This amendment was rejected by a vote of 112 ayes to 44

noes.

Mr. Adams, as a substitute for the report of the committee, offered the following resolution:

Resolved, That this Convention having been called to secede from the Union on account of the past aggressions of the Federal government, yielding to the popular vote of October last against that remedy, and not agreeing on any other, do now adjourn sine die.

Laid on the table.

Finally, the report of the Committee of Twenty-one was adopted as the action of the Convention by a vote of one hundred and thirty-six to nineteen.

On motion of the Hon. Langdon Cheves, the Convention then adjourned sine die, and was declared dissolved.

Thus ended the Secession Movement of 1850, memorable only as the advance storm-cloud of the revolution that was to burst upon the country in another decade.

At the session of the Legislature for the year 1852, Mr. Memminger was appointed one of the electors for President and Vice-President of the United States, and as such he cast his vote for Franklin Pierce and William R. King. It was at this session that a bill was introduced by Mr. Edward McCrady to charter the Blue Ridge Railroad Company, an enterprise designed to open a more direct communication between Charleston and the Northwestern States. This enterprise received the approval and active co-operation of Mr. Memminger, who was at all times ready to advance any public movement that would, in his judgment, promote the business interests of Charleston and advance the general material interests of the State. In after years he watched with great concern the progress of this railroad, which he justly regarded as a most important commercial highway, bringing Charleston nearer by many miles to the great trading centres of the Ohio and Mississippi valleys than any

railway that had as yet been projected. He advocated granting State aid to the road under such restrictions as would secure the State against loss, and as would enable the management, by prudent administration, to obtain the means necessary for the expensive and difficult work of crossing the Blue Ridge mountains. Unhappily, Mr. Memminger was not permitted to witness the completion of this great enterprise. Either from mismanagement, a want of energetic action on the part of the directors, or deficient engineering skill, or from the disastrous results of the civil war-most probably all of these operating as causes-the road has never been completed beyond the mountains. The great tunnel beyond Walhalla seems to have exhausted all resource of money and energy, and to have proven the grave of this great highway, which at one time promised to make Charleston the great seaport of the South Atlantic. There it ends, amid the wilds of an unproductive mountain region and in a silent recess of the great Appalachian Chain.

Mr. Memminger declined to stand for re-election to the House of Representatives in 1853 and 1854, but was returned as a member for the session of 1855, and resumed his place as chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means-a post of honor and of usefulness he had filled with great credit to himself and benefit to the State for many years. It was at this session that bills were introduced to alter and amend the constitution of the State so as to give the election of the Governor and Lieutenant-Governor to the people, and also to allow the people to vote directly for President and VicePresident of the United States. These officers, by a constitutional provision of the State, thought by some to have been undemocratic, were elected by the Legislature, a measure which caused Mr. Clay once to remark that South Carolina was in form a Republic, while the other States were Democracies. While these measures were under consideration

in the House, Mr. Memminger presided as chaiman of the Committee of the Whole.

The year 1857 is memorable in the history of the United States as one of great financial depression, the result of` wild speculations, following upon the discovery of gold in California and the rapid settlement of the Western territories. It was during this year that the word "Panic" came to be applied to the action of the banks and other financial institutions, as well as to those persons who alarmed at certain unforeseen events suspended specie payments, and who in many instances were found to be insolvent when called upon to respond to the demands of their depositors and creditors. This "panic" became widespread, reaching to every section of the country and affecting all branches of business. So general was the feeling of mistrust and so great the depression of trade that the intervention of the Federal and State governments was sought to remedy if possible the cause of the evil and to give relief to the country. In South Carolina, as elsewhere in the United States, some of the banks suspended specie payments, notwithstanding the penalties fixed by law for such an act, and in many instances business establishments were closed and their proprietors forced into bankruptcy. Referring to this unhappy state of affairs, Governor Alston, in his message to the Legislature used the following language:

Regarding the recent revulsion in finance and the currency, I will not attempt to enumerate its causes, but will venture to direct your attention not so much to the banks as to the system of banking. A system which sanctions the issue of paper money to so large an amount, leading to inflated credits, inflated prices, extravagant habits of living and reckless speculation, may be supposed calculated to produce a crisis. sooner or later. The unhappy sinking of a ship with bullion from California, or any event sufficiently exciting to create a momentary panic, was enough to precipitate it. It has had the effect to paralyze the arm of honest industry wherever labor is opposed to capital-to depress the opening market for produce-and to impair the confidence between man

and man. The banks in this State were effected by the common panic, and felt the pressure severely-some of them yielding to its influence, have suspended specie payments. The suspension of specie payments by a bank is a failure to redeem its notes on demand—a forfeiture of its promise to pay in gold or silver, current coin, the full value of every bill issued from its counter-a promise, on which is based the privilege granted by the State to issue bills and to circulate them as currency. However, it may be supposed to afford present relief to the business interests of the country, which, unfortunately are so wound up with the banks as to suffer inevitably from the contraction of their credits and their stringent demands, it is demoralizing in its tendency.

The banks of this State with which I am at all familiar, are well administered. Several of them have bravely withstood the shock, and are prepared to do a legitimate business as usual. All it is believed are solvent. If, however, there be some so dependent on the banks and brokers of New York as to fail in their pledges to the public, when the Northern banks fail, it is their misfortune to have to answer for the sins of others as well as for their own mismanagement. The consequences to the quiet, uninitiated and the laboring community, are alike distrust and loss, leading to want and suffering, too often to moral ruin and crime.

The matter of the suspension of specie payment by the banks being under consideration by the House of Representatives, Mr. Memminger offered the following resolutions :

1. Resolved, That the issue of notes as currency is a privilege granted to the banks upon the implied condition that they will redeem such notes with coin, at the pleasure of the holder; that the failure to perform this condition justly forfeits the privilege, and should deprive the banks of the profits arising from such issues; that the act in relation to suspension of specie payments simply contemplates such privation in the form of a penalty of five per cent. per annum upon the circulation of each suspended bank, and the State should insist upon payment of the same so long as the banks shall continue to refuse payment in specie.

2. That the paying out by the other banks of the notes of the suspended banks is in effect the issue by them of a depreciated currency instead of their own notes, redeemable in coin, and is a plain violation of law, for which proper proceedings should be instituted by the AttorneyGeneral and Solicitors.

3. That the supposed convertibility of bank-notes into coin at the pleasure of the holder has hitherto been relied upon to secure their use as currency, but the suspension now in existence exhibits the failure of this security and renders necessary a resort to increased securities.

4. That one of the chief causes of these convulsions is to be found in the power to expand and contract the currency, which is exercised at pleasure by every bank of issues, and that the first step towards prevention should be to limit or withdraw this power.

5. That a withdrawal of the power would involve the adoption of an entire metallic currency, or a circulation of the bank notes of other States; both of which schemes being obviously impracticable or inexpedient, we are brought to the alternative of providing some efficient checks and limitations to a proper currency.

6. That among these checks one of the most salutary is to be found in a reduction of the amount of paper circulation by filling the channels of trade with the smaller coins, and inasmuch as paper of the same denominations will always displace coin, it becomes necessary to withdraw from circulation bank-notes of the smaller denominations; that to this end all the banks of this State should be required to withdraw from circulation within two years all notes under five dollars, and within three years all notes under ten dollars.

7. That to make this measure more effective it should be proposed to the neighboring States of Georgia and North Carolina to place a like restriction on the issues of their banks.

8. That the proper limitations to a paper currency are such as would attach to it, as early as possible, the essential features of a currency in coin, amongst which the most important are actual exchangeable value and comparative freedom from fluctuation.

9. That the first feature, to-wit, an actual exchangeable value, may be secured by requiring each bank, in addition to the provision requisite to redeem its issues in coin, to deposit as collateral security for their redemption an equivalent amount of public stocks; and the second feature may be secured by limiting the total amount of bank-notes issued to that sum which experience has settled to be the circulation, which, under any circumstances, will remain current in our State; that each bank should be permitted to issue no more than its ratable part of this sum in proportion to its capital, except upon the deposit of coin to an equal amount set apart for the redemption of such increase.

10. That to carry into effect the last mentioned measure, the minimum circulation of the State shall be ascertained as nearly as practicable, and each bank shall substitute for its present issues a new circulation to the extent prescribed by the last resolution, to be countersigned by a proper officer upon the deposit with him of stocks or bonds of this State or the United States, or of the city of Charleston or Columbia, to an equal market value with the new circulation by the bank entitled to the same, which deposit shall be applicable to the redemption of the issues of each bank in addition to the securities already provided by law; and that further issues of bank-notes shall be allowed to any bank,