The first section requires the Secretary of the Treasury to take
measures for collecting the public revenue, first, in the legal currency
of the United States (i.e., gold and silver), or, second, in the notes
of such specie-paying banks as shall from time to time conform to
certain conditions in regard to small bills, described in the section.
This section does not expressly give the Secretary power to direct that
any particular notes _shall_ be received for lands or for duties, but it
_forbids_ the receipt of any paper currency other than such bank notes
as are described in the section; and it requires the Secretary to adopt
measures, in his discretion, to effectuate that prohibition.
The second section extends the prohibition still further, by forbidding
the receipt of any notes which the banks in which they are to be
deposited shall not, under the supervision and control of the Secretary
of the Treasury, agree to pass to the credit of the United States as
_cash_; to which is added a proviso authorizing the Secretary to
withdraw the public deposits from any bank which shall refuse to receive
as cash from the United States any notes receivable under the law which
such bank receives in the ordinary course of business on general
deposit.
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