department of industry with great and ruinous embarrassment.
The greatest vigilance becomes necessary on the part of Government to
guard against this state of things. The depositories must be given
distinctly to understand that the favors of the Government will be
altogether withdrawn, or substantially diminished, if its revenues shall
be regarded as additions to their banking capital or as the foundation
of an enlarged circulation.

The Government, through its revenue, has at all times an important part
to perform in connection with the currency, and it greatly depends upon
its vigilance and care whether the country be involved in embarrassments
similar to those which it has had recently to encounter, or, aided by
the action of the Treasury, shall be preserved in a sound and healthy
condition.

The dangers to be guarded against are greatly augmented by too large a
surplus of revenue. When that surplus greatly exceeds in amount what
shall be required by a wise and prudent forecast to meet unforeseen
contingencies, the Legislature itself may come to be seized with a
disposition to indulge in extravagant appropriations to objects many
of which may, and most probably would, be found to conflict with the
Constitution. A fancied expediency is elevated above constitutional
authority, and a reckless and wasteful extravagance but too certainly
follows.

The important power of taxation, which when exercised in its most
restricted form is a burthen on labor and production, is resorted to
under various pretexts for purposes having no affinity to the motives
which dictated its grant, and the extravagance of Government stimulates
individual extravagance until the spirit of a wild and ill-regulated
speculation involves one and all in its unfortunate results. In view of
such fatal consequences, it may be laid down as an axiom founded in
moral and political truth that no greater taxes should be imposed than
are necessary for an economical administration of the Government, and
that whatever exists beyond should be reduced or modified. This doctrine
does in no way conflict with the exercise of a sound discrimination in
the selection of the articles to be taxed, which a due regard to the
public weal would at all times suggest to the legislative mind. It
leaves the range of selection undefined; and such selection should
always be made with an eye to the great interests of the country.
Composed as is the Union of separate and independen