and for distributing the same in payment of the public creditors without charging commission or claiming allowance on account of the difference of exchange,” as required by the act of incorporation, but for something more beneficial to the stockholders.  The original act declares that it (the bonus) is granted “in consideration of the exclusive privileges and benefits conferred by this act upon the said bank,” and the act before me declares it to be “in consideration of the exclusive benefits and privileges continued by this act to the said corporation for fifteen years, as aforesaid.”  It is therefore for “exclusive privileges and benefits” conferred for their own use and emolument, and not for the advantage of the Government, that a bonus is exacted.  These surplus powers for which the bank is required to pay can not surely be “necessary” to make it the fiscal agent of the Treasury.  If they were, the exaction of a bonus for them would not be “proper.”

It is maintained by some that the bank is a means of executing the constitutional power “to coin money and regulate the value thereof.”  Congress have established a mint to coin money and passed laws to regulate the value thereof.  The money so coined, with its value so regulated, and such foreign coins as Congress may adopt are the only currency known to the Constitution.  But if they have other power to regulate the currency, it was conferred to be exercised by themselves, and not to be transferred to a corporation.  If the bank be established for that purpose, with a charter unalterable without its consent, Congress have parted with their power for a term of years, during which the Constitution is a dead letter.  It is neither necessary nor proper to transfer its legislative power to such a bank, and therefore unconstitutional.

By its silence, considered in connection with the decision of the Supreme Court in the case of McCulloch against the State of Maryland, this act takes from the States the power to tax a portion of the banking business carried on within their limits, in subversion of one of the strongest barriers which secured them against Federal encroachments.  Banking, like farming, manufacturing, or any other occupation or profession, is a business, the right to follow which is not originally derived from the laws.  Every citizen and every company of citizens in all of our States possessed the right until the State legislatures deemed it good policy to prohibit private banking by law.  If the prohibitory State laws were now repealed, every citizen would again possess the right.  The State banks are a qualified restoration of the right which has been taken away by the laws against banking, guarded by such provisions and limitations as in the opinion of the State legislatures the public interest requires.  These corporations, unless there be an exemption in their charter, are, like private bankers and banking companies, subject to State taxation.  The manner in which these taxes shall be laid depends wholly on legislative discretion.  It may be upon the bank, upon the stock, upon the profits, or in any other mode which the sovereign power shall will.