Banking theories in the United States before 1860

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1755492553

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-133529

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Miller, Harry Edward http://d-nb.info/gnd/1055250875

Title:: Banking theories in the United States before 1860

Place of publication:: Cambridge

Publisher:: Harvard University Press

Year of publication:: 1927

Scope:: XI, 240 S.

Digitisation:: 2021

Collection:: Economics Books

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Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Part I. The utility of banks as a source of media of payment

Collection:: Economics Books

20 BANKING THEORIES IN UNITED STATES never will.” ! And Thomas Jefferson, who seems to have profited little from a reading of Hume and Smith, favored “banks of discount for cash” and banks of deposit, but was irreconcilably opposed to banks with the privilege of note issue.2 “I sincerely believe, with you,” he wrote to John Taylor in 1816, that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.’ ” 8 His fellow patriot, John Adams, condemned the in- stitution with characteristic vigor. “Our whole banking system,” he wrote in 1811, “I ever abhorred, I continue to abhorr [sic] and I shall die abhorring.” For “every bank of discount, every bank by which interest is to be paid or profit of any kind made by the deponent, is downright corruption. It is taxing the public for the benefit and profit of individuals; it is worse than old tenor, con- tinental currency, or any other paper money.” * Every dollar of a bank bill that is issued beyond the quantity of gold and silver in the vaults,” Adams maintained, ‘‘represents nothing, and is therefore a cheat upon somebody.” ? The dislike of banks that Jackson’s hard-money school had nurtured during the period of the “bank war” was fanned to fever heat by the suspension of 1837. An anti-bank convention was held in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on July fourth of that year, and the Loco Foco party held indignation meetings in several cities.® As late as 1853 the secretary of the treasury expressed the hope that the increase in supply of the precious metals in this country (following upon the California discoveries) would continue a few years longer, so that we might yet find it possible to abolish banks and return to a purely metallic cur- rency.” This animosity toward banks found reflection in their L «Country Clown,” cited in Matthew Carey’s Letters to Seybert (1810), p. 56. 2 Writings, ix, 417. Se dbid., %, 31. t John Adams, Letter to Benjamin Rush (August 28, 1811), Works (C.F. Adams edition), ix, 638. 5 Letter to F. A. Vanderkemp (February 16, 1809), ibid., ix, 610. See also, Letter to John Taylor (March 12, 1819), ibid., X, 375. 6 See Niles’ Register (1837), vol. lii, for an account of these. 7 James Guthrie, Finance Reports (1853), p. 10. Cp. Message of the Governor of Michigan (January 2, 1843), in United States House of Representatives, 29th Congress, First Session, Document 226, p. 1215.

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