oper articles, and having contributed the requisite capital
can invest such part of it, not less than a fixed minimum, in United-
States bonds, and having deposited these bonds with the proper
officer of the United States can receive United-States notes in
such denominations as may be desired, and employ them as money in
discounts and exchanges." As a further inducement, the secretary
said "the stockholders of any existing banks can in like manner
organize under the Act, and transfer, by such degrees as may be
found convenient, the capital of the old to the use of the new
associations. The notes thus put into circulation will be payable
until resumption in United-States notes, and after resumption in
specie, by the association which issues them, on demand, and if
not so paid will be redeemable at the Treasury of the United States
from the proceeds of the bonds pledged in security." The secretary
thought it would be "difficult to conceive of a note circulation
which will combine higher local and general credit than this.
After a few years no other circulation would be used, nor could
the issues of the national circulation be easily increased beyond
the legitimate demands of business. Every dollar of circulation
would represent real capital actually invested in national stocks,
and the total amount issued could at all times be easily and quickly
ascertained from the books of the Treasury."

SENATE DISCUSSES THE BANKING SYSTEM.

The bill to carry out these suggestions was introduced in the Senate
on the 26th of January, 1863, by Mr. Sherman, and was reported from
the Finance Committee on the 2d of February. On the 9th the Senate
took it up for consideration. Mr. Sherman advocated the proposed
system in an elaborate argument on several distinct grounds: "The
banks would furnish a market for United-States bonds; they would
absorb the circulation of the State banks gradually and without
harsh measures; they would create a community of interest between
the stockholders of the banks, the people, and the government,
where now there existed a great contrariety of opinion and a great
diversity of interests; adequate safeguards would be established
against counterfeiting; the currency proposed would be uniform and
would take the place of the notes of sixteen hundred banks, differing
in style, and so easily imitated and altered that while notes of
one-sixth of the existing banks had be