74 
Indiana University 
the poorest people in the state owed it $2,500,000 or $3,000,- 
000.^°® All during his term of office Governor Adair, whom 
Shaler calls “weak-minded”, was in sympathy with the so- 
called relief measures.^®® In his annual message in October, 
1822, Adair favored the gradual retirement of the Common- 
wealth Bank’s notes. Soon the legislature began to retire the 
notes of both state banks. Several million dollars in paper 
were called in during 1823 and either burned or boxed up and 
held in reserve. In the one month of January, 1823, the 
Bank of Kentucky burned $1,398,924 of its notes.^®® After the 
Bank of the Commonwealth retired half the $3,000,000 in 
notes it had outstanding, the remainder gradually approached 
par.^®^ Teaching a frontier state the intricate problems of 
finance and sound economic principles thru experience was 
hard, but teaching Kentucky her proper relations to the fed- 
eral government, that constitutions are written to protect 
minorities, and that her legislature was not supreme in all 
things was harder. 
^05 Sumner, Andrew Jackson (citing Niles’ Register, XXIII, 337), 163, 
Shaler, Kentucky a Pioneer Commonwealth, 179. 
Niles’ Register, XXIII, 171. 
National Intelligencer, February 5, 1823. 
Kerr (ed.), Histerry of Kentucky, II, 617, 618. 
