PRINCIPLES OF NOTE ISSUE 167 upon the duty of banks to care for the wants of their immediate vicinity, with little regard to the merits of an elastic flow of funds from one point to another. Charters and statutes frequently re- stricted the power of the banks to make loans on distant paper, and the bank commissioners of the New England states depre- ciated such “foreign loans” in a number of their reports.! The independent banking system that prevailed in most parts of the country undoubtedly contributed to this narrow conception of the scope of banking. 1 See, in this regard, the next chapter.