officers, do its fiscal business, consisting in “the collection, safe-keeping, transfer, and disbursement of the public money.” He further recommended the enactment of a bankrupt law applicable to “corporations and other bankers.” He declared his determination not to withdraw the specie circular. Nothing but the constitutional currency, gold and silver, or “its equivalent,” — notes convertible into specie on demand, — should be taken in payment by the government. He also urged that the distribution of the fourth surplus installment, due on October 1, should be withheld, as there was no available “surplus;” and that the prospective deficit in the Treasury be covered by the temporary issue of treasury notes.
Further measures of “relief” he did not propose, giving as a reason that it was not the office of the government under the Constitution to help people out of their business embarrassments. Neither did he think that the government had anything to do with the “management of domestic and foreign exchange.” In his opinion, all the government could do was to furnish to the people a good “constitutional currency,” to collect its taxes in good money, and to defray its expenses and pay its creditors in good money. In this respect he did not go far enough to “follow the footsteps of President Jackson,” who had made most of his experiments of financial policy, professedly at least, with a view to improving the domestic exchanges. Van Buren recognized no duty of the government
