And as the vicissitudes of Nations beget a perpetual tendency to the accumulation of debt, there ought to be in every government a perpetual, anxious, and unceasing effort to reduce that, which at any times exists, as fast as shall be practicable consistently with integrity and good faith.
United States. Dept. of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton (1828). “Reports of the secretary of the Treasury of the United States”, p.101
