Page:Memoir upon the negotiations between Spain and the United States of America which led to the treaty of 1819.djvu/80

70. But notwithstanding their knowledge of all this, they have hitherto made no efforts to change the course of their commerce, and undertake a system adapted to their true interests. The country is exhausted of money, and it is believed that the amount of it at present in circulation, in all the States of the Union, does not exceed 20 millions of dollars. This scarcity of effective funds, and the failures which are continually succeeding each other throughout the country, have debased credit and publick confidence. The Banks had facilitated the speculations of the merchants, by giving them, in paper money, the sums they wanted, in exchange for their notes at a discount of six per cent. per annum; but so excessive has been the multitude of Banks in that country, and so disproportioned to their specie, the quantity of paper money which they had and still have in circulation, that the publick have no longer any confidence in them, and only suffer them from the consideration of not losing the whole. The Banks would be declared in a state of bankruptcy, were all or the greater part of the individuals who hold their paper to demand payment in specie. The Bank of the United States, which was created two years ago as a national establishment, under the direction of the government, is that which is most in discredit; and, at the last session of Congress, memorials were presented from various States of the Union,