¹ Hildreth, R., Banks, Banking, and Paper Currencies (Reprint ed.; New York, 1968), p. 118.Google Scholar

² Hammond, Bray, Banks and Politics in the United States, from the Revolution to the Civil War (Princeton, 1957), p. 68.Google Scholar

³ Ibid., p. 626.

⁴ Redlich, Fritz, The Molding of American Banking: Men and Ideas (2nd ed.; New York, 1968), Part II, ch. xiv, pp. 60–84.Google Scholar

⁵ ibid., pp. 60–63.

⁶ Ibid., pp. 60, 64, 72.

⁷ Ibid., p. 73. I have not checked the source but will note that Larson cites the same issue of the Bankers' Magazine as showing 369 rather than 269 private bankers outside of New York. See Larson, Henrietta M., Jay Cooke, Private Banker (Cambridge, Mass., 1936), p. 52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁸ Redlich, Molding, Part II, pp. 61–62.

⁹ Baldwin wrote: “When, therefore, a merchant or any person possessed of capital, has, by his punctuality, integrity, and honest dealing, so far gained the confidence of the public, that bis notes pass currently as money, he ought not to be restrained in reaping the advantage of his credit. It is the fruit of his virtues; a natural right, the exercise of which does him honour; and to limit its circulation, either in quantity, denomination, or territorial extent, is the grossest injustice. The credit of a private banker will fix its own boundaries, beyond which it will seldom wander.” Baldwin, Laommi, Thoughts on the Study of Political Economy, as Connected with the Population Industry and Paper Currency of the United States (Cambridge, Mass., 1809), p. 54.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Smith, Alice E., George Smith's Money, A Scottish Investor in America (Madison, 1966), pp. 51–53.Google Scholar

¹¹ Redlich, Molding, Part II, p. 63.

¹² Larson, Jay Cooke, pp. 61–62.

¹³ In addition to his private bank in Chicago and the Milwaukee “insurance” company, George Smith had affiliates in New York, Buffalo, Detroit, Galena, and St. Louis. Clark-affiliated houses were in Philadelphia, Boston, New York, New Orleans, St. Louis, and Burlington, Iowa. Like other bankers, both chartered and private, Smith and the Clark's had a network of correspondents as well. Smith, George Smith's Money, pp. 64–65, 106; Larson, Jay Cooke, pp. 53–63.

¹⁴ Smith, George Smith's Money, p. 117; Larson, Jay Cooke, pp. 442–443.

¹⁵ Smith, George Smith's Money, pp. 124–130.

¹⁶ Larson, Jay Cooke, pp. 55; 62–63.

¹⁷ Erickson, Erling A., Banking in Frontier Iowa, 1836–1865 (Ames, 1971), pp. 62–70.Google Scholar

¹⁸ See Redlich, Fritz and Christman, Webster M., “Early American Checks and an Example of Their Use,” Business History Review, 41 (Autumn, 1967), pp. 285–302CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and James P. Baughman, “Early American Checks: Forms and Functions,” Ibid., pp. 421–435.

¹⁹ Redlich and Christman, “Early American Checks,” pp. 295–302.

²⁰ Ibid., pp. 293–295; Baughman, “Early American Checks,” pp. 433–435.

²¹ Peter Temin, The Jacksonian Economy, Appendix, p. 181.

²² See Hammond, Banks and Politics, p. 81–82, for pertinent excerpts from the writings of Webster and Hamilton. Baugnman, “Early American Checks,” p. 435, argues that Webster's “Essay on Credit” (1786) is ambiguous on the economic equivalence of bank note and deposit credit, a point which my reading of the “Essay” suggests has some validity. Baughman further argues, however, that Hamilton's statement clearly showing the theoretical equivalence merely indicates that Hamilton was “ahead of his time” since deposit credit was not practiced. But Hammond, Banks and Politics, p. 81, which Baughman cites for the Hamilton passage, shows that Hamilton did in fact give his promissory note for a deposit credit at the Bank of New York in 1791, indicating that practice did not really lag behind theory in the way Baughman suggests.

²³ See Friedman, Milton and Schwartz, Anna J., Monetary Statistics of the United States (New York, 1970), Table 13, pp. 216–225.Google Scholar

²⁴ Redlich and Christman, “Early American Checks,” pp. 296–302.

²⁵ Fenstermaker, J. Van, The Development of American Commercial Banking: 1782–1837 (Kent, Ohio, 1965), pp. 36–41.Google Scholar

²⁶ Smith, George Smith's Money, pp. 50–51; Larson, Jay Cooke, p. 63.

²⁷ Baughman, “Early American Checks,” p. 432.

²⁸ Hubbard, Timothy W. and Davids, Lewis E., Banking in Mid-America, A History of Missouri's Banks (Washington, D.C., 1969), p. 63.Google Scholar

²⁹ Ibid., p. 67.

³⁰ Ibid., ch. viii; Erickson, Banking in Iowa, ch. iv; Smith, George Smith's Money, chs. iii-vi; Larson, Jay Cooke, ch. iv.

³¹ J. Van Fenstermaker, Development of Banking.

³² Ibid., pp. 21–22, 170.

³³ Stephen Girard, for example, was successful in having his bank exempted from the Pennsylvania statute prohibiting unincorporated bank note issues. And he pleaded with the Congress to eliminate a differentially severe tax on private bank notes. See Redlich, Molding, Part II, p. 62; American State Papers, Finance, Vol. II, pp. 869–870.

³⁴ Van Fenstermaker, Development of Banking, pp. 21–22.

³⁵ Why, for example, did Kentucky charter 47 banks in January, 1818, when before that date only one had been chartered? Were all of the 47 newly organized? And why did Tennessee charter 10 banks in November, 1817, which was twice the number chartered in all earlier years? See Van Fenstermaker, Development of Banking, Tables A-11 and A-27, pp. 123–127, 179–180.

³⁶ Secretary of the Treasury, “Report on Banks,” (1856), 34th Congress, 1st Session, House Executive Document No. 102, p. 1.

³⁷ Ibid., p. 4.

³⁸ The title of the publication, which emanated from New York, varied. In the 1850's some issues were entitled Merchant's and Banker's Almanac while others were Banker's Almanac and Register. It was affiliated with the New York Bankers' Magazine.

³⁹ Specifically, in my dissertation which is now available in book form: Sylla, , The American Capital Market, 1846–1914 (New York, 1975), Appendix A, pp. 253–265.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ See Feller, William, An Introduction to Probability Theory and Its Applications. (2nd ed.; New York, 1957), pp. 41–45.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Hubbard and Davids, Banking, p. 66.

⁴² Temin, Jacksonian Economy, ch. iii.

⁴³ Sushka, Marie Elizabeth, “An Econometric Model of the Money Market in the United States, 1823–1859,” Journal of Economic History, 25 (March, 1975), pp. 280–285.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁴ Both Redlich and Hammond cite a writer in Hunt's Merchants' Magazine, 1843, who stated that the banking business was “falling into private hands” at the expense of incorporated banks. See Redlich, Molding, Part II, pp. 69–70, and Hammond, Banks and Politics, pp. 625–626. Temin, Jacksonian Economy, pp. 155–165, argues that the U.S. depression of 1839–1843 was similar to that of the 1930's with respect to monetary contraction, but that it differed by not exhibiting any contraction of real output. To the extent that the public shifted money holdings from incorporated to private banks, the monetary contraction of 1839–1843, calculated from incorporated bank data, may itself be exaggerated.

⁴⁵ Stevens, Edward J., “Composition of the Money Stock Prior to the Civil War,” Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, 3 (February, 1971), pp. 84–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴⁶ Hubbard and Davids, Banking, pp. 68, 73–76.

⁴⁷ Timberlake, Richard H. Jr., “Denominational Factors in Nineteenth-Century Currency Experience,” Journal of Economic History, 34 (December, 1974), pp. 835–850.CrossRefGoogle Scholar