The necessary means of information were therefore
provided in the charter, and five officers of the Government, appointed
in the usual manner, responsible to the public and not to the
stockholders, were placed as sentinels at the board, and are bound by
the nature and character of their office to resist, and if unsuccessful
to report to the proper authority, every infraction of the charter and
every abuse of power, in order that due measures should be taken to
punish or correct it; and in like manner it is their duty to give, when
called upon, any explanation of their own official conduct touching the
management of the institution.
It was perhaps scarcely necessary to present to the Senate these views
of the power of the Executive and of the duties of the five directors
appointed by the United States. But the bank is believed to be now
striving to obtain for itself the government of the country, and is
seeking by new and strained constructions to wrest from the hands of the
constituted authorities the salutary control reserved by the charter;
and as misrepresentation is one of its most usual weapons of attack,
I have deemed it my duty to put before the Senate in a manner not to be
misunderstood the principles on which I have acted.
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