The Senator from Vermont [Mr. Collamer] complained that it was proposed to sequester so large an amount of property from State taxation. The sum-total of property thus sequestered is $300,000,000[330]; but has the Senator considered how much is sequestered by other agencies to save this Republic? There is the army with all the material of war, there is the navy with all the material of the navy,—all sequestered. Who complains that this vast material, now counted far beyond $300,000,000, is sequestered from State taxation? Does any Senator, in the name of State Rights, claim that the enlarged navy of the Republic, as it floats into a Northern port, shall be brought within the sphere of local taxation, whether State or municipal? Does any Senator say that all the vast material of war, ammunition, cannon, and the like, deposited, for the time being, in any particular locality, shall fall within the sphere of State or municipal taxation? Or does any Senator insist that the public securities shall be left exposed to State taxation? No Senator makes any such complaint. But the complaint is reserved for the present occasion, when it is proposed to create a new agency for the currency of the country.
I know not how the exemption can be sanctioned in one case and not in the other. The reason applicable to one is applicable to the other. It is said that the army and navy are for war, and naturally share exemptions incident to war and its preparations. But it would be difficult to say, that, in this crisis, what you do for the finances is not essentially a war measure, entitled to all the consideration accorded to such measures in a moment of war. What are your army and navy without a Treasury? Milton, in one of his sublimest sonnets, has aptly pictured that statesmanship which was able
“to advise how War may, best upheld,
Move by her two main nerves, iron and gold,
In all her equipage.”[331]
In these few words the very likeness is given. All who hear them will confess their truth.
Now, Sir, no Senator complains because we protect the nerve of iron; but the Senator from Vermont registers complaints because it is proposed to protect the much more delicate nerve of gold. What is worth doing is worth well doing; and if it be worth while to organize the finances of this Republic by the proposed banking system, it is worth while to do it well; and can you do it well, if, at the very moment of its organization, you leave its most sensitive part exposed to hostile influence?
The precedent for this exemption is complete. Already you exempt the public stocks and securities from local taxation. Pray, Sir, tell me what policy justifies such exemption which is not equally strong for the exemption of shares in the national banks. Clearly, it was to commend your national stocks that you established the exemption; and for the same reason I ask you now to establish this other exemption. It is strange that the vast sequestration of the national stocks from State taxation should have been made with so little doubt, when Senators question so pertinaciously this smaller sequestration. If it was proper in one case, it is in the other. If it was necessary in one case, it is in the other.
If you allow the State to interfere with the proposed system by taxation in any way, may they not embarrass it? Where shall they stop? Where will you run a line? Undoubtedly, according to the Supreme Court, they cannot tax the bank directly. This would be unconstitutional. But it is said that they may tax the shares. Now I raise no constitutional question. It may be that a tax on shares is constitutional. But I shall not consider it on this ground. I am now arguing against the policy of such tax. It is a question of expediency which I raise, for the sake of the system we are about to establish. But here the rule seems clear. Every consideration urged against taxing the bank directly may be urged against taxing the shares. If it be bad policy in one case, it must be in the other.