ormally declare such a
principle. They wisely enough avoid deciding on abstract questions. But
they may be induced to keep themselves within its limits.

I am sorry to see our loans begin at so exorbitant an interest. And yet,
even at that, you will soon be at the bottom of the loan-bag. We are an
agricultural nation. Such an one employs its sparings in the purchase or
improvement of land or stocks. The lendable money among them is chiefly
that of orphans and wards in the hands of executors and guardians, and
that which the farmer lays by till he has enough for the purchase in
view. In such a nation there is one and one only resource for loans,
sufficient to carry them through the expense of a war; and that will
always be sufficient, and in the power of an honest government, punctual
in the preservation of its faith. The fund I mean, is the mass of
circulating coin. Every one knows, that, although not literally, it is
nearly true, that every paper dollar emitted banishes a silver one from
the circulation. A nation, therefore, making its purchases and payments
with bills fitted for circulation, thrusts an equal sum of coin out
of circulation. This is equivalent to borrowing that sum, and yet the
vendor, receiving payment in a medium as effectual as coin for his
purchases or payments, has no claim to interest. And so the nation may
continue to issue its bills as far as its wants require, and the limits
of the circulation will admit. Those limits are understood to extend
with us, at present, to two hundred millions of dollars, a greater sum
than would be necessary for any war. But this, the only resource
which the government could command with certainty, the States have
unfortunately fooled away, nay corruptly alienated to swindlers and
shavers, under the cover of private banks. Say, too, as an additional
evil, that the disposable funds of individuals, to this great amount,
have thus been withdrawn from improvement and useful enterprise, and
employed in the useless, usurious, and demoralizing practices of bank
directors and their accomplices. In the war of 1755, our State availed
itself of this fund by issuing a paper money, bottomed on a specific tax
for its redemption, and, to insure its credit, bearing an interest of
five per cent. Within a very short time, not a bill of this emission was
to be found in circulation. It was locked up in the chests of executors,
guardians, widows, farmers, &tc. We then issued bills, bottom