Thirty Years' View (Vol. II of 2). Benton Thomas Hart
bank connections, their governments may avoid the evils that we have suffered; and, by seeing the excitements of 1837, they may save themselves from ever becoming the victims of such delusion.
CHAPTER V.
ACTUAL SUSPENSION OF THE BANKS: PROPAGATION OF THE ALARM
None of the public meetings, and there were many following the leading one in New York, recommended in terms a suspension of specie payments by the banks. All avoided, by concert or instinct, the naming of that high measure; but it was in the list, and at the head of the list, of the measures to be adopted; and every thing said or done was with a view to that crowning event; and to prepare the way for it before it came; and to plead its subsequent justification by showing its previous necessity. It was in the programme, and bound to come in its appointed time; and did – and that within a few days after the last great meeting in New York. It took place quietly and generally, on the morning of the 10th of May, altogether, and with a concert and punctuality of action, and with a military and police preparation, which announced arrangement and determination; such as attend revolts and insurrections in other countries. The preceding night all the banks of the city, three excepted, met by their officers, and adopted resolutions to close their doors in the morning: and gave out notice to that effect. At the same time three regiments of volunteers, and a squadron of horse, were placed on duty in the principal parts of the city; and the entire police force, largely reinforced with special constables, was on foot. This was to suppress the discontent of those who might be too much dissatisfied at being repulsed when they came to ask for the amount of a deposit, or the contents of a bank note. It was a humiliating spectacle, but an effectual precaution. The people remained quiet. At twelve o'clock a large mercantile meeting took place. Resolutions were adopted by it to sustain the suspension, and the newspaper press was profuse and energetic in its support. The measure was consummated: the suspension was complete: it was triumphant in that city whose example, in such a case, was law to the rest of the Union. But, let due discrimination be made. Though all the banks joined in the act, all were not equally culpable; and some, in fact, not culpable at all, but victims of the criminality, or misfortunes of others. It was the effect of necessity with the deposit banks, exhausted by vain efforts to meet the quarterly deliveries of the forty millions to be deposited with the States; and pressed on all sides because they were government banks, and because the programme required them to stop first. It was an act of self-defence in others which were too weak to stand alone, and which followed with reluctance an example which they could not resist. With others it was an act of policy, and of criminal contrivance, as the means of carrying a real distress into the ranks of the people, and exciting them against the political party to whose acts the distress was attributed. But the prime mover, and master manager of the suspension, was the Bank of the United States, then rotten to the core and tottering to its fall, but strong enough to carry others with it, and seeking to hide its own downfall in the crash of a general catastrophe. Having contrived the suspension, it wished to appear as opposing it, and as having been dragged down by others; and accordingly took the attitude of a victim. But the impudence and emptiness of that pretension was soon exposed by the difficulty which other banks had in forcing her to resume; and by the facility with which she fell back, "solitary and alone," into the state of permanent insolvency from which the other banks had momentarily galvanized her. But the occasion was too good to be lost for one of those complacent epistles, models of quiet impudence and cool mendacity, with which Mr. Biddle was accustomed to regale the public in seasons of moneyed distress. It was impossible to forego such an opportunity; and, accordingly, three days after the New York suspension, and two days after his own, he held forth in a strain of which the following is a sample:
"All the deposit banks of the government of the United States in the city of New York suspended specie payments this week – the deposit banks elsewhere have followed their example; which was of course adopted by the State banks not connected with the government. I say of course, because it is certain that when the government banks cease to pay specie, all the other banks must cease, and for this clear reason. The great creditor in the United States is the government. It receives for duties the notes of the various banks, which are placed for collection in certain government banks, and are paid to those government banks in specie if requested. From the moment that the deposit banks of New York, failed to comply with their engagements, it was manifest that all the other deposit banks must do the same, that there must be a universal suspension throughout the country, and that the treasury itself in the midst of its nominal abundance must be practically bankrupt."
This was all true. The stoppage of the deposit banks was the stoppage of the Treasury. Non-payment by the government, was an excuse for non-payment by others. Bankruptcy was the legal condition of non-payment; and that condition was the fate of the government as well as of others; and all this was perfectly known before by those who contrived, and those who resisted the deposit with the States and the use of paper money by the federal government. These two measures made the suspension and the bankruptcy; and all this was so obvious to the writer of this View that he proclaimed it incessantly in his speeches, and was amazed at the conduct of those professing friends of the administration who voted with the opposition on these measures, and by their votes insured the bankruptcy of the government which they professed to support. Mr. Biddle was right. The deposit banks were gone; the federal treasury was bankrupt; and those two events were two steps on the road which was to lead to the re-establishment of the Bank of the United States! and Mr. Biddle stood ready with his bank to travel that road. The next paragraph displayed this readiness.
"In the midst of these disorders the Bank of the United States occupies a peculiar position, and has special duties. Had it consulted merely its own strength it would have continued its payments without reserve. But in such a state of things the first consideration is how to escape from it – how to provide at the earliest practicable moment to change a condition which should not be tolerated beyond the necessity which commanded it. The old associations, the extensive connections, the established credit, the large capital of the Bank of the United States, rendered it the natural rallying point of the country for the resumption of specie payments. It seemed wiser, therefore, not to waste its strength in a struggle which might be doubtful while the Executive persevered in its present policy, but to husband all its resources so as to profit by the first favorable moment to take the lead in the early resumption of specie payments. Accordingly the Bank of the United States assumes that position. From this moment its efforts will be to keep itself strong, and to make itself stronger; always prepared and always anxious to assist in recalling the currency and the exchanges of the country to the point from which they have fallen. It will co-operate cordially and zealously with the government, with the government banks, with all the other banks, and with any other influences which can aid in that object."
This was a bold face for an eviscerated institution to assume – one which was then nothing but the empty skin of an immolated victim – the contriver of the suspension to cover its own rottenness, and the architect of distress and ruin that out of the public calamity it might get again into existence and replenish its coffers out of the revenues and credit of the federal government. "Would have continued specie payments, if it had only consulted its own strength" – "only suspended from a sense of duty and patriotism" – "will take the lead in resuming" – "assumes the position of restorer of the currency" – "presents itself as the rallying point of the country in the resumption of specie payments" – "even promises to co-operate with the government: " such were the impudent professions at the very moment that this restorer of currency, and rallying point of resumption, was plotting a continuance of the distress and suspension until it could get hold of the federal moneys to recover upon; and without which it never could recover.
Indissolubly connected with this bank suspension, and throwing a broad light upon its history, (if further light were wanted,) was Mr. Webster's tour to the West, and the speeches which he made in the course of it. The tour extended to the Valley of the Mississippi, and the speeches took for their burden the distress and the suspension, excusing and justifying the banks, throwing all blame upon the government, and looking to the Bank of the United States for the sole remedy. It was at Wheeling that he opened the series of speeches which he delivered in his tour, it being at that place that he was overtaken by the news of the suspension, and which furnished him with the text for his discourse.
"Recent evils have not at all