[For The Mercury.]

Messrs. Editors,-In your paper of yesterday Colonel Elmore alludes to a certificate which I had furnished Mr. Memminger, respecting the appointment of the committees of examination for the Bank of the State of South Carolina and its branches in 1838, and my remarks which accompanied the certificate.

It is proper to state that Mr. Memminger applied to me to know how the committees were appointed at the annual session of 1838 and if he had had any agency in the appointment. When he wrote I had only the rough journal of that year before me, without an index, and finding that the appointment was made on a concurrence by the House with a message from the Senate, it did not occur to me to look further, nor had I any recollection that a resolution was also introduced for that purpose. I did not speak from memory, but from that portion of the proceedings then before me, and in that I was correct. It is no doubt true, as Col. Elmore states, that Mr. Memminger before submitted a resolution on the subject, but the action of the House on the message from the Senate superseded the necessity of considering Mr. Memminger's resolution, and the appointment of the committees was certainly not made on that resolution, nor, as far as I know, by the agency of Mr. Memminger. How far the fact that he had submitted such a resolution influenced the Speaker in the appointment of the committees I have no means of knowing. Very respectfully,

March 6th, 1850.

T. W. GLOVER.

The following is the summing up of the whole matter, and presents clearly the reasons why he opposed with such earnestness the re-chartering of the bank.

To the People of St. Philip's and St. Michael's Parishes:

FELLOW-CITIZENS,-I propose now to sum up the various matters which I have submitted to your consideration.

I have endeavored to satisfy your judgments that the Bank of the State ought not to be re-chartered, for the following reasons:

1. Because it is an institution not consistent with the character of popular governments-inasmuch as it is so complex in its machinery and relations that few can spare the time and attention necessary to understand them.

2. Because it is unconstitutional, and can only be judiciously sustained by the same evasion of the Constitution of the United States by which a protective tariff is sustained.

3. Because its charter violates the spirit of our State Constitution, in the following particulars:

1. In that it confers on a body of thirteen men, sitting in secret, and bound to each other by an oath of secrecy, the power to appropriate, at pleasure, the public money; when, by the Constitution of the State, no such appropriation can be made but by an act of the Legislature, which must first be read three times in the Senate and three times in the House of Representatives, on three successive days, before it can become a law; and, as a further security, the Constitution requires each House to keep a journal of its proceedings and to record the yeas and nays for public information; while the proceedings of the bank are performed secretly and studiously concealed from the public eye.

II. The State Constitution gives to the Legislature alone the power to tax the people, and guards this power with so much jealousy as not even to permit the Senate to originate a tax bill, whereas the bank directors have power at any moment, by a mere order issued in secret, to tax the people to the extent of millions by contracting debts or issuing notes, which the people are bound to pay.

III. Because the State Constitution require the treasurers of the people's treasury to go out of office every four years so that their accounts may be passed upon by successors, whereas the bank officers, who hold ten times as much of the public money, and have in their hands all the treasury of the State, continue in office for a life-time.

IV. Because the State Constitution confines the legislative authority of South Carolina to the General Assembly alone, whereas the board of bank directors, sitting in secret, have undertaken to exercise many of the most responsible functions of the Legislature; such as subscribing to and patronizing railroad companies, banks, and manufacturing corporations, without any public discussion and without its even being known to the public by whom, or for what reasons these acts of the bank legislature have been passed.

4. Because this State has, with an almost unanimous voice, repeatedly condemned the connection of bank and State as unwise and inexpedient, and as involving the public revenues in all the casualties of banking; and because the extension of this system to the borrowing of money upon the public faith, to lend out to individuals by bank accommodation-as has been done for this bank-is fraught with still more disastrous consequences to the public.

5. Because the tendency of such a bank is to mislead and swerve from their duty, not only its own officers, but the public authorities themselves, by the influence it exerts over them; and if the president of the bank be a politician, it gives a master to the State.

6. Because the experience of the Bank of the United States, of the Alabama and other State banks has proved all banking institutions which are connected with governments to be uniformly injurious to the public interests.

7. Because the history of our own bank is fraught with similar lessons. It has, on every occasion in which its interests or wishes are concerned, from the fire loan down to the present time, swerved the State from her true policy, plunged her into debt, and involved her in complicated and embarrassing transactions, with which she would otherwise have had no connection.

8. Because the power exercised by the bank directors to issue bills and other obligations, which the people are pledged to redeem, and the distribution of the money thus raised among the bank directors and their friends, is a partial system of favoritism in which each citizen of the. State is virtually converted into an indorser of the notes of a favored few, whether the citizen will or no.

These reasons having clearly established that the bank ought not to be re-chartered, I then proceeded to examine the objections urged by the friends of the bank against any interference with it.

I. First objection: The chief of these was, that the pledge of the funds of the State and of the profits of the bank to the foreign creditor under the fire-loan act, stood in our way.

To this, it was answered, that we did not propose to remove any of the funds of the State from the obligation imposed upon them. They were to be preserved for the foreign creditor until his debt should be paid. Whether the funds were in the hands of a bank, or any other agent, they were equally the funds of the State and equally secured to the foreign creditor his debt.

II. It was answered, that a pledge of the funds of the State did not prevent a change of investment any more than when trust funds are invested for a private trust; otherwise, all the substitutions of railroad stocks in the upper country, which the State had lately made for its South Carolina railroad bonds and stock, were unlawful.

III. It was answered, that as to the bank itself the creditor when he loaned his money, had before him the bank charter, which on its face declared that the charter would expire in 1856; and he had, therefore, no right to count on its existence beyond that time.

IV. It was answered, that so far as the profits were concerned, the creditor would be benefited by discontinuing the bank, inasmuch as the returns of the bank itself showed that during the last ten years the average profit on the capital was less than six per cent. per annum; whereas the money loaned out without any banking risk would bring seven per cent.

Second objection: That this was a bank for the accommodation of planters; and to destroy it would be injurious to the agricultural community. This objection was answered by showing that the officers and directors of the bank itself had among them $1,091,118—which left of the actual capital of the bank only $31,344 for all the rest of the State.

That so far as the borrowed capital was concerned, $727,000 of it was loaned in Charleston under the fire loan; and that of the other money in the bank, thirty individuals had out upwards of $700,000; that in Charleston, Columbia and Camden alone, near two millions were loaned; so that the planters in the State at large would find no greater relative surplus for their accommodation from the borrowed than from the real capital. That in fact the bank was administered for the benefit of the directors and a few favorites, and not for the planters.

The argument having been advanced to this point, and the objections answered, it followed, as a matter of course, that the bank's charter ought not to be renewed; and this brought up the inquiry, When should we commence measures of preparation ?

I maintained that it was necessary to begin now

1. Because in a small community like ours, it would necessarily take many years to call in so large an amount of money as is employed by this bank; and, if we did not begin before the end of the charter, a renewal of it would be forced upon us by necessity.

2. Because the sooner we begin the more time could we take for distributing the payments to be made by the debtors.

3. Because the country is now in so excellent a financial condition that no danger was to be apprehended from commencing the change now. 4. Because the analogies of private business established the wisdom and prudence of changing the mode of conducting any large concern when a period was fixed upon for its termination.

Objection: At this point it was objected that our relations with the general government rendered it unwise to interfere with the bank, or to divide the State into parties.

Reply: To this we replied that, extended as this bank always has been-with its assets beyond its control-in times of panic or difficulty, it never could assist the State. It would be a source of weakness, instead of strength, and would be more likely to need help from the State to sustain itself rather than to afford any to the State; and, so far as any measures of protection for such a crisis were to be taken, the best that could be advised were to call in the assets of the bank, and place them in an available form, instead of leaving them at large, as they now are.

It was further replied, that whatever division existed in the State was the act of the bank and its friends. They had attempted to get a recharter eight years in advance, and when the State authorities had decided against their charter, instead of conforming themselves to that decision, they had set every engine at work, at home and abroad, to counteract the decision of these authorities; and that the whole division, therefore, was of their own instigation.

Having thus established that a change was proper, and that now is the time for commencing it, it remained to inquire, What should this change be?

The plan which we proposed embraced four leading features, set forth in a bill, and the fifth embraced in a resolution; all of which were before the Legislature at the last session.

1. The board of directors was reduced to a president and four directors, with a salary of $1,000 to each director, and no privilege to borrow; agencies were substituted for the branches, and officers and expenses reduced.

2. The chartered powers and privileges of the bank were continued, in all respects, except that no new loans of money were to be made.

3. The business paper and bills of exchange, and the convertible property of the bank were to be applied to meet its engagements, and on all other paper an extension of time, not exceeding ten years, is given to all debtors who would give unexceptionable security to pay an annual interest of seven per cent. on the whole debt, and at least onetenth of the principal.

4. All surplus collections were to be applied to pay the foreign debt of the State.

5. To these was added a proposition to employ an agent to treat with the foreign creditor and see upon what terms his debt could be transferred home.

These various details were shown to be reasonable and proper, and, in the expectation that the bank would obey the solemn determination of the Legislature, they were supposed to be such as would be acceptable to the bank itself.

But, instead of that, the plan was met with open war, and instead of the assault being made upon its reasonableness or expediency, the campaign was transferred back to the old ground, and the friends of the bank recurred to the question of re-charter and renewed the argument on that score.

I did not think it necessary again to refute their arguments, but merely to take up the new matter which was brought forward since the decision against the re-charter in 1848.

This new matter classed itself under two heads

1. The facts reported by the investigating committees appointed in 1848, and

2. An appeal made to the Governor by Messrs. Baring, Brothers & Co., claiming a renewal of the charter as a matter of right.

1. As to the investigating committees, I showed that, so far from their helping the bank, they had proved all the substantial charges made against it.

I. They stated that the money of the bank was most unequally distributed, and that four districts in the State had out two millions of dollars; that the funds had been monopolized by a few individuals, and chiefly by the officers and directors.