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the state banks for the bank of the United States, as the fiscal agent of the government.

In reply to these resolutions, and to the remarks of Mr. Wright, Mr. Webster delivered his second speech, near the opening of which he presents a fine picture of the senate in its debates on the subject, and gives an account of public opinion upon it at that time: "But the gentleman has discovered, or he thinks he has discovered, motives for the complaints which arise on all sides. It is all but an attempt to bring the administration into disfavor. This alone is the reason why the removal of the deposits is so strongly censured! Sir, the gentleman is mistaken. He does not, at least I think he does not, rightly understand the signs of the times. The cause of the complaint is much deeper and stronger than any mere desire to produce political effect. The gentleman must be aware, that, notwithstanding the great vote by which the New York resolutions were carried, and the support given by other proceedings to the removal of the deposits, there are many as ardent friends of the president as are to be found anywhere, who exceedingly regret and deplore the measure. Sir, on this floor there has been going on for many weeks as interesting a debate as has been witnessed for twenty years; and yet I have not heard, among all who have supported the administration, a single senator say that he approved the removal of the depos its, or was glad it had taken place, until the gentleman from New York spoke. I saw the gentleman from Georgia approach that point; but he shunned direct contact. He complained much of the bank; he insisted, too, on the power of removal; but I did not hear him say he thought it a wise act. The gentleman from Virginia, not now in his seat, also de fended the power, and has arraigned the bank; but has he said that he approved the measure of removal? I have not met with twenty individuals, in or out of congress, who have ex pressed an approval of it, among the many hundreds whose

opinions I have heard-not twenty, who have maintained that it was a wise proceeding; but I have heard individuals of ample fortune, although they wholly disapproved the measure, declare, nevertheless, that, since it was adopted, they would sacrifice all they possessed rather than not support it. Such is the warmth of party zeal!" The object of this speech was to show the necessity of a national bank for the safe keeping of the public moneys; the necessity of restoring the deposits to the national bank; and the disasters which would follow a persistence in the course of opposition now set down as the established policy of the administration.

Mr. Tallmadge, of New York, replied to Mr. Webster, de nying, in the most emphatic manner, the constitutionality of the bank of the United States, but maintaining the right of the secretary of the treasury to use the state banks as the fiscal agent of the government; and Mr. Webster, at the opening of the session of the next day, spoke briefly in answer to both of the New York senators. He argued that the power to use a bank, granted by Mr. Tallmadge, implied the power to create one; that, if one act was constitutional, the other must be also; and that the constitutional power of congress was no longer a debatable question, as it had been debated and determined too frequently to need any farther argument: “I do not intend now, Mr. President,” he says, "to go into a regular and formal argument to prove the constitutional power of congress to establish a national bank. That question has been argued a hundred times, and always settled the same way. The whole history of the country, for almost forty years, proves that such a power has been believed to exist. All previous congresses, or nearly all, have admitted or sanctioned it; the judicial tribunals, federal and state, have sanctioned it. The supreme court of the United States has declared the constitutionality of the present bank, after the most solemn argument, without a dissenting voice on the bench. Every successiv

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president has, tacitly or expressly, admitted the power. The present president has done this; he has informed congress that he could furnish the plan of a bank, which should conform to the constitution. In objecting to the recharter of the present bank, he objected for particular reasons; and he has said that a bank of the United States would be useful and convenient for the people." Though disclaiming all intention of arguing the subject, it would not be easy, so far as authority goes, to construct a more perfect argument; and there are passages in this speech of such power of logic and force of expression as Mr. Webster himself seldom surpassed.

The great struggle, however, was not closed. On the 21st day of February, Mr. Forsyth, of Georgia, read to the senate a memorial from Maine, and accompanied the reading with a speech, in which he declared that the plan of the administration was, to return to an exclusive specie currency, first, by employing the state banks instead of the general bank, and secondly, by dispensing at last with the state banks themselves. Mr. Webster replied to Mr. Forsyth in a strain of invective, sarcasm, ridicule and argument, sound and irresistible argument, enough to overwhelm a much abler antagonist; but Mr. Forsyth stood up and attempted a reply. This again called out Mr. Webster. On Friday, March the 7th, in presenting a memorial from the building mechanics of the city and county of Philadelphia; on Tuesday, March 18th, on presenting another memorial from citizens of Boston; on Friday, March 28th, on offering another from citizens of Albany; and on Tuesday, April 25th, on reading a fourth from three thousand citizens of Ontario county, New York, he spoke briefly, in explanation of his own views and of the outraged feelings of the whole country. He spoke again on the 20th of May, on presenting to the senate a memorial from the citizens of Columbia, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, and again on the 3d of June, on the reading, by Mr. McKean, of the memorial of the Penn

sylvania state convention; but the longest and ablest of all his productions, at this time, on the subject of the currency, was his report from the committee on finance, of which he was chairman, read on the 5th of February of this year. It is a document worthy of the frequent perusal of every statesman; and we have no statesinan who would not enlighten himself by pondering deeply on the positions and arguments so carefully drawn up and forcibly expressed.

His next effort in relation to the currency, which, during the second term of General Jackson's administration, was the absorbing topic in the senate, and in the house, was his speech, delivered on the 18th of March, on the presentation of his own bill for continuing the charter of the United States bank for six years after the expiration of its existing charter; and this was followed, on the 7th of May, by a speech in reply to the president, who had sent to the senate, on the 15th of April, a violent and somewhat angry protest against the proceedings of the senate in reference to the removal of the deposits. This latter speech was regarded, at the time of its delivery, by the best judges, as the ablest that Mr. Webster had ever made since his reply to Hayne. "You never," said Chancellor Kent, in a letter of approbation to the orator,-"you never equaled this effort. It surpasses everything in logic, in simplicity, and beauty, and energy of diction, in clearness, in rebuke, in sarcasm, in patriotic and glowing feeling, in just and profound constitutional views, in critical severity, and matchless strength. It is worth millions to our liberties." And Governor Tazewell, in a letter to Mr. Tyler, employs equally emphatic language: "Tel! Webster from me," he says, "that I have read his speech in the National Intelligencer with more pleasure than any I have lately seen. If the approbation of one, who has not been used to coincide with him in opinion, can be grateful to him, he has mine in extenso. I agree with him perfectly, and thank him cordially for his many excellent illustrations of what I al

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ways thought. If it is published in a pamphlet form, beg him to send me one. I will have it bound in good Russia leather, and leave it as a special legacy to my children." The first raptures of admiration may have done injustice to other speeches of Mr. Webster; but it cannot be doubted that this is one of the master-pieces of that great statesman. As in his reply to Hayne, he was thoroughly roused. The interference of the president with the clear prerogatives of the senate was so glaring a breach of privilege, that it stirred his indignation to the bottom; and he spoke with an earnestness, a sincerity, a singleness and power of purpose, whose meaning could not be mistaken. Not only was the whole speech remarkably able, but there are passages in it, which even he never equaled. Guarding himself, near the beginning of his speech, against the objection, that there was no occasion for so much feeling, that it was only the assertion of a principle, not any overt act, on the part of the president, which had given occasion to the debate, he strikes out into one of his boldest strains of rhetoric, and closes with a figure, which, probably, has no superior in the English language: "The senate regarded this interposition," said the orator, "as an encroachment by the executive on other branches of the government; as an interference with the legis lative disposition of the public treasure. It was strongly and forcibly urged, yesterday, by the honorable member from South Carolina, that the true and only mode of preserving any balance of power, in mixed governments, is to keep an exact balance. This is very true; and to this end encroachment must be resisted at the first step. The question is, therefore, whether, upon the true principles of the constitution, this exercise of power by the president can be justified. Whether the consequences be prejudicial or not, if there be an illegal exercise of power, it is to be resisted in the proper manner. Even if no harm or inconvenience result from transgressing the boundary, the intrusion is not to be suffered to pass unnoticed.