weal.

The capital invested in banks of discount in the United States, created
by the States, at this time exceeds $350,000,000, and if the discounting
of local paper could have produced any beneficial effects the United
States ought to possess the soundest currency in the world; but the
reverse is lamentably the fact.

Is the measure now under consideration of the objectionable character
to which I have alluded? It is clearly so unless by the sixteenth
fundamental article of the eleventh section it is made otherwise. That
article is in the following words:

The directors of the said corporation shall establish one competent
office of discount and deposit in any State in which two thousand shares
shall have been subscribed or may be held, whenever, upon application of
the legislature of such State, Congress may by law require the same. And
the said directors may also establish one or more competent offices of
discount and deposit in any Territory or District of the United States,
and in any State with the assent of such State, and when established the
said office or offices shall be only withdrawn or removed by the said
directors prior to the expiration of this charter with the previous
assent of Congress: _Provided_, In respect to any State which shall not,
at the first session of the legislature thereof held after the passage
of this act, by resolution or other usual legislative proceeding,
unconditionally assent or dissent to the establishment of such office
or offices within it, such assent of the said State shall be thereafter
presumed: _And provided, nevertheless_, That whenever it shall become
necessary and proper for carrying into execution any of the powers
granted by the Constitution to establish an office or offices in any of