536 THE IMPENDING REVOLUTION. 



the battle-field, starving and dying in prisons and hospitals, 

 or toiling in the far off harvest fields, these money 

 lenders, these sharks and ghouls, were plotting treason of 

 the most damnable kind in the very temple of liberty, and 

 laying deep and broad the foundation of a moneyed aris- 

 tocracy, which should, eventually, as effectually rule over 

 and enslave them, as ever did the Southern master over 

 the dusky sons of the rice field and the cotton plantation. 

 The bill passed the Senate, and thus mutilated and loaded 

 with shackles was reported back to the House on the i4th 

 of February. 



On February i8th Mr. Stevens reported the bill as 

 amended by the Senate, and said: 



"I have no purpose of considering the bill at this 

 time. I desire that it shall be referred to the Committee 

 of the Whole, and be made the special order of to-morrow 

 at one o'clock. I hope gentlemen of the House will read 

 the amendments. They are very important, and, in my 

 judgment, very pernicious, but I hope the House will 

 examine them." 



On Wednesday, the I9th, Mr. Spaulding opened the 

 debate in opposition to some of the amendments in the 

 following language: 



"Mr. Chairman: 



"I des'ire especially to oppose the amendments of the 

 Senate, which require the interest on bonds and notes to 

 be paid in coin semi-annually, and which authorize the 

 secretary of the treasury to sell 6 per cent, bonds at the 

 market price for coin to pay the interest. The treasury 

 note bill, as reported first from the committee of Ways and 

 Means as a necessary war measure, was simple and perspic- 

 uous in its terms, and easily understood. It was so plain 

 that everybody could understand that it authorized the 



