Yet from the first he was liberal and sometimes magnificent in the management of his bank.  He would discount none but good paper, but it was his policy to grant accommodations to small traders, and thus encourage beginners, usually giving the preference to small notes, by this system doing very much to avert the evils that would of necessity have sprung from the suspension of the old Bank of the United States.  The Government credit was almost destroyed, and money was needed to carry on the war.  He made repeated advances to the treasury, unsolicited by the authorities, and on more than one occasion kept the Government supplied with the sinews of war.  In 1814, when our prospects, both military and financial, were at their lowest ebb, when the British forces had burned Washington and the New England States were threatening to withdraw from the Union, the Government asked for a loan of five millions of dollars, with the most liberal inducements to subscribers.  Only twenty thousand dollars could be obtained, and the project seemed doomed to failure, when it was announced that Stephen Girard had subscribed for the whole amount.  This announcement at once restored the public confidence, and Mr. Girard was beset with requests from persons anxious to take a part of the loan, even at an advanced rate.  They were allowed to do so upon the original terms.  When the Government could not, for want of funds, pay the interest on its debt to him, he wrote to the Secretary of the Treasury: 

“I am of opinion that those who have any claim for interest on public stock, etc., should patiently wait for a more favorable moment, or at least receive in payment treasury notes.  Should you be under the necessity of resorting to either of these plans, as one of the public creditors, I shall not murmur.”

“A circumstance soon occurred, however, which was a source of no little discomfiture to the financial arrangements of his individual institution.  This fact was the suspension of specie payments by the State banks, resulting from the non-intercourse act, the suspension of the old bank, and the combined causes tending to produce a derangement of the currency of the country.  It was then a matter of great doubt with him how he should preserve the integrity of his own institution, while the other banks were suspending their payments; but the credit of his own bank was effectually secured by the suggestion of his cashier, Mr. Simpson, who advised the recalling of his own notes by redeeming them with specie, and by paying out the notes of the State banks.  In this mode not a single note of his own was suffered to be depreciated, and he was thus enabled, in 1817, to contribute effectually to the restoration of specie payments.”

He was instrumental in securing the establishment of the new Bank of the United States, and was its largest stockholder and one of its directors.  He even offered to unite his own institution with it upon certain liberal conditions, which were refused.  Yet he was always a firm friend to it.