and westward expansion essentially halted until the Panic ended. Both merchants and farmers began to suffer for the investment risks that they had taken when the prices were high. Remedies By 1859, the Panic began to level off, and the economy had begun to stabilize. President James Buchanan announced that the paper-money system seemed to be the root cause of the Panic and then decided to withdraw the usage of all bank notes under twenty dollars. He also "advised the State banks to break away from the banks [and urged] them to follow the example of the Federal Government." He felt that would decrease the paper money supply to allow the specie supply time to increase and to reduce inflation rates. Buchanan wanted the state banks to follow the federal government, specifically the Independent Treasury system, which allowed the federal government to keep up with specie payments. That helped to alleviate some of the financial stress that had been brought on by the bank suspensions. In his State of the Union message December 7, 1857, Buchanan said: He also revealed the new strategy of "reform not relief" and expressed his feeling that "the government sympathized but could do nothing to alleviate the suffering individuals." To avoid further financial panics, Buchanan encouraged the US Congress to pass a law to provide the immediate forfeiture of a bank's charter if a bank suspended specie payments. Additionally, he asked state banks to keep one dollar in specie for every three issued as paper, and he discouraged the use of federal or state bonds as security on bank notes to avoid future inflation. Results The result of the Panic of 1857 was that the largely-agrarian southern economy, which had few railroads, suffered little, but the northern economy took a significant hit and made a slow recovery. The area affected the most by the Panic was the Great Lakes region, and the troubles of that region were "quickly passed to those enterprises in the East that depended upon western sales". After approximately a year, much of the economy in the North and the entire South had recovered from the Panic. By the end of the Panic, in 1859, tensions between the North and South regarding the issue of slavery in the United States were increasing. The Panic of 1857 encouraged those in the South who believed the North needed the South to keep a stabilized