A Biography of Henry Clay, the Senator from Kentucky / Containing Also, a Complete Report of All His Speeches; Selections From His Private Correspondence; Eulogies in the Senate and House; and a Poem, by George D. Prentice, Esq.

by Unknown

Thus stood the treasury from 1789 to 1816. During that long time no president had ever attempted to interfere with the custody of the public purse. It remained where the law placed it, undisturbed, and every chief magistrate, including the father of his country, respected the law.

In 1816 an act passed to establish the late bank of the United States for the term of twenty years; and, by the sixteenth section of the act, it is enacted,

‘That the deposits of the money of the United States in places in which the said bank and the branches thereof may be established, shall be made in said bank or branches thereof, unless the secretary of the treasury shall at any time otherwise order and direct; in which case the secretary of the treasury shall immediately lay before congress, if in session, and if not, immediately after the commencement of the next session, the reasons of such order or direction.’

Thus it is perfectly manifest, from the express words of the law, that the power to make any order or direction for the removal of the public deposits, is confided to the secretary alone, to the absolute exclusion of the president, and all the world besides. And the law, proceeding upon the established principle, that the secretary of the treasury, in all that concerns the public purse, acts as the direct agent of congress, requires, in the event of his ordering or directing a removal of the deposits, that he shall immediately lay his reasons therefor before whom? the president? No: before congress.

So stood the public treasury and the public deposits from the year 1816 to September, 1833. In all that period of seventeen years, running through or into four several administrations of the government, the law had its uninterrupted operation, no chief magistrate having assumed upon himself the power of diverting the public purse from its lawful custody, or of substituting his will to that of the officer to whose care it was exclusively intrusted.

In the session of congress of 1832–3, an inquiry had been instituted by the house of representatives into the condition of the bank of the United States. It resulted in a conviction of its entire safety, and a declaration by the house, made only a short time before the adjournment of congress on the fourth of March, 1833, that the public deposits were perfectly secure. This declarationwas probably made in consequence of suspicions then afloat of a design on the part of the executive to remove the deposits. These suspicions were denied by the press friendly to the administration. Nevertheless, the members had scarcely reached their respective homes, before measures were commenced by the executive to effect a removal of the deposits from that very place of safety which it was among the last acts of the house to declare existed in the bank of the United States.

In prosecution of this design, Mr. McLane, the secretary of the treasury, who was decidedly opposed to such a measure, was promoted to the department of state, and Mr. Duane was appointed to succeed him. But Mr. Duane was equally convinced with his predecessor, that he was forbidden by every consideration of duty to execute the power with which the law had intrusted the secretary of the treasury, and refused to remove the deposits; whereupon he was dismissed from office, a new secretary of the treasury was appointed, and, in September, 1833, by the command of the president, the measure was finally accomplished. That it was the president’s act was never denied, but proclaimed, boasted, defended. It fell upon the country like a thunderbolt, agitating the union from one extremity to the other. The stoutest adherents of the administration were alarmed; and all thinking men, not blinded by party prejudice, beheld in the act a bold and dangerous exercise of power; and no human sagacity can now foresee the tremendous consequences which will ensue. The measure was adopted not long before the approaching session of congress; and, as the concurrence of both branches might be necessary to compel a restoration of the deposits, the object was to take the chance of a possible division between them, and thereby defeat the restoration.

And where did the president find the power for this most extraordinary act? It has been seen that the constitution, jealous of all executive interference with the treasury of the nation, had confined it to the exclusive care of congress by every precautionary guard, from the first imposition of the taxes to the final disbursement of the public money.

It has been seen that the language of the sixteenth section of the law of 1816 is express and free from all ambiguity; and that the secretary of the treasury is the sole, exclusive depository of the authority which it confers.

Those who maintain the power of the president, have to support it against the positive language of the constitution, against the explicit words of the statute, and against the genius and theory of all our institutions.