Page:A History of Banking in the United States.djvu/98

 joint resolution should be the rule of the Department. August 6th, a meeting of representatives of the New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore banks was held at Philadelphia, at which it was voted not to approve of any such notification by the Secretary, and to express to him the opinion that resumption ought not to be attempted before July 1, 1817. It being thus clear that nothing could be obtained from the banks in the way of voluntary co-operation, the Secretary published a notice, September 12th, that the Department would receive after February 20, 1817, only the currency approved in the joint resolution of April 29th. The fact was that there was no authority which could deal with the banks. W.H. Crawford, of Georgia, became Secretary of the Treasury, October 22, 1816. There were at this time 89 banks of deposit. In a letter to the Senate, in 1823, Crawford says that, when he took office, the Treasury had $11 millions in the State banks. Urging them to join the Bank of the United States in resuming, he offered not to draw on them before July 1, 1817, unless his receipts should prove less than his expenditures, which there was no reason to apprehend, and that then he would only draw gradually and not in favor of the Bank of the United States, unless it should be necessary in order to protect that bank against the State banks. They refused. Here certainly there was very dainty action with regard to the "removal of the deposits." His further correspondence with them shows the same disposition on their part, and the same lack of authority on his side. No such insubordination was ever manifested by either Bank of the United States as characterized the State banks in the dealings of the government with them.

Subscriptions for the stock of the Bank of the United States were opened at various points July 1, 1816. When the reports were received, it was found that the subscriptions fell short of the $28 millions open to the public by $3,038,300. Stephen Girard subscribed this sum. The Secretary of the Treasury informed the Commissioners at Philadelphia, August 16th, that the stock had been subscribed, and recommended them to proceed with the necessary preparations for opening the bank.

It has been said above that the public conception of the way in which this bank was to bring about resumption and "equalization of the exchanges" was very vague; but the fear in the State banks that in some way or other it would force resumption was also vague, and their reduction of their liabilities, with an improvement in the exchanges, commenced from the time that the bank stock was subscribed. The banks held large amounts of public stock, as we have seen. These they were unwilling to dispose of for the reduction of their issues, and some complaints arose that they confined their reductions entirely to their discounts. Some of them had lost on public stocks in 1814, and as those securities were now rising, it was a good investment to hold them. These bank contractions arrested the speculations which were in progress, which accounts for Carey's complaint.