed his own course in this respect justi-ing to the committee. But Mr. Wilson had namfiable. The objection of the subscriber was, ed Mr. Paul Beck and Mr. Rueben M. Whitney, not that the chairman had thought proper to two of the directors of the bank in 1824, and listen privately to secret informers, but that he to whom he had incidentally communicated his required the action of the committee for a call slight discontents at the period immediately be of testimony deeply affecting the moral charac-fore his removal.