At once the Secretary of the Treasury did what he could to relieve the money market, by prepaying bonds which had been called in the process of the payment of the public debt; but the principal relief given to the market at that time was the action of the Clearing House Association of New York, by the issue of over $24,000,000 of clearing house certificates. This was purely a defensive operation adopted by the associated banks of New York, fifteen of which are state institutions and the balance national banks.
All that was done in New York to prevent a panic was done by the banks themselves. The government of the United States had no lot or parcel in it except so far as the Secretary of the Treasury prepaid bonds that had already been called, a transaction which has been done a hundred times. So far as the government was concerned it had nothing to do with these banks; the measures of relief were furnished by the banks themselves.
This condition of financial affairs led to a long debate in the Senate, commencing on the 17th of June, on the merits and demerits of the system of national banks, and especially of the clearing house of the city of New York. The comptroller of the currency had taken active and efficient measures to protect the interests of the United States. He was called before the committee on finance and gave a full statement of these measures. It was apparent that the temporary panic grew out of the reckless and criminal conduct of a few men and not from defects in the national bank system or the clearing house. The debate that followed, in the Senate, was mainly between Morgan, Beck and myself. I stated fully the methods of conducting the business of the clearing house, a corporation of the State of New York, and closed as follows:
"As the prosecution against John C. Eno is now pending in Canada, a foreign country, as a matter of course no one can state what will be the result of it. We only know that proper legal proceedings are now being urged to have an extradition, and if he is brought within the jurisdiction of the courts as a matter of course the prosecution can then be pushed. So with James D. Fish. Indictments have been had and are now pending against him for a violation, not only of the national banking act, but I believe also for a violation of the state law; and the same is to be said of Ferdinand Ward. These three persons are the only ones who have been charged with fraudulent and illegal transactions leading to these financial disasters. The Metropolitan bank, thanks to the agency and the aid that was given in a trying time, in now going on and doing business as of old, no doubt having met with large losses.
"It is a matter of satisfaction that with the single exception of the Marine Bank, of New York, no national bank has been overwhelmed by this disaster. It is true that the Second National Bank was bankrupted by the crimes and wrongs of John C. Eno, but his father, with a sensitive pride not to allow innocent persons to suffer from the misconduct of his son, with a spirit really worthy of commendation, here or anywhere else, threw a large sum of money into the maelstrom and saved not only the credit of the bank and advanced his own credit, but to some extent, as far as he could at least, expiated the fault, the folly, and the crime of his son. The Metropolitan Bank is relieved from its embarrassments by its associate banks. The losses caused by the speculations of its president did not entirely fall upon the bank. That bank, now relived from the pressure of unexpected demands, is pursuing its even tenor. It seems to me that all these facts taken together show the strength and confidence that may well be reposed in the national banking system. The law cannot entirely prevent fraud and crime, but it has guarded the public from the results of such offense far better than any previous system."
On the 10th of May, 1884, which happened to be my birthday, the statue of John Marshall, formerly Chief Justice of the United States, was dedicated. This is a bronze statue in a sitting posture, erected by the bar of Philadelphia and the Congress of the United States. A fund had been collected shortly after the death of Marshall, but it was insufficient to erect a suitable monument, and it was placed in the hands of trustees and invested as "The Marshall Memorial Fund." On the death of the last of the trustees, Peter McCall, it was found that the fund had, by honest stewardship, increased sevenfold its original amount. This sum, with an equal amount appropriated by Congress, was applied to the erection of a statue to the memory of Chief Justice Marshall, to be placed in a suitable reservation in the city of Washington. The artist who executed this work was W. W. Story, a son of the late Justice Story of the Supreme Court. I was chairman of the joint committee on the library and presided on the occasion. Chief Justice Waite delivered an appropriate address. He was followed by William Henry Rawle, of Philadelphia, in an eloquent oration, closing as follows:
"And for what in his life he did for us, let there be lasting memory. He and the men of his time have passed away; other generations have succeeded them; other phases of our country's growth have come and gone; other trials, greater a hundredfold than he or they could possibly have imagined, have jeoparded the nation's life; but still that which they wrought remains to us, secured by the same means, enforced by the same authority, dearer far for all that is past, and holding together a great, a united and happy people. And all largely because he whose figure is now before us has, above and beyond all others, taught the people of the United States, in words of absolute authority, what was the constitution which they ordained, 'in order to form a perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their posterity.'
"Wherefore, with all gratitude, with fitting ceremony and circumstance; in the presence of the highest in the land; in the presence of those who make, of those who execute, and of those who interpret, the laws; in the presence of those descendants in whose veins flows Marshall's blood, have the bar and the Congress of the United States here set up this semblance of his living form, in perpetual memory of the honor, the reverence and the love which the people of this country bear to the great chief justice."
During this session Mr. Ingalls offered to a House bill granting a pension to soldiers and sailors of the Mexican War, the following amendment:
"That all pensions which have been or which may hereafter be granted in consequence of death occurring from a cause which originated in the service since the 4th day of March, 1861, or in consequence of wounds or injuries received or disease contracted since that date in the service and in the line of duty, shall commence from the death or discharge of the person on whose account the claim has been or is hereafter granted, if the disability occurred prior to discharge, and if such disability occurred after the discharge, then from the date of actual disability, or from the termination of the right of the party having prior title to such pension."