Page:A History of Banking in the United States.djvu/159

 At the session of 1825-6, the House voted to abolish the new court; but the Senate, by the casting vote of the Lieutenant-governor, refused to concur.

The bitterness of the parties to this old and new court contest is illustrated by the fact that a three days' argument, shared in by all the leading lawyers of the day, was held upon the application of a gentleman to be admitted to practice in the Woodford Circuit Court, he having been licensed as an attorney by the old court after that court had been legislated out of existence. The Judge did not dare to decide the question, but allowed him to practice out of courtesy.

After another hotly contested election, in 1826, the old court was in control of both Houses. December 30, 1826, a law was passed over the Governor's veto, "to remove the unconstitutional obstructions which have been thrown in the way of the Court of Appeals." In the preamble it is said: "The above recited acts have been decided by the good people of this Commonwealth at two successive elections, to be dangerous violations of the Constitution, and subversive of the long tried principles upon which experience has demonstrated that the security of life, liberty, and property depends." The two acts erecting the new court and fixing the salaries of the Judges in it were repealed, and all the acts which the new court act had repealed were revived. January 11, 1827, an act was passed to try to bridge over the new court time. The period from November 30, 1824, to April 1, 1827, was to be considered non in the Court of Appeals, and the clerk of the new court was to deliver to the clerk of the old court all papers "in any wise pertaining to the Court of Appeals." The second volume of T. B. Monroe's reports contains the decisions in seventy-seven cases, which have never been cited by the Supreme Court of the State, being the decisions of the new court.

In 1827, the currency of the States in the Mississippi Valley was very much improved. There remained, as was said, only $800,000 of Commonwealth paper out, and this was merchandise, not currency. The bank held notes of individuals to the amount of one and a-half millions and real estate worth $30,592. Hence there was due to it a balance from the public, after all its notes should be paid in, of $600,000. Its debtors had this to pay in specie or its equivalent, or else the Bank would get their property. No other instance is known in which debtors had to endure so great an appreciation between the time of borrowing and repaying as in the case of this paper money machine. No one has ever explained how any paper money machine could act otherwise unless there should be constant new issues, depreciating more and more until they reached zero. On its paper issue of notes nominally for $3 millions it had won $600,000 worth of property in five years. Who got this gain? It seems that there must have been personal interests at stake to account for the intensity of feeling which was enlisted in its defense, especially on the part of a clique of leading politicians.