



Produced by James Linden.  HTML version by Al Haines.








State of the Union Addresses of James Buchanan



The addresses are separated by three asterisks: ***

Dates of addresses by James Buchanan in this eBook:

  December 8, 1857
  December 6, 1858
  December 19, 1859
  December 3, 1860



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State of the Union Address
James Buchanan
December 8, 1857

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives:

In obedience to the command of the Constitution, it has now become my duty
"to give to Congress information of the state of the Union and recommend to
their consideration such measures" as I judge to be "necessary and
expedient."

But first and above all, our thanks are due to Almighty God for the
numerous benefits which He has bestowed upon this people, and our united
prayers ought to ascend to Him that He would continue to bless our great
Republic in time to come as He has blessed it in time past. Since the
adjournment of the last Congress our constituents have enjoyed an unusual
degree of health. The earth has yielded her fruits abundantly and has
bountifully rewarded the toil of the husbandman. Our great staples have
commanded high prices, and up till within a brief period our manufacturing,
mineral, and mechanical occupations have largely partaken of the general
prosperity. We have possessed all the elements of material wealth in rich
abundance, and yet, notwithstanding all these advantages, our country in
its monetary interests is at the present moment in a deplorable condition.
In the midst of unsurpassed plenty in all the productions of agriculture
and in all the elements of national wealth, we find our manufactures
suspended, our public works retarded, our private enterprises of different
kinds abandoned, and thousands of useful laborers thrown out of employment
and reduced to want. The revenue of the Government, which is chiefly
derived from duties on imports from abroad, has been greatly reduced,
whilst the appropriations made by Congress at its last session for the
current fiscal year are very large in amount.

Under these circumstances a loan may be required before the close of your
present session; but this, although deeply to be regretted, would prove to
be only a slight misfortune when compared with the suffering and distress
prevailing among the people. With this the Government can not fail deeply
to sympathize, though it may be without the power to extend relief.

It is our duty to inquire what has produced such unfortunate results and
whether their recurrence can be prevented. In all former revulsions the
blame might have been fairly attributed to a variety of cooperating causes,
but not so upon the present occasion. It is apparent that our existing
misfortunes have proceeded solely from our extravagant and vicious system
of paper currency and bank credits, exciting the people to wild
speculations and gambling in stocks. These revulsions must continue to
recur at successive intervals so long as the amount of the paper currency
and bank loans and discounts of the country shall be left to the discretion
of 1,400 irresponsible banking institutions, which from the very law of
their nature will consult the interest of their stockholders rather than
the public welfare.

The framers of the Constitution, when they gave to Congress the power "to
coin money and to regulate the value thereof" and prohibited the States
from coining money, emitting bills of credit, or making anything but gold
and silver coin a tender in payment of debts, supposed they had protected
the people against the evils of an excessive and irredeemable paper
currency. They are not responsible for the existing anomaly that a
Government endowed with the sovereign attribute of coining money and
regulating the value thereof should have no power to prevent others from
driving this coin out of the country and filling up the channels of
circulation with paper which does not represent gold and silver.

It is one of the highest and most responsible duties of Government to
insure to the people a sound circulating medium, the amount of which ought
to be adapted with the utmost possible wisdom and skill to the wants of
internal trade and foreign exchanges. If this be either greatly above or
greatly below the proper standard, the marketable value of every man's
property is increased or diminished in the same proportion, and injustice
to individuals as well as incalculable evils to the community are the
consequence.

Unfortunately, under the construction of the Federal Constitution which has
now prevailed too long to be changed this important and delicate duty has
been dissevered from the coining power and virtually transferred to more
than 1,400 State banks acting independently of each other and regulating
their paper issues almost exclusively by a regard to the present interest
of their stockholders. Exercising the sovereign power of providing a paper
currency instead of coin for the country, the first duty which these banks
owe to the public is to keep in their vaults a sufficient
amount of gold and silver to insure the convertibility of
their notes into coin at all times and under all circumstances.
No bank ought ever to be chartered without such restrictions
on its business as to secure this result. All other restrictions are
comparatively vain. This is the only true touchstone, the only efficient
regulator of a paper currency--the only one which can guard the public
against overissues and bank suspensions. As a collateral and eventual
security, it is doubtless wise, and in all cases ought to be required, that
banks shall hold an amount of United States or State securities equal to
their notes in circulation and pledged for their redemption. This, however,
furnishes no adequate security against overissue. On the contrary, it may
be perverted to inflate the currency. Indeed, it is possible by this means
to convert all the debts of the United States and State Governments into
bank notes, without reference to the specie required to redeem them.
However valuable these securities may be in themselves, they can not be
converted into gold and silver at the moment of pressure, as our experience
teaches, in sufficient time to prevent bank suspensions and the
depreciation of bank notes. In England, which is to a considerable extent a
paper-money country, though vastly behind our own in this respect, it was
deemed advisable, anterior to the act of Parliament of 1844, which wisely
separated the issue of notes from the banking department, for the Bank of
England always to keep on hand gold and silver equal to one-third of its
combined circulation and deposits. If this proportion was no more than
sufficient to secure the convertibility of its notes with the whole of
Great Britain and to some extent the continent of Europe as a field for its
circulation, rendering it almost impossible that a sudden and immediate run
to a dangerous amount should be made upon it, the same proportion would
certainly be insufficient under our banking system. Each of our 1,400 banks
has but a limited circumference for its circulation, and in the course of a
very few days the depositors and note holders might demand from such a bank
a sufficient amount in specie to compel it to suspend, even although it had
coin in its vaults equal to one-third of its immediate liabilities. And yet
I am not aware, with the exception of the banks of Louisiana, that any
State bank throughout the Union has been required by its charter to keep
this or any other proportion of gold and silver compared with the amount of
its combined circulation and deposits. What has been the consequence? In a
recent report made by the Treasury Department on the condition of the banks
throughout the different States, according to returns dated nearest to
January, 1857, the aggregate amount of actual specie in their vaults is
$58,349,838, of their circulation $214,778,822, and of their deposits
$230,351,352. Thus it appears that these banks in the aggregate have
considerably less than one dollar in seven of gold and silver compared with
their circulation and deposits. It was palpable, therefore, that the very
first pressure must drive them to suspension and deprive the people of a
convertible currency, with all its disastrous consequences. It is truly
wonderful that they should have so long continued to preserve their credit
when a demand for the payment of one-seventh of their immediate liabilities
would have driven them into insolvency. And this is the condition of the
banks, notwithstanding that four hundred millions of gold from California
have flowed in upon us within the last eight years, and the tide still
continues to flow. Indeed, such has been the extravagance of bank credits
that the banks now hold a considerably less amount of specie, either in
proportion to their capital or to their circulation and deposits combined,
than they did before the discovery of gold in California. Whilst in the
year 1848 their specie in proportion to their capital was more than equal
to one dollar for four and a half, in 1857 it does not amount to one dollar
for every six dollars and thirty-three cents of their capital. In the year
1848 the specie was equal within a very small fraction to one dollar