able condition of the country, we shall leave him, whilst awaiting better times, to trace out and illustrate, more fully, the three first of those causes; and assume to ourselves the task of considering in all of its many phases, the extraordinary executive measure, "the Removal of the Deposits," which has awakened the deepest feeling in the country, not only for the preservation of its commercial prosperity, but for the maintenance of those divisions of political power, those checks and balances, which have been established for the security of political liberty.

In considering this important subject, we design to treat it with all the candour which a profound veneration for historical truth should inspire. But we should be ashamed to pretend that we have not formed a decided opinion upon it; because, we hold such to be a profession of dishonourable and disgusting indifference to the sufferings and danger of the country.

The executive department of the general government has declared an interminable war against the Bank of the United States, which it does not more ardently pursue, than loudly and energetically avow. The motives of this extraordinary enmity against a fiscal agent, whose great utility and correct fulfilment of its duties have been almost universally acknowledged, are asserted to be of a disinterested and patriotic character. How untruly asserted, will be most obvious in the progress of our investigation. In pursuing our purpose we propose,

I. To trace the hostility of the President against the Bank, from its first demonstration to the removal of the deposits.

II. To examine the right of the President to direct and enforce the removal.

III. To consider the reasons of the Secretary of the Treasury assigned therefor, and to show the course of the two houses of Congress thereon.

IV. To inquire into the right claimed for the President to remove at his pleasure from office, all persons whom he is empowered to nominate;-a claim which has become a most important feature of this remarkable case.

I. It is said, General Jackson was ever among those who deny the constitutional right of Congress to charter a bank, under any form; and, that, from this cause, his hostility to the Bank of the United States originated. If this be true, it is among the extraordinary features of his administration, that such right has not been denied in any official document. Proper occasions for expressing such an opinion presented themselves in his several messages, and, especially, in his veto on the bank bill of 1832. Yet none were used; and we may justly infer, that no such sentiment existed, until a very late period; or that it was suppressed for cause. Let us examine how the execu

tive sense has been developed; since it is important, not only in determining the cause of executive operations against the bank, but has become essential for their defence.

In his message to Congress of December 1829, the President says:

"The charter of the Bank of the United States expires in 1836, and its stockholders will, most probably, apply for a renewal of their privileges. In order to avoid the evils resulting from precipitancy, in a measure involving such important principles, and such deep pecuniary interests, I feel, that I cannot, in justice to the parties interested, too soon present it to the deliberate consideration of the legislature and the people. Both the constitutionality and the expediency of the law, creating this Bank, are well questioned, by a large portion of our fellow-citizens; and it must be admitted, by all, that it has failed in the great end of establishing a uniform and sound currency."

In this, there is no committal upon the question of constitutionality; and in a subsequent passage, it is submitted "whether a National Bank, founded on the credit of the Government and its resources, might not be devised?”

In the message of 1830, speaking of the Bank, he observes:

"Nothing has occurred to lessen, in any degree, the danger which many of our citizens apprehend from that institution, as at present organized. In the spirit of improvement and compromise which distinguishes our country and its institutions, it becomes us to inquire, whether it be not possible, to secure the advantages afforded by the present Bank, through the agency of a Bank of the United States, so modified in its principles and structure, as to obviate constitutional and other objections."

The subject is very briefly treated in 1831, after the following manner:

"Entertaining the opinions heretofore expressed in relation to the Bank of the United States, as at present organized, I felt it my duty, in my former messages, frankly to disclose them."

The veto message of July 1832, declares:

"A Bank of the United States is, in many respects, convenient for the government and useful for the people. Entertaining this opinion, and deeply impressed with the belief, that some of the powers and privileges possessed by the existing Bank are unauthorized by the constitution, subversive of the rights of the States, and dangerous to the liberties of the people, I felt it my duty, at an early period of my administration, to call the attention of Congress to the practicability of organizing an institution, combining all its advantages and obviating these objections. I sincerely regret, that, in the act before me, I can perceive, none of those modifications of the Bank charter, which are necessary, in my opinion, to make it compatible with justice, with sound policy, or with the constitution of the country. "That a Bank of the United States, competent to all the duties which may be required by the government, might be so organized, as not to infringe on our own delegated powers or the reserved rights of the States, I do not entertain a doubt. Had the Executive been called upon to furnish the project of such an institution, the duty would have been cheerfully performed."

....

Even so late as July 1833, it is apparent, from the communications of Mr. Duane, that the President's hostility to the Bank was not founded on constitutional scruples; for, when the Secretary introduced, into the instructions of his agent, a declaration that the President was opposed to any national bank, he modified this, so as to announce opposition only to an institution, organized on the principles of the existing Bank.

We have nothing, therefore, official, to warrant the conclusion, that the President would not unite in chartering the Bank, with suitable modifications; nothing to show that determination so frequently and fiercely uttered since the removal of the deposits, "never to recharter the United States Bank, or sign a charter for any other bank." Accordingly, in the canvass which ensued the Veto, the partisans of the President used his reserve for the purpose for which it was designed; and boldly asserted, wherever such assertion would be serviceable, that he was not opposed to the Bank with proper amendments, and that his objections would be removed, and the Bank sustained, in the event of his re-election.

Constitutional principles, then, have not caused the President to resist the wishes of the people for the continuance of an institution, which, next to the enjoyment of civil and religious liberty, has contributed most to their welfare. We have seen him, upon questions of mere expediency, array himself against the councils of the nation, and exercise the most exceptionable power of the constitution, the veto, as if it were a hereditary right, from a regal ancestor. We have seen him, the chief executive officer, whose voice in legislation should, on sound political principles, be heard, only, in extreme cases, and when the power delegated to the Executive by the constitution is asassailed-we have seen him pervert that power to defeat the wishes of the people, distinctly expressed through their immediate representatives. Is there an intelligible motive which can be assigned for this extraordinary conduct? We think there is, and shall endeavour to explain it.

The country passed through the first cycle of its existence. by a conservative impulse which has now ceased to operate. The parties which grew out of the revolution, and the events succeeding it, were formed upon certain political principles, which, like religious dogmas, became subjects of supreme veneration. The leaders were estimated only as they were faithful and zealous apostles of these principles. For the high offices of the nation, the revolution had supplied candidates, who, already rich in fame, would not risk that wealth in experiment. They had no inducement to assume forbidden powers for the gratification of themselves or their partisans. The men and the parties of our early national history have passed from

the scene. Party principles growing from the revolution and its consequences have been amalgamated by the success of our political system; and have been succeeded by a new spring of political action, more exclusively selfish. Jacksonism is neither federalism nor democracy. It has, indeed, relation to political principles of no kind; being a system of peculiar and unmixed selfishness-the leaders of the party grasping, by any means, every species of power, and their dependants yielding, for reward, the most abject service.

There is in military fame an attraction which has ever proven irresistible with the mass of mankind, from fear, from gratitude, from sympathy with energetic power, or from a combination of all these causes. It is an indispensable, a necessary evil of the social system, requiring perpetual vigilance to repress it. It is the besetting danger of republics; the open or insidious, but ever active, enemy of political and civil liberty. The military chieftain, when able and ambitious, is ever ready to use. its influence for forbidden ends; and if he want talent or disposition for self-aggrandizement, he becomes the instrument of others.

In General Jackson, there is no want of ambition, whatever there may be of ability. That he is the tool of others, every passing day brings new and indubitable evidence; and thus, the nation is subjected to the action of two powerful causes of evil.

The nomination of General Jackson for the presidency may have been prompted by grateful recollection of his services. But his election is ascribable to other causes-to the combination of aspiring politicians, who made his elevation the means of their own. Qualification for the office was wholly unconsidered. The honours and emoluments of office, had from the election of Mr. Jefferson flowed in a steady unperturbed stream, in a channel which excluded a large portion of the enterprising and ambitious spirits, even of the reigning party, and the whole of the remnant and progeny of federalism, as effectually, as if they were legitimately proscribed. To participate in office, it was requisite to overthrow the reigning dynasty, to break the line of succession. To this end, a combination was formed between all the Outs and such of the Ins as feared to lose, or hoped to gain, by the change. General Jackson became the leader of the combined forces, whose banner, with the broad legend of "BOOTY," was flung to the breeze, and whose war cry, the "Spoils of Victory," was shouted, not only in our cities, but in the remotest and almost uninhabited forest glens. The battle was won; and the principles on which it was fought were proclaimed by the President, in his first annual message, announcing "rotation in office" as a cardinal rule of his administra

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tion. This put, at once, every official incumbent and every official aspirant, in manacles at his feet.

Every political society is divisible into two great classes, the speculative and the practical,-that which indicates the way, and that which provides the means, of progression. The first, like the superincumbent wave of the ocean, forming an inconsiderable portion of the mass of moving waters, is ever visible, and is swollen and stirred into foam and spray by every gale that blows. The second, like the great depths of the sea, is moved only by powerful causes, but when urged by the hurricane or earthquake, is irresistible. The first class, in the calms of state, usurps the functions of the whole body politic, and rules the nation. It is the proper province of party, and is that for which, on ordinary occasions, political gamesters play. The second comes into voluntary action, only, when the deepest interests of social life are at stake; and then, the first is made the servant of its will. It is the first class in which Jacksonism is triumphant. The force of the second is about to be felt.

The immense power lodged in the executive of the United States was almost unknown. It had been used for the public interest only; and its capacity for evil, for party rule, was not dreaded. It remained for General Jackson to reveal its dangers, and, happily, to awaken the intelligence of the country against them. Hitherto, the fifty thousand executive appointees were deemed by themselves and the public, to be the servants of the people; but they are now claimed, and, in truth, are the servants of the President; responsible to him, in thought and deed, and removable, not for malversation in office, only, but, also, because they may not fulfil the duties imposed by party discipline. We have, thus, attained the worst stage of party feuds, in which every thing is dependant on the will of party leaders. The personal parties of Marius and Sylla, of Cæsar and Pompey, are rising among us. Office and political distinction are attainable, only, by subservience, from which conscious integrity shrinks; and the incumbent can preserve his place, only, whilst oblivious *of the public weal. The worst evils which flowed from the corruption of the ancient republics of Greece and Rome would soon follow, were it not, that the mass of the people, which seeks in government, only, the general happiness, is in action to secure it.

It is to maintain a party system such as we have described, that the President, already endowed with the armed power of the nation, has sought, and is seeking, the unrestrained control of the public treasure. For this purpose, the prostitution of the Bank of the United States to the unhallowed desires of party, was solicited, and from this cause has its resistance been followed