PAPER CURRENCY 187

of the executive Government, namely in 1847, 1857, and 1866.
The permission received by the authorities of the Bank, from
the Government, so to overstep the fiduciary issue allowed by
the law, was only used in 1857, and an act of indemnity
was passed as soon as opportunity offered, relieving the
directors from liability to punishment for breach of the law.
Of other systems of paper currency closely following the
lines of the English Act of 1844, the Dominion note-issues
in Canada are an example of practically identical provisions.
The notes of the Swedish National Bank are also regulated
on similar lines, but the cash in hand may not fall below a
fixed minimum, while the fiduciary issue may exceed an
assigned limit by as much as the cash exceeds the minimum
allowed. The securities held against the fiduciary issues
may be either stock exchange securities of specified classes
or bills of exchange. An interesting and important further
Provision permits the issue of notes, beyond the limits
Named above, to an amount equal to the funds of the Bank
held, in foreign countries, on current account with banking
and mercantile houses. Such credit balances are, thus,
Permitted to rank nearly on a level with cash in hand. The
Circumstances of the case do, in practice, make these
balances available for meeting claims of note-holders, since a
foreign credit may be what they need more than coin.
The paper currency issued by the United States Government
 practically follows the lines of the issues of the Bank
of England, The greenbacks, which are legal tender notes
whose issue dates from the Civil War, are secured by a fixed
gold fund of 150,000,000 dollars, which must be promptly
made good if depleted by use in the redemption of the notes.
The amount of the circulation of greenbacks is neither
Ncreased nor decreased, except in so far as a temporary
lecrease is implied to the extent to which the treasury holds
Such notes at any moment. As the greenbacks amount to a
total estimated at 346,681,016 dollars, there is a fiduciary
Issue of about 200 millions of dollars, secured on the credit
of the United States, though the formal deposit of bonds
does not occur in this as it does in the Bank of England
case. Further, the U.S. Treasury issues certificates against