Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/180

 The whole amount of exchequers subject to issue was strictly limited to $200,000; gold and silver, and exchequers, were alone receivable for customs-dues, for taxes and licenses. They could only be paid out from the treasury on specific appropriations by Congress. For several months scarcely $40,000 had been paid out. At no time ever, subsequently to the passage of the act, was there in circulation near half the amount provided by the act. As for redbacks, lavishly issued by the preceding administration, they were as utterly ignored as if not a dollar of them had ever been heard of.

It needs scarcely to remind any one that the exchequers were in all essential respects the same as the first treasury notes issued in 1837, the star money under another name.

The experience of the redbacks naturally created distrust of the exchequers. It was loudly asserted that these were only redbacks under the thin disguise of another name, and their utter and speedy depreciation, like their redback predecessor of unhappy name, was confidently prophesied. Speculators, like buzzards watching a sick animal, attacked the exchequers and entered into combinations to destroy their value. They sunk to 30 cents, and even less, on the dollar. President Houston was equal to the emergency. He convened Congress in extra session, June 27, 1842. On the 23d July a law was passed, requiring collectors of customs, sheriffs, clerks, and postmasters, to receive exchequers only at the current rates at which they were sold on "Change" in open market.

It would be natural to suppose that the act of July 23d would appreciate promptly the exchequers. Nevertheless, they appreciated very slowly. This was a natural consequence of distrust from recent experience of redback treasury notes. Pecuniary confidence is, especially, a plant of slow growth. Besides, being receivable only at their cash value in market, and worth no more in payment of Government dues than a like amount of gold and silver, nothing was gained by purchasing them. As a consequence, gold and silver flowed into the treasury, and at the close of President Houston's second term exchequers were on a par with coin.

The foregoing outline of the financial history of Gen. Houston's administrations would be incomplete without some mention of the sequel. Anson Jones, who had been Secretary of State under Houston, and who was, perhaps, his most trusted Cabinet officer, succeeded General Houston as President of the Republic in December, 1844. Anson Jones, too, was a man of eminently sound judgment; he held the same sound opinions as General Houston on paper currency on irredeemable promises to pay, on the