The intensity of this pressure on the
community is in proportion to the previous liberality of credit and
consequent expansion of the currency. Forced sales of property are made
at the time when the means of purchasing are most reduced, and the worst
calamities to individuals are only at last arrested by an open violation
of their obligations by the banks--a refusal to pay specie for their
notes and an imposition upon the community of a fluctuating and
depreciated currency.
These consequences are inherent in the present system. They are not
influenced by the banks being large or small, created by National
or State Governments. They are the results of the irresistible laws
of trade or credit. In the recent events, which have so strikingly
illustrated the certain effects of these laws, we have seen the bank
of the largest capital in the Union, established under a national
charter, and lately strengthened, as we were authoritatively informed,
by exchanging that for a State charter with new and unusual
privileges--in a condition, too, as it was said, of entire soundness
and great prosperity--not merely unable to resist these effects, but
the first to yield to them.
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