THK FAR.MKR AND TlIK ]'.AM<EK. 143 



however, the national banks profited enormously. Their 

 bonds doubled in value, while all the time paying six per cent 

 interest in gold, in addition to the profit on circulation. They 

 paid for the bonds all that the government could get from any 

 one else, in many cases unquestionably as a patriotic duty, and 

 they turned out a bonanza. The result of all this has been a 

 very bitter feeling on the part of the farming community 

 towards the national banks. They are commonly spoken of as 

 leaches who sucked the life-blood of the nation in the hour of 

 its extremity. There is no foundation for this opinion. The 

 bankers "were quite as patriotic as otliers. During the Rebel- 

 lion many farmers invested their savings in government bonds, 

 often, as in the case of many bankers, from patriotic motives. 

 They paid only the current market price for them, just as the 

 bankers paid, nor w^ould they have paid more. Had they 

 kept them they would have made the same profit that the 

 bankers made. Very few of them, however, did so. 



The punishment which it is pro|)osed to visit upon the 

 national banks of to-day for the alleged sins of their prede- 

 cessors of a generation ago is to deprive them of the privilege, 

 or at least the exclusive privilege, of issuing circulating notes. 

 It is true that the majority of those who hold these views, 

 hold them as their views of a proper fiscal policy, but the 

 alleged extortions of former days are the n^ain arguments 

 used to fire the popular heart and arouse to action. In fact, it 

 is a popular belief that the national banks are still in receipt 

 of the enormous profits which they formerly made. This 

 belief is held by so many of our people that the question of 

 continuing our present bank circulation is in some measure a 

 "question of the day." Its proper consideration raises two 

 questions: First, do the national banks now nnike an undue 

 profit from their circulation? Second, is or is not our present 

 national bank currency safer, and, therefore, more desirable 

 for the people, than state bank-notes, or government notes. 

 Let us consider these questions in their order. 



The national banks do not now make an undue profit on 

 their circulation. It depends upon circumstances whether they 

 make any profit at all. As a matter of fact, many banks can 



