Legislative and documentary history of the Bank of the United States including the original Bank of North America.
Washington: Gales and Seaton, 1832, First edition.
Octavo in 4s (8 ¾” x 5 ½”, 222mm x 140mm): binder’s blank, 14 (14 blank) 2-994 1004(-1004) a-d4 e2 1014, binder’s blank. 421 leaves, pp. [2] (2 blanks) i-iii (title, blank, preface) iv-vi 9 10-832 2799 2800-808. (=viii, 834).
Bound in contemporary mottled sheep. On the spine, 6 panels, title gilt to black sheep in the second.
Rubbed, with patches of wear along the bottom. Fore-corners bumped. Mildly evenly tanned with some passages of soiling or light foxing. Collated superior to Sabin (with the initial blank).
The First Bank of the United States, established 1791, attempted to bring financial unity to the young Republic. Famously championed by Alexander Hamilton, but with many opponents, its charter lasted only 20 years after failing to be renewed in 1811. In 1816 the concept was revived under President Madison as the second bank of the United States. The institution remained divisive and became a major issue in President Andrew Jackson’s re-election campaign in 1832. It is in this year that Mathew Clarke (1790-1852) and David Hall (1795-1870) publish the present work. Clarke was a journalist, author and politician who served seven terms as the Clerk of the House of Representatives and Hall was a prominent attorney in the D.C. area.
Clarke and Hall set out to compile a complete history surrounding the discourse of the proposed US Central bank spanning from the letters and writings of the founding fathers to all the way to the debates and speeches of Congress in the current year of 1832. Their aims were both to preserve the speeches and historical documents on the topic as well as to compile the entire history of the discourse surrounding the US banking system, since it had become such a mire of competing ideologies. This book remains a foundational work regarding the history of the US banking system.
Sabin 13438.
Cataloged by C.W. Kiel
Item #CWK0002
Price: $825