Debates in Congress
A number of financial bills came before Congress in winter/early spring 1791. In addition to the Bank bill, the House of Representatives and the Senate debated bills to establish the U.S. Mint and to impose an excise tax on distilled spirits. Dissent existed over the direction of the nation's economy. In the case of the bill to establish a national bank, the debates reflected a concern over northern financiers having too much power. For some Bank opponents, attacking the constitutionality of the Bank appeared to be a more promising angle in a Federalist-dominated Congress.
The Senate
"An aristocratick influence subversive of the spirit of the free, equal government." -- Senator Pierce Butler to Congressman James Jackson, January 24, 1791
The 26 senators met on the second floor of Philadelphia's Congress Hall, the national capitol building from 1790 to 1800. They had no public gallery and little is known of their debates on the first Bank of the United States. Introduced in late December 1790, the Bank bill passed on January 20, 1791 by voice vote with no record of the individual votes. Given their opposition to the bill, it's likely that Senators Pierce Butler (SC) and William Maclay (PA) were among those who voted against it. Butler called out the bank as elitist and Maclay feared that the Bank would concentrate wealth in the hands of the few, noting in his Journal the need to prevent the establishment of a "machine for the purposes of bad ministers."
The House of Representatives
"Congress may do what is necessary to the end for which the Constitution was adopted..." -- Congressman Fisher Ames in a speech, February 3, 1791
Consideration of the Bank bill began on the floor of the House on February 1, 1791. Congressman James Jackson (GA) believed that the Bank would advantage merchants over farmers, stating "...the plan of a National Bank is calculated to benefit a small part of the United States - the mercantile interest..."
Congressman James Madison (VA) expanded on Jackson's argument, saying that the proposed National Bank "...would directly interfere with the rights of the states to prohibit as well as establish Banks, and the circulation of [state] bank notes." Madison also attacked the Bank's constitutionality by asking, "Is the power of establishing an incorporated Bank among the powers vested by the Constitution in the Legislature of the United States?"
Defenders in the House chamber, like Congressman Fisher Ames (MA), stressed how the Bank would improve trade and make tax collection more efficient. Ames also affirmed the constitutionality of the Bank of the United States, arguing that Congress had the power to make laws implied, though not explicitly expressed, in the U.S. Constitution.
The bill passed the House by a vote of 39-20 on February 8, 1791. Of the 39 Representatives in favor of establishing the Bank, 33 were from the north and 6 were from the south. Almost all of the bill's opponents were from the south.
