time nor inclination to argue with the gentleman on the veto power as an
original question; but I wish to show that General Taylor, and not he,
agrees with the earlier statesmen on this question. When the bill
chartering the first Bank of the United States passed Congress, its
constitutionality was questioned. Mr. Madison, then in the House of
Representatives, as well as others, had opposed it on that ground.
General Washington, as President, was called on to approve or reject it.
He sought and obtained on the constitutionality question the separate
written opinions of Jefferson, Hamilton, and Edmund Randolph,--they then
being respectively Secretary of State, Secretary of the Treasury, and
Attorney general. Hamilton's opinion was for the power; while Randolph's
and Jefferson's were both against it. Mr. Jefferson, after giving his
opinion deciding only against the constitutionality of the bill, closes
his letter with the paragraph which I now read:

"It must be admitted, however, that unless the President's mind, on a
view of everything which is urged for and against this bill, is tolerably
clear that it is unauthorized by the Constitution,--if the pro and con
hang so even as to balance his judgment, a just respect for the wisdom of
the legislature would naturally decide the balance in favor of their
opinion. It is chiefly for cases where they are clearly misled by error,
ambition, or interest, that the Constitution has placed a check in the
negative of the President.

"THOMAS JEFFERSON.

"February 15, 1791."


General Taylor's opinion, as expressed in his Allison letter, is as I now