The original act of incorporation, section 21, enacts “that no other bank shall be established by any future law of the United States during the continuance of the corporation hereby created, for which the faith of the United States is hereby pledged:  Provided, Congress may renew existing charters for banks within the District of Columbia not increasing the capital thereof, and may also establish any other bank or banks in said District with capitals not exceeding in the whole $6,000,000 if they shall deem it expedient.”  This provision is continued in force by the act before me fifteen years from the 3d of March, 1836.

If Congress possessed the power to establish one bank, they had power to establish more than one if in their opinion two or more banks had been “necessary” to facilitate the execution of the powers delegated to them in the Constitution.  If they possessed the power to establish a second bank, it was a power derived from the Constitution to be exercised from time to time, and at any time when the interests of the country or the emergencies of the Government might make it expedient.  It was possessed by one Congress as well as another, and by all Congresses alike, and alike at every session.  But the Congress of 1816 have taken it away from their successors for twenty years, and the Congress of 1832 proposes to abolish it for fifteen years more.  It can not be “necessary” or “proper” for Congress to barter away or divest themselves of any of the powers vested in them by the Constitution to be exercised for the public good.  It is not “necessary” to the efficiency of the bank, nor is it “proper” in relation to themselves and their successors.  They may properly use the discretion vested in them, but they may not limit the discretion of their successors.  This restriction on themselves and grant of a monopoly to the bank is therefore unconstitutional.

In another point of view this provision is a palpable attempt to amend the Constitution by an act of legislation.  The Constitution declares that “the Congress shall have power to exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever” over the District of Columbia.  Its constitutional power, therefore, to establish banks in the District of Columbia and increase their capital at will is unlimited and uncontrollable by any other power than that which gave authority to the Constitution.  Yet this act declares that Congress shall not increase the capital of existing banks, nor create other banks with capitals exceeding in the whole $6,000,000.  The Constitution declares that Congress shall have power to exercise exclusive legislation over this District “in all cases whatsoever,” and this act declares they shall not.  Which is the supreme law of the land?  This provision can not be “necessary” or “proper” or constitutional unless the absurdity be admitted that whenever it be “necessary and proper” in the opinion of Congress they have a right to barter away one portion of the powers vested in them by the Constitution as a means of executing the rest.