t to the constitution of the United States,
proposed by the 39th Congress, and known as article fourteen, and
when said article shall have become a part of the constitution of
the United States, said state shall be declared entitled to
representation in Congress, and Senators and Representatives shall
be admitted therefrom on their taking the oath prescribed by law,
and then and thereafter the preceding sections of this act shall
be inoperative in said state: _Provided_, That no person excluded
from the privilege of holding office by said proposed amendment to
the constitution of the United States shall be eligible to election
as a member of the convention to frame a constitution for any of
said rebel states, nor shall any such person vote for members of
such convention.

"Sec. 6. _And be it further enacted_, That, until the people of
said rebel states shall be by law admitted to representation in
the Congress of the United States, any civil government which may
exist therein shall be deemed provisional only, and in all respects
subject to the paramount authority of the United States at any time
to abolish, modify, control, or supersede the same; and in all
elections to any office under such provisional governments all
persons shall be entitled to vote, and none others, who are entitled
to vote, under the provisions of the fifth section of this act;
and no person shall be eligible to any office under any such
provisional governments who would be disqualified from holding
office under the provisions of the third article of said constitutional
amendment."

At the same time, the financial question, embracing the currency,
the public debt and the national revenue were of the highest
importance and demanded immediate consideration. Hugh McCulloch,
the Secretary of the Treasury, had been during most of his life a
banker in the State of Indiana, of acknowledged ability as such,
but with little or no experience as a financier dealing with public
questions. He was the first comptroller of the currency under the
banking act, and rendered valuable service in organizing the system
of national banks, though he had not originally favored the system,
but was, at the time of its adoption, a strong supporter of sound
state banks. In his first report to Congress on the 4th of December,
1865, he, as Secretary of the Treasury, took strong ground against
United States notes as a circulating medium and their being made
a legal tende