ens stockholders in this bank an interest
and title, as members of the corporation, to all the real property it
may acquire within any of the States of this Union. This privilege
granted to aliens is not "_necessary_" to enable the bank to perform its
public duties, nor in any sense "_proper_" because it is vitally
subversive of the rights of the States.

The Government of the United States have no constitutional power to
purchase lands within the States except "for the erection of forts,
magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings," and even
for these objects only "by the consent of the legislature of the State
in which the same shall be." By making themselves stockholders in the
bank and granting to the corporation the power to purchase lands for
other purposes they assume a power not granted in the Constitution and
grant to others what they do not themselves possess. It is not
_necessary_ to the receiving, safe-keeping, or transmission of the funds
of the Government that the bank should possess this power, and it is not
_proper_ that Congress should thus enlarge the powers delegated to them
in the Constitution.

The old Bank of the United States possessed a capital of only
$11,000,000, which was found fully sufficient to enable it with dispatch
and safety to perform all the functions required of it by the
Government. The capital of the present bank is $35,000,000--at least
twenty-four more than experience has proved to be _necessary_ to enable
a bank to perform its public functions. The public debt which existed
during the period of the old bank and on the establishment of the new
has been nearly paid off, and our revenue will soon be reduced. This
increase of capital is therefore not for public but for private
purposes.

The Government is the only "_proper_" judge where its agents should
reside and keep their offices, because it best knows where their
presence will be "_necessary_." It can not, therefore, be "_necessary_"
or "_proper_" to authorize the bank to locate branches where it pleases
to perform the public service, without consulting the Government, and
contrary to its will. The principle laid down by the Supreme Court
concedes that Congress can not establish a bank for purposes of private
speculation and gain, but only as a means of executing the delegated
powers of the General Government. By the same principle a branch bank
can not constitutionally be established for other than public pu