The President thinks that these facts and
circumstances afford as strong a guaranty as can be had in human
affairs for the safety of the public funds and the practicability of
a new system of collection and disbursement through the agency of the
State banks.
From all these considerations the President thinks that the State banks
ought immediately to be employed in the collection and disbursement of
the public revenue, and the funds now in the Bank of the United States
drawn out with all convenient dispatch. The safety of the public moneys
if deposited in the State banks must be secured beyond all reasonable
doubts; but the extent and nature of the security, in addition to their
capital, if any be deemed necessary, is a subject of detail to which the
Treasury Department will undoubtedly give its anxious attention. The
banks to be employed must remit the moneys of the Government without
charge, as the Bank of the United States now does; must render all the
services which that bank now performs; must keep the Government advised
of their situation by periodical returns; in fine, in any arrangement
with the State banks the Government must not in any respect be placed on
a worse footing than it now is.
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