withdrawn and transferred once more, and this time it was said that, if these "deposits" were such an advantage, the states ought to have it, and could then, as well as the banks, be called on to give back the money whenever it might be needed. The deposit took place in 1837, in three installments, January, April, and July, and amounted to twenty-eight millions. The fourth installment was never paid. The money was all squandered or worse.
The charter of the Bank of the United States was to expire on the 3d of March, 1836. One year before that time the directors ordered the "exchange committee" to loan the capital, as fast as it should be released, on stocks, so as to prepare for winding up. From this resolution dates the subsequent history of the Bank, for the exchange committee consisted of the President and two directors selected by him, to whose hands the whole business of the Bank was hereby entrusted. The branches were sold and the capital gradually released throughout 1835, but in February, 1836, an act was suddenly passed by the Pennsylvania legislature to charter the United States Bank of Pennsylvania, continuing the old Bank. The act was said to have been obtained by bribery, but investigation failed to prove it. The most open bribery was on the face of it, for it provided for several pet local schemes of public improvement, for a bonus and loans to the state by the Bank, and for abolishing taxes — provisions which secured the necessary support to carry it.
During the year 1836 the money market was very stringent. The enterprises, speculations, and internal improvements demanded continual new supplies of capital. The amount of securities exported grew greater and greater and kept the foreign exchanges depressed. American importing houses contracted larger and longer debts to foreign agents. The money market in England became very stringent likewise, and these long credits became
