THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF ILLINOIS 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 332 
 B875 
 
 V- 32 

 
 THE CURRENCY. 
 
 SPEECH 
 
 09 
 
 THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 SIR ROBERT PEEL, Bart., M.P., 
 
 IN 
 
 THE HOUSE OF COMMONS, 
 
 On Tuesday, April 23, 1833 ; 
 
 (ON THE MOTION OF MR. M. ATTWOOD, FOR A COM- 
 
 MITTEE TO INQUIRE INTO OUR PRESENT 
 
 MONETARY SYSTEM, &c.) 
 
 [Extracted from the Mirror of Parliament. — Part CCV.] 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR 
 
 THE PROPRIETORS OF " THE MIRROR OF PARLIAMENT," 
 3, ABINGDON-STREET, WESTMINSTER. 
 
 1833. 
 
 n
 
 HOUSE OF COMMONS. 
 
 Tuesday, april 23, 1833, 
 
 SIR ROBERT PEEL.— Although, Sir, I believe that I 
 shall agree with my Honourable Friend (Mr. Baring:) in the 
 practical conclusion to which I shall come, and the vote I shall 
 give on the present question, yet he propounded, in 'he course 
 of his speech, some doctrines which excite in my min I so 
 much doubt and apprehension, that I feel no scruple as to 
 the propriety of immediately followiuij him in the course of 
 detiate. I must begin by ubservina:, that as my Honourable 
 Friend is prepared to maintain the opinions expressed in the 
 concludinij part of his s|)eech, it would have been but just and 
 becoming in him to have al)stained from those terms of con- 
 temptuous severity applied in the commencement of that 
 speech to those with whom the present motion oriijmated. 
 My Honourable Friend although prepared rigidly to adhere 
 to the standard, is yet willing to admit of, nay to advise, an 
 inquiry into three very important alterations in the esta- 
 blished monetary system: first, the union of silver with 
 gold as a joint standard of value ; secondly, permission to 
 every country banker to offer as a legal tender, Bank of 
 Enirland notes in exchange for his own promissory notes; 
 and thirdly, to sanction the re-issue of ll. and 2/. notes. If 
 my Honcmrable Friend be really prepatt'd to irrant a (Joni- 
 miitee of Inquiry into the policy of three such important 
 and extensive alterations as tht:.se, he surely must foresee 
 that his own course wid, m great n^easure, cause that slate 
 of suspense,— will raise all those donhis in commercial d^-al- 
 iniis, which, in the first part ot his speerh, h^; urijed as a main 
 ot)stacle and impediment in the way of his asse;:?ing to the 
 motion of the Honourable Member for Whitehaven. The 
 re-issue of \l. and 2L notes! Why, Sir, I never felt conri- 
 dence.in predictingthe result of any political measure, irreater 
 than that which 1 feel in predicting what must be the 
 consequence of permitting the re-isMie of 1/. and 2l. notes. 
 Tiiat consequence wiil inevitably be, the dis^tppear-mce of 
 the gold currency fr m circulation. I do not lely on mere 
 reasoninir for the proof of tiiis, but I refer to the example 
 of every country m which small notes have been allowed to 
 circulate. In Scotland you have 1/. and 21. notes, such 
 A '2
 
 notes being nominally, and indeed practically, when ten- 
 dered by the holders, convertible into coin ; but it is, neverthe- 
 less, true that they have, in point of fact, excluded from cir- 
 culation the whole of the metallic currency. In Ireland 
 you have also 1/. and 2L notes, and the same consequence 
 has followed. In America there are, or at least there were 
 permitted, notes of still smaller value, and the result has 
 been the same not only with respect to gold coin, but to 
 silver also. The currency of the cheaper, has banished 
 that of the more precious material. So it will be in Ens;- 
 land. By permitting the issue of small notes, you will 
 aflFord a direct premium to the country banker to discourage, 
 as far as possible, the circulation of coin in his neighbour- 
 hood. No one can deny that whilst the small notes main- 
 tain their credit, they are a cheaper instrument of circula- 
 tion, and one not less efficacious than gold ; and that it 
 would be a positive pecuniary advantage to the country to 
 get rid of the gold currency altogether, if you could ensure 
 entire and permanent confidence in paper and the fixed 
 value of it, after the exclusion of gold. But I contend 
 that there is no security in an immense mass of paper cir- 
 culation, professedly convertible into gold — but not resting 
 for its basis upon a metallic circulation. You think you 
 can takeeflFectual precautions against panics, commercial or 
 political, by insisting on security from the issuers of paper. 
 There can, in truth, be no effectual security against such 
 panics and their disastrous effects. The best security is the 
 presence of a metallic currency equally diffused throughout 
 the country. But take what precautions you please to ensure 
 the solvency of country banks,— compel them, if you will, to 
 deposit Exchequer bills or funded property, or to assign 
 land as a security for their issues, — I assert, you do positively 
 nothing by these precautions to control the excessive issue 
 of paper, or to ensure the competency of these banks in the 
 time of pressure and alarm, to fulfil their engagements ; 
 which engagements are, expressly, — to pay a definite weight 
 of gold in exchange for their promissory notes. You con- 
 sider the banks safe, and the holders of bank-notes secure, 
 provided the notes are issued on the security and deposit of 
 real capital. Why, this reasoning would prove that the 
 whole landed and funded property of the country, might 
 be converted into circulating medium, and that there 
 would be no danger of excess in the issue, however ex- 
 travagant, so long as there was a corresponding deposit 
 of property. Now, in my opinion, such a deposit may be 
 the guarantee of the ultimate solvency of a particular bank, 
 in a sound state of the currency, but it is no guarantee 
 whatever that that bank will be able to pay its notes in gold
 
 on demand, after gold shall have been banished from circu- 
 lation. Depend upon it, the time will shortly come when 
 the demand will be made ; and if made and refused, what is 
 this but inabihty to meet engagements, and fulfil positive 
 contracts ? 1 admit, that by the re-issue of small notes, you 
 may give a stimulus, a fictitious stimulus to trade ; — all may 
 go on well for several months ; — gold, being no longer indis- 
 pensable for domestic circulation, will flow out of the coun- 
 try for the purpose of effecting foreign payments — the im- 
 portation of foreign articles will, for a time, be promoted — 
 the export of the gold will at first counteract the tendency 
 to an unfavourable exchange, or at least diminish the indi- 
 cations of it; — and you will, in short, have every symptom of 
 increasing prosperity ; but in the course of eighteen months 
 or two years, the currency will become excessive, the ex- 
 changes will rapidly fall, there will be a demand upon the 
 Bank for gold: — the Bank will take the alarm, will refuse 
 accommodation, and contract its issues : — the demand for 
 gold will extend to all the issuers of paper, — then will come 
 ti\e rapid and simultaneous sale of public securities, and the 
 renewal of that panic and all its consequences, of which you 
 had the disastrous experience in the winter of 1825. The 
 Bank may remain solvent in one sense — that is, may have 
 means beyond its liabilities ; but it will be unable to meet 
 its obligations to impatient creditors, who demand instant 
 payment in gold. What must be the result ? Actual 
 failure, or a restriction imposed by authority. 
 
 With respect to my Honourable Friends proposition for 
 a joint gold and silver standard, it has been already submitted 
 to this House, and has been negatived — among other rea- 
 sons, because its direct tendency, and, indeed, avowed object, 
 was to lower the standard of value. 
 
 Mr. BARING. — One word in e;;planation. I have al- 
 ways contended that, on the adoption of a gold and silver 
 standard, it must be so regulated as ncl tc lower the gene- 
 ral value of the pound sterling. 
 
 SIR ROBERT PEEL.— Then my Honourable Friend 
 must take the present market-price of silver, and not the 
 old Mint price, for the standard. The market-price of silver 
 is now, I believe, 4s. 1 Id. per ounce ; the Mint price of silver, 
 when silver was a legal tender, was 5s. 2d. per ounce. If 
 my Honourable Friend should take the Mint price of silver 
 for the standard of value, he will depreciate the present 
 standard ; if he should take the market-price, he will not 
 adhere to the ancient standard. That the same great prin- 
 ciples which apply to gold as a standard of value, in respect 
 to its controlling excessive issues, and regulating the value
 
 of paper, apply equally to silver, or to a joint standard of 
 gold and silver, I do not deny ; but there are many consi- 
 derations, — such, for instance, as whether silver ever was, 
 practically, the standard of value, in this country, after the 
 gold currency was reformed ; whether you can maintain, in 
 the same country, two metals constantly varying in their re- 
 lative value, as a standard ; whether it would be desirable to 
 maintain them if you could ; — these are considerations which 
 would require very serious inquiry, but into which I will not 
 now enter. 
 
 The third suggestion of my Honourable Friend is, that 
 every country banker shall, hereafter, be allowed to offer 
 Bank of England notes in exchange for his own notes, when 
 presented for payment. But it is impossible to stop there. 
 If a Bank of England note is to be a legal tender, on the 
 part of a country banker, so must it be on the part of 
 every other man in the country. Will my Honourable 
 Friend say that his proposition is to be limited to country 
 bankers ? That the issuers of paper shall have the special 
 exclusive privilege of discharging their debts in other paper? 
 That a customer who has deposited gold with a country 
 banker, and who asks to have that gold returned, may re- 
 ceive for answer, — " We have no gold for you, but here is 
 a Bank of Entrland note;" — while that same customer shall 
 remain under the obligation of discharging all his own debts 
 and incumbrances in standard gold ? But, suppose the cus- 
 tomer shall draw a draft upon the country banker for 41. 10*. 
 or wanting a hundred sovereigns, shall draw on successive 
 days twenty drafts for snms below 5^., how are these drafts 
 to be paid, except in eold, unless, indeed, my Honour- 
 al>!e Friend's other plan of issuing 1^. notes shall have 
 bf en already adopted ? It is clear that the issue of notes 
 below 5/. must be the concomitant of a plan which would 
 make Bank of England paper a legal tender, and would re- 
 lieve the country banker from the liability to payments in 
 cash. But these are great changes to make in our mone- 
 tary system ; so great and important, indeed, that I must 
 again say, that if a Committee were trranted to consider 
 them, there would arise all that agitation and suspense in 
 pecuniary dealings, which my Honourable Friend is the first 
 to deprecate, and which, as he justly says, would, in the 
 present artificial state of society, and the peculiar condition 
 of the commercial classes, aggravate every evil under which 
 we are now said to be suffering. 
 
 The House, Sir, will probably expect from me, or at least 
 will not be surprised, that, I should wish to state my views 
 upon the principal points which are the immediate subject of 
 debate. Such references have been made to the part I per-
 
 sonally took, in 1819, m establishing the present system of 
 our currency ; the importance of the subject is so great ; (he 
 interest I feel in it on every ground, public and private, is 
 so overuhelmino; ; that, wearied as the House must be by a 
 debate, dull and tedious from the abstruse and abstract 
 nature of its subject, I yet hope from its indulgence a patient 
 hearing. No doubt the most important part of the ques- 
 tion is, the practical one, — namely, the consideration of 
 what can be done in the present condition of society for the 
 purpose of relieving the distress alleged to exist; but si ill 1 
 cannot permit to pass without remark, the references which 
 have been made to the Act of 1819. I might pass by those 
 references if personal feelings were alone concerned. I 
 might submit, in silence, to the imputations of rashness and 
 folly, if the consequence was mere injustice to the authors 
 of the measure; but I well know that that is not the single 
 consequence ; — that if without contradiction you can stigma- 
 tize the Act of 1819 as an Act of confiscation, — if you may 
 take for granted that though possibly well intended, it was, 
 in fact, founded on injustice and injury, — I well know that 
 you cannot do this without undermininsi the foundations of 
 itie whole monetary system, and preparing for its total sub- 
 version. To avert such an evil, I am prepared to deny the 
 justice of the aspersions cast upon the measure of 1819. 
 Gentlemen who have taken part in this debate speak of the 
 promoters of that Act as if they were repentant sinners, as 
 if they acknowledged the evil which they had done, and, 
 made wise by experience, bitterly lamented the consequences 
 of their folly. I scorn those vile imputations of base, in- 
 terested motives which have been thrown out in other places. 
 1 know that they will not influence the judgment of this 
 House. I have heard none of them within these walls. I 
 would to God that I had ; and that those men who are bold 
 enough, when they have no one present to confute them, — 
 who are not sparing of their calumnies and menaces when 
 they are addressing inflammable assemblies of the people, — 
 would here, (ace to face, in presence of the accused, redeem 
 their jjiedijes, and repeat (heir accusations. 
 
 An Honourable Gentleman, the Member for Knaresbo- 
 rough with intentions, at least, for which I return him my 
 sincere (hanks, has been kind enough (o (hrovv his protecting 
 shield over me. He said, " The Bill of 18 19 was not Mr. Peel's 
 Bill. Oh, no ! he was an ingenuous young man, ignorant 
 of the suliject of currency, performing a task thrown upon 
 him by (lie Ministers, and all the tilame belongs to Lord 
 Liverpool." Sir, I will not allow the blame, if (here be blame, 
 to be transferred to any one, still less to one who is no more. 
 1 was not, in 1819, connected with the Government. I had
 
 quitted office, and had no desire to return to it ; but I was 
 the Chairman of the Committee of Inquiry, and I brought 
 in the Act of 1819 in consequence of a conviction, founded 
 on positive demonstration, that there could be no standard 
 of vahie except a definite weight of the precious metals, 
 and that a paper circulation, inconvertible, or resting on any- 
 thing but a metallic basis, must be liable to injurious fluc- 
 tuations both in amount and value, and exposed to the 
 constant hazard of discredit. In 1819, the question came 
 before the House for final decision. In my opinion, that 
 question was, the choice between two alternatives, — eternal 
 Bank restriction, or the return to cash payments without 
 further delay. — Gentlemen now speak, as if no evils had 
 been suffered before 1819. They assume that the Act of 
 1819 was brought in without experience of past embarrass- 
 ment, without the pressure of any actual evil, without any 
 expectation or demand on the part of the public ; and the 
 Member for Knaresborough is simple enough to think that 
 the House of Commons was, on a sudden, deluded by a 
 speech which the Honourable Gentleman himself heard, 
 and which he describes as void of all matter — of all reason- 
 ing — but which very strongly reminded him of the harp of 
 Orpheus. The harp of Orpheus ! Does the Honourable 
 Gentleman really think that Orpheus would have chosen, for 
 the subject of his lyre, the Bullion Report ? or that having 
 chosen it, and having poured forth a melody with soft tones, 
 but " without matter" or the " shadow of an argument," he 
 would have been able to cajole the simple understandings 
 of city merchants, and to soften the flinty hearts of Bank 
 directois ; 
 
 Mulcentemque Tigres, et agentem carmine quercus. 
 What a notion, — that the House of Commons was taken by 
 surprise on the currency question in the year 1819 ! that the 
 restoration of the metallic standard was heard of, for the 
 first time, in 1819 ! Why, the Bullion Report had been 
 made in 1810— that is, nine years before, and had provoked 
 a pamphlet from almost every man that could write. When 
 Mr. Horner proposed, in 1811, among other resolutions, 
 that cash payments should be resumed within two years of 
 that date, that resolution was negatived, and other reso- 
 lutions proposed by Mr. Vansittart were adopted. But did 
 these latter resolutions sanction the doctrine, that cash pay- 
 ments must never be resumed ? Did they intimate that the 
 public creditor must be repaid in depreciated currency ? 
 No such thing. Among these resolutions of Mr. Vansittart, 
 was one, expressly recording it as the opinion of the House, 
 that it was expedient that, at the earliest period compatible 
 with the public safety, the Bank should resume its payments
 
 in coin at the ancient standard of value. Peace arrived in 
 1814; and what course did Parliament pursue? It dis- 
 tinctly recognised the justice of resuming; cash payments. 
 It recognised the claim of the public creditor to repayment 
 in coin, and hmited the further restriction on the Bank to 
 one year. In 1815, war again broke out, and the battle of 
 Waterloo was fought. The restriction was continued ; but 
 ■was again limited to one year. The year 1816 came, and it 
 was found necessary to continue the restriction for a further 
 
 Seriod of two years ; but in the preamble of the continuing 
 ill, there was admitted, by universal consent, a distinct 
 recognition that the Bank ought to prepare for the imme- 
 diate resumption of cash payments : 1818 arrived, and there 
 was again an almost unanimous expression of opinion in 
 Parliament, that the time had arrived when the ancient 
 standard must be restored, no one then doubting the claims 
 of the public creditor, in point of justice, or denying the 
 general policy of returning to cash payments. Another 
 postponement, however, took place, limited to a year; but 
 in 1819, the House became weary of these continued delays, 
 and a Committee was appointed, mainly on the suggestion, 
 and at the instance of Mr. Tierney, to inquire into the whole 
 subject, and the best mode of insurins the resumption of 
 cash payments. As I have already said, I was not in office, 
 but I was selected as Chairman of that Committee, and I 
 presented its report to the House. The substance of it was, 
 that at the end of four years from its date, cash payments, 
 according to the ancient standard, must be resumed ; but 
 that the resumption should be effected by gradual steps, 
 assuming the actual market-price of gold, at the time, as the 
 preparatory and provisional standard. I ask the House this 
 question, — if cash payments were ever to be resumed, had 
 not the time then arrived ? Four years had elapsed since 
 the peace, when the inquiry was commenced ; and if we 
 had then deferred the actual resumption to a later period 
 than 1823 — that is, for more than eight years after the con- 
 clusion of peace, — do you think it ever would have taken 
 place at all ?— that the Bank, or the public would have be- 
 lieved that we were in earnest ? I greatly doubt whether 
 the old doctrines about paper and gold are not still main- 
 tained — whether there are not many of those whom I am 
 now addressing, who dream of inconvertible paper, or of 
 some other foundation for paper currency, than a metallic 
 basis. 
 
 Several Honourable Members. — No! no! 
 
 SIR ROBERT PEEL.— I rejoice to hear the denial ; but 
 this I know, that many of the arguments urged by those
 
 10 
 
 who vote for the Committee, apply with as much force to 
 the adoption of any determinate, unvarying metallic stand- 
 ard, as to the ancient standard. 
 
 I have now done with the assertion, that the House was 
 taken by surprise by the Act of 1819. T approach another 
 assertion — that although, in 1 8 1 9, it might be tit to prepare for 
 cash payments, yet that another standard of value should 
 have been adopted, and that the ounce of gold should have 
 been coined into bl. or 6^., or some other sum, instead of 
 3/. ] 7s. 1 (i\d. That is easy wisdom, — (even if in this case it 
 be wisdom) — which is acquired afier the event. It is very 
 well to say now — that the ancient standard should not have 
 been resumed — that after all the promises made during the 
 war — after the unanimous expressions of opinion, repeated, 
 time after time, in favour of the resumption of cash pay- 
 ments at the ancient standard — another, and a lower 
 standard should have been taken ; but I should like to ask 
 any impartial man, who remembers the state of public feel- 
 ing and public opinion in 1819, what would have been the 
 fate of a proposition, in that year, to enable the Bank to dis- 
 charge its promissory notes at the rate of 15*. in the pound! 
 What ! — with the feeling on the sul)ject of forgery of notes 
 — with the impression that the Bank had amassed great 
 gains by means of the Bank restriction— that the nominal 
 rise, in the price of gold, was owing to exces.sive and most 
 profitable issues of paper, do you think that Parliament 
 would have tolerated — would have listened for one moment 
 to — the proposal, that the issuers of the Bank of England 
 paper, and of all other paper, should compound with their 
 creditors, by debasing the standard ? Wtio was the Minis- 
 ter that could have reconciled Parliament, or the people of 
 this country, to such a proposal? Why, the Bank itself 
 never denied its own liability to pay its notes, at some time 
 or other, in gold at the ancient standard. Nay, the Bank 
 did ac'ually, of its own accord — without any compulsion on 
 the part of Parliament, — after the peace, but before this fatal 
 year, 1819; issue above 7,000,000 of gold sovereigns 
 in exchange for its promissory notes. A foolish issue I 
 admit ; but an issue, demonstrating the opinion of the Bank, 
 as to the nature of its ownobiijiations ; — and yet, in 1819, 
 we were, — against the opinions, and conviction, and practice 
 of the Bank itself— to enable the Bank to pay with 15*. a 
 debt of 20s. ! 
 
 If the Act of 1819 was so clearly unjust — so manifestly 
 impolitic — how CHme it, that of all those who now take 
 credit for their wisdom and foresight — not one man was 
 found, in either House of Parliament, bold enough 
 or honest -enough to take the sense of either House
 
 n 
 
 against the Bill, or against any one of its enactments? 
 Ttie Member for Coveniry did, indeed, bring forward 
 resolutions op[)osed, not to the principles of mine, but 
 to some of the details ; but he found the sense of the 
 House so adverse to him, that he withdrew his resolutions ; 
 and those moved by me, as the foundation of the Bill, 
 passed through the House of Commons, as it stands re- 
 corded in the Parliamentary debates, without one dissentient 
 voice. Is it decent, then, in the men who were then present, 
 to impute all the subsequent distress of the country to the 
 rashness and haste of the measure of 1819, — and to me, as 
 the author of it, — when they who now claim credit for having 
 so clearly fdreseen the difficulties in which it would involve 
 us, never came forward to oppose its principles, or even 
 delay its progress? But I have understated the case. There 
 were two amendments proposed to the measure, — one in 
 this House, and one in the House of Lords. That proposed 
 to this House affirmed that there ought to be no inter- 
 mediate steps of resumption, and that cash payments at the 
 ancient standard should be resumed in 1822, instead of 
 1823 ; — actually a year earlier than I myself proposed. That 
 was the only amendment proposed in this House, and 
 pressed to a division. The amendment nroposed in the 
 other House of Parliament was by Lord Holland, who, for 
 the purpose of recording his opinion, moved that cash pay- 
 ments be resumed in 1820, instead of 1823. Have I not, 
 then, a right to say, (if I wanted to shrink from any perso- 
 nal responsibility, which I do not,) since the only complaint 
 put on record by any Member was, that the resumption was 
 too gradual, and too remote, — have I not a right to say, 
 that Parliament is peculiarly and specially responsible for 
 the Act of 1819? 
 
 I approach the last, and the most important consideration 
 connected with the measure of 1819: namely, this — Is the 
 distress of the country fairly attri!)utable in the whole, or in 
 any important degree, to that measure ? I think I have 
 shewn, first, that Parliament was not taken by surprise; — 
 secondly, that the measure was not the measure of an indi- 
 vidual, or of a party, or of a Government ; but was the 
 measure of the Parliament, speaking the voice, and repre- 
 senting the deliberate judgment of the country. Still, 
 these considerations are not to fetter us from reviewing 
 the measure, if it have been the cause of public evil, 
 and if that evil be now reparable; but both these hypo- 
 theses must be proved. Now, I begin by admitting that 
 there has been great depression of price, great occasional 
 distress, — from some cause or ot her, — since t he peace. N ay, 
 more, I will admit that some distress was the inevitable
 
 12 
 
 consequence of the measure of resumption. Resumption 
 implied the termination of that state of ease, which, no 
 doubt, in one sense, accompanied inconvertible paper — it 
 ensured also, inevitably, some increase in the value of the 
 currency of the country, and pro tanto affected the then 
 existing engagements. But to attribute the whole de- 
 pression of prices, and the whole distress consequent on 
 that depression to the change in the currency is a fallacy, 
 as gross as any that ever was imposed upon the under- 
 standings of men. You may contend that Mr. Ricardo was 
 wrong in estimating the whole change in the value of the 
 currency at 3 or 4 per cent. ; but his error (if it was an 
 error) was nothing to yours, who attribute the whole 
 alteration in prices to the change in the currency. I have 
 admitted, — and repeat — that it was impossible for us to return 
 from a system of inconvertible paper currency to a system 
 where gold or silver was the standard, without a sense of 
 pressure and restraint. It was impossible, after having so 
 long indulged in stimulants, that we could return to a 
 course of temperance and sobriety without feeling depres- 
 sion. But what lesson is it that we are taught by the past ? 
 Again to depreciate the currency ? No. " These things 
 are written for your learning." The sufferings that you 
 now undergo are the certain consequences of the original 
 departure from right principles. They cannot be alleviated: 
 they will only be aggravated by abandoning those principles 
 now. They ought to warn you, that having restored a 
 metallic standard, you ought to adhere to it, and not again 
 to enter upon a course, the return from which is no doubt 
 attended with pressure and difficulty, but with no evil com- 
 parable to that of the indefinite continuance of an incon- 
 vertible paper currency. 
 
 No doubt there has been a great depression of prices ; 
 but this I say, that if any man hopes, by any system 
 of currency, to bolster up prices to those of the war, he is 
 miserably mistaken. Look at the duration and character 
 of that war, commencing in 1793, and lasting till 1815. 
 During this period of twenty-two years you had an incon- 
 vertible paper currency, — you monopolized the whole supply 
 of Europe with manufactured articles, — you were the only 
 country in Europe not subject to hostile invasion, — and you 
 had the command of the seas. Do you think such a state 
 of things could cease, and perfect tranquillity be restored to 
 the whole world, — and that you could yet maintain the prices 
 of the war ? 
 
 My Honourable Friend quotes Mr. Thornton as having 
 admitted that prices had been raised during the war 40 or 
 50 per cent; but Mr. Thornton was then speaking of the
 
 13 
 
 years 1810 and 1811, when the war was raging, and when 
 all the other causes of high price were in full vigour. Now, 
 in 1819, four years after the peace, many of these causes 
 had ceased to operate ; prices had already come down ; and 
 our bloated and turgid prosperity had collapsed with the 
 return to peace, and the cessation of war monopoly and 
 war stimulants. We hear the distress since 1819 de- 
 scribed in terms as if distress was unknown at previous 
 periods — as if there could be no cause of distress but the 
 resumption of cash payments. In the year 1793 was there 
 no distress? Did not 100 bankers fail? Was there none 
 in 1797 ? Was there no distress in 1810, when you had an 
 inconvertible paper currency, and with little prospect of the 
 return to a metallic standard? In that year a Committee 
 was appointed for the express purpose of administering 
 relief to the commercial community. It was in evidence 
 before that Committee that prices had fallen 50, 60, and 70 
 per cent. Wherefore was this, — if the doctrine be true that 
 inconvertible paper, or enlarged issues of paper, will be a 
 security against commercial failure and general pecuniary 
 embarrassment ? You had an inconvertible paper currency 
 in the years 1816 and 1817 — you had no contraction of 
 paper by the Bank of England in those years, as compared 
 with the average of former years — quite the reverse ; and 
 yet, many country bankers failed, and involved large masses 
 of the community in misery. The proof is quite conclusive, 
 that the enhancement of the currency must be dated from a 
 much earlier period than from the year 1819. I could prove 
 this from the distinct admissions of those who now ask for 
 this Committee, which, if it is to have any practical result 
 at all, must lead to a depreciation of the currency. What 
 will be the effect of that depreciation? Why, that every 
 man who has entered into contracts (not merely during the 
 last four or five, but, as I shall shew, during the last 
 eighteen years) will have them disturbed in the most unex- 
 pected and unjust manner. If, indeed, you could take 
 from the public creditor, who lent money in the depre- 
 ciated currency of the war, and who has received pay- 
 ment in the appreciated currency of the peace, the difference 
 between the sums paid and received (though you would 
 commit, in my opinion, a most dishonest act), there would 
 be, at any rate, an intelligible pretext for the proceeding. 
 But the effect of depreciating the currency, now, will have no 
 such operation, but it will disturb all unfulfilled contracts 
 which have been made in the improved currency, — being 99 
 out of every 100 of the total number. These contracts, as 
 I before said, are not limited to recent years ; do not date 
 merely from 1823, when the Bill of 1819 came into full
 
 14 
 
 operation; — but extend over, at least, the whole period that 
 has elapsed since the peace. To prove this, I put into the 
 witness-box, the Honourable Member for Birmingham. He 
 will confirm my statement, that the enhancement of tlie 
 currency began many years before 1819. On the 2nd of 
 May, 1817, he wrote a letter to Mr. Vansittart, describing 
 the state of the country in respect to its monetary system m 
 connexion with trade and industry. This was two years 
 before 1819, and six years before the Act which passed in 
 that year, came into full operation. At that time there was 
 no lack of paper ; and that paper was inconvertible. Notes 
 below 5/. were issued by all banks, without restriction. 
 Yet you will see that neither abundance of paper, nor incon- 
 vertible paper, nor iZ. and 2/. notes were any securities 
 against pecuniary embarrassment and general distress. 
 But the special object for which I refer to this letter is, to 
 shew, on authority (for this purpose indisputable), that the 
 alterations in the value of money had actually taken place 
 long before 1819; and that the contracts, since 18(5, have 
 been in an enhanced currency. The Honourable Member, 
 in this letter of 1817, remarks, " Money has dout:)led in 
 value in the last five years." He says, again, — 
 
 A scarcity of money has existed for five years, which caused 
 prices to fall. 
 Now, as to distress : — 
 
 There are 40,000 manufacturers of nails in this neighbourhood. 
 The articles which they manufacture are not articles for the con- 
 sumption of war, and yet thousands of these men are perishing 
 with hunger. Sir, I speak literally, and not figuratively— thou- 
 sands of these men are perishing with hunger, or are dying by 
 inches from the effects of unwholesome and unusual food. 
 
 Now, as to land and the agricultural interest : — 
 
 The landlords have received no rent for the last four years. If 
 they have received any income from their land, it has been drawn 
 from the capital of the farmer, or from the impoverishment of 
 their land, or, at least, from the amount of the principal of their 
 land, which is fallen one-half in monied value ; and, consequently, 
 the landlord who converted his property into money a few years 
 ago, has thereby positively doubled his real capital. 
 
 Let us now hear the situation of the monied man in 
 1817:— 
 
 Observe the situation of the capitalist for the last three or four 
 years. It has been quite impossible for him to improve his cir- 
 cumstances by any kind of industry. The depression of prices 
 has mocked his labours and mortified his hopes. Let him have 
 produced whatever he will, it is quite certain that the product of 
 his industry has not repaid him the money which it cost him. 
 If an invading army could have succeeded in breaking up the 
 whole of the high roads throughout the kingdom, the conse- 
 quences would have been exactly similar to those which we have 
 already experienced, until such roads were restored.
 
 15 
 
 The products of industry could no longer have been exchanaied 
 for each other, and the natives of every district and of every vil- 
 lage would have been left to perish in the midst of plenty. This 
 has been the situation of England, in a very great measure, ever 
 since the Bullion Report first acted in breaking up the established 
 relations between property and money in the year 1810. The con- 
 tractive action then commenced : and, ever since then, until the 
 present period, in a greater or less degree, there has been a greater 
 reward in indolence than in industry. 
 
 What are the facts established by these extracts, on the 
 authority of the Member for Birmingham ? That, before 
 the Act of 1819 was dreamt of, the contraction in the 
 currency had taken place ; that it commenced five years be- 
 fore he wrote, in 1817; and that, in 1817, money was 
 doubled in value; that, in his neighbourhood, such was the 
 condition of the workina; classes, that thousands of one 
 single class — namely, manufacturers of nails — were, not 
 figuratively, — oh, no-" I speak literally, not figuratively" 
 — perishing with hunger, or dying by inches, of unwhole- 
 some food. Bear in mind these two things— that the con- 
 traction began seven years before " Peel's Bill " was intro- 
 duced, and that money was doubled in value ; and all this 
 bitter distress was endured, with inconvertible paper, and 
 1^. and 21. notes. But, perhaps, during the period of which 
 the Member for Birmingham was speaking, the Bank of 
 England had been progressively contracting its circulation. 
 By no means. The Bank issues had increased regularly 
 and rapidly from 1806 to 1817. Their amount on a given 
 day in each year — namely, the 31st of March, was as 
 follows : 
 
 In 1806 
 
 JOUD . 
 
 1807 
 
 io,ojo,uuu 
 16,6.57,000 
 
 1808 
 
 16,645,000 
 
 1809 
 
 17,840,000 
 
 1810 
 
 20,442,000 
 
 1811 
 
 23,333,000 
 
 1812 
 
 23,332,000 
 
 1813 
 
 24,000,000 
 
 1814 
 
 25,157,000 
 
 1815 
 
 27,298,000 
 
 1816 
 
 26,573,000 
 
 1817 
 
 27,138,000 
 
 At particular periods of these years, there may have been 
 fluctuations in the amount of bank-notes; and there were, 
 in 1816 and 1817, rapid contractions of the currency. You 
 refer to these contractions and their consequences as confir- 
 mations of your theory — that distress is the consequence 
 of restricted currency. We do not deny that distress will 
 follow sudden contractions of the currency ; but we assert 
 that such contractions are the inevitable consequences, the 
 necessary and painful correctives, of excessive issues. We
 
 16 
 
 admit that, by depreciating the currency, you may be able 
 to obtain higher prices for a time — to command a delusive 
 and temporary prosperity — but we say, that the foundations, 
 both of your currency and your prosperity, are sure to fail 
 you ; and that, in proportion to the artificial elevation, will be 
 the severity of the fall. You attribute the distress of 1810, 
 and 1816, and 1825 merely to the contraction of paper, and 
 consider that distress a proof that increased issues would be 
 the remedy. We assert, and in my opinion with much more 
 truth, that the excessive issues are themselves the primary 
 cause of the evil ; and while they seem the symptoms of 
 prosperity, are but generating the causes of certain and tre- 
 mendous explosion. AVhat was the remedy proposed by the 
 Member for Birmingham in 1817? What was his device 
 for enlarging the circulation — and, of course, ensuring the 
 re-establishment of prosperity ? He writes thus — 
 
 The most ready and facilitous way of effecting this object, in a 
 country like England, seems to be in converting a part ot the per- 
 manent and fixed national debt into a circulating or floating debt; 
 by creating a quantity of circulating Exchequer bills of various 
 sizes, bearing no interest, and with them buying up an equal 
 quantity of the national debt. If 10,000,000/. of additional money 
 are created in this way, there is no additional debt contracted, 
 nor is there any additional depreciation of money occasioned, pro- 
 vided the issue is not carried further than will suffice to employ 
 the whole labourers of the kingdom, at the usual wages to which 
 they have been accustomed. 
 
 What an admirable system of currency ! that rests for its 
 security upon debt, and has for its standard of value " the 
 accustomed wages of all classes of labourers throughout 
 the whole United Kingdom." 
 
 I shall now address myself to the immediate question of 
 the appointment of a Select Committee — the nature of its 
 inquiries — and their probable result. The resolution moved 
 by the Member for Whitehaven assumes the fact of uni- 
 versal distress ; and proposes an inquiry into the connexion 
 of that distress, with the present monetary system. If 
 this Committee shall be unfortunately appointed, and I 
 should be a Member of it, I shall — (and if I am not. I hope 
 that some one, who is a Member of it, will) — address the 
 Committee to this effect — " We admit a great fall of prices 
 since the war — we admit that the profits of capital are low ; — 
 but nothing will be so absurd as to assume, without the most 
 extensive inquiry, that the change in the currency has been 
 the sole or the main cause of that depression of price and 
 reduction of profits. There are many causes to be investi- 
 gated that lie very deep, and the effect of which is not easily 
 ascertained ; you cannot make a report until you have sur- 
 veyed the condition of the country for the last thirty>nine
 
 17 
 
 years — until you have inquired into the peculiar character 
 and effect of that war which frequently gave you almost a 
 monopoly of the markets of the world — into the effect of the 
 stimulus of war prices, and a large Government expenditure 
 — and into the consequences of the cessation of that stimulus. 
 If you are about to take an enlarged and philosophical view 
 of the subject, you must ascertain what has been the effect 
 of eighteen years of uninterrupted peace in reducing the 
 prices of manufactured articles throughout the civilized 
 world ; in converting those nations which were your cus- 
 tomers in time of war, into rivals and competitors in time 
 of peace ! " Why, Sir, does England hope that she can 
 retain for ever that monopoly of supply which she enjoyed 
 during war, when she had destroyed every hostile fleet — 
 when the commercial marine of every other country was ;it 
 her mercy — when every nation of Europe, except herself, — 
 when Spain, and Portugal, and Germany, and Italy, and 
 Prussia, and Belgium, and Holland, had been exposed to, 
 and were constantly menaced by, hostile invasion from the 
 arms of France ? In all these countries industry has revived. 
 They are now at liberty to turn their attention and applv 
 their capital to the supply of many of their wants by means 
 of their own peaceful labour. Does England hope to main- 
 tain war prices despite of such competition ? Look at the 
 state of manufacturing industry in America and in the coun- 
 tries which I have mentioned, and then consider what influ- 
 ence these causes must have had in reducing the prices of 
 your manufactured articles. Take, again, the influence of 
 other causes, which must, and which ouirht to, reduce prices 
 here : — the diminished hazard, both of import and export — 
 the reduction of the rates of marine msurance — but, above 
 all, the diminished cost of the raw materials, which are the 
 staple of your manufactures. You buy everything at a 
 less price, and you must sell at a less price. Is it meant 
 that you should pay a much lower price for the raw mate- 
 rial, and charge the old price for the manufactured article ? 
 Then you must inquire what has been the effect upon 
 prices, of improvements in machinery; — what the effect of 
 the application of steam, in diminishing both thi cost of 
 production and the cost of carriage. Can any one doubt 
 that the influence of all these several causes upon prices 
 and upon profits, must be ascertained before you can deter- 
 mine the degree to which they have been affected by the 
 resumption of payments in cash? Again, with respect to 
 land, — I admit that land has fallen; but, does any landlord 
 hope to maintain, since the war, the war prices ? Durins; the 
 war, an undue stimulus and excitement were given to agri- 
 cultural speculation ; land was then brought into cultivation 
 
 B
 
 18 
 
 which would not adequately repay the cost of cultivation, 
 after peace had been established. No man regrets more 
 deeply than myself the consequences, to individuals, of 
 throwing that land out of cultivation ; but the depreciation 
 of the standard will afford no remedy. Here, again, many 
 other causes — besides the increased value of money — are in 
 operation. What has been the effect of Irish importations 
 upon English prices, and on the profits of English agricul- 
 ture ? — of a perfectly free trade in corn with Ireland ? 
 Whatever it has been, it is not owing to the Bill of 1819 ; 
 it would have existed separately from that Bill. The moment 
 you opened the English markets to Irish produce, from 
 that moment the prices of English produce must have fallen. 
 Again, the operation of the poor-laws, and of their defective 
 administration, must be inquired into ; and, I repeat, you 
 will not be worthy of the name of legislators and statesmen, 
 if, having undertaken this inquiry, you do not attempt, at 
 least, to assign to each of the several causes which I have 
 mentioned, its effect in producing the fall of prices, and the 
 distress of any particular branch of industry. 
 
 It is scarcely worth referring to the mere declamation by 
 which the Act of 1819 has been assailed. It is not only 
 described as the source of every domestic calamity, but it 
 is made chargeable with the misfortunes of other nations. 
 Nay, so extensive has been its operation, that one Honour- 
 able Gentleman has discovered that the Revolution of 
 France, in 1830, was not owing to the Ordonnances of July, 
 — but that to the Act of 1819 we are to attribute the downfal 
 of the dynasty of the Bourbons ; and that Louis Philippe 
 now sits on a tottering throne, because he cannot command 
 high prices for the productions of France. The Honourable 
 Member for Whitehaven wisely considers it much better, as 
 a general rule, to deal in vague declamation, and to turn 
 eloquent periods upon " devouring poverty and appalling 
 distress," than to venture on any specific facts. Facts and 
 figures are dangerous things to meddle with, unless they 
 can be relied on ; but they are very important on questions 
 of this nature. Prophecies of evil are easily uttered — and 
 can only be met by counter-prophecies — as worthless as 
 themselves. But the Honourable Member did make an 
 occasional exception from the general rule of his speech, 
 and appealed to facts. He said, " 1 take Ireland as my 
 example ; 1 will prove everythmg by figures ; and whatever 
 I say of Ireland will be true, as applied to England." The 
 Honourable Gentleman first assumes that Irish disturbances 
 were unknown before the year 1819. His position is this. 
 All Irish disturbance grows out of controversies and quar- 
 rels about land ; and the depression of the price of agricul-
 
 19 
 
 tiiral produce, in consequence of a restricted currency, is 
 the main cause both of the distress and the insurrectionary 
 violence in Ireland. Now I meet this assertion by these 
 facts. In 1807, during the war, when prices were hiirh, and 
 when currency was unrestricted, such was the disposition to 
 disturbance in Ireland, that the Insurrection Act was intro- 
 duced, and remained in force lor several successive years. 
 It was allowed to expire ; but was introduced again in 1814 ; 
 and again remained in force for a considerable period. I 
 will not go to earlier periods. 
 
 I turn now to the picture given by the Honourable Gen- 
 tleman of the state of Ireland, in respect to agricultural 
 produce. I took down his words; they were to this 
 effect : — 
 
 The cattle liave vanished from the fields, — the plough is no 
 longer at work, — no manure is purchased, — land is going out of 
 cultivation, — agricultural produce is declining in quantity, — and 
 there is universal distress throughout the country. 
 Observe, we are not now discussing whether the profits of 
 agricultural produce are appropriated exactly as we should 
 wish. Some Irish Member probably will say, " The poor 
 of Ireland derive no benefit from the increased produce, 
 the profits are all taken away by absentees." But that is 
 not the question. We are not inquiring to whom these 
 profits ought to go — we are not determining whether the 
 relation of landlord and tenant be in a healthful and satis- 
 factory state — but whether agriculture be declining in Ire- 
 land, because capital cannot be properly applied to the 
 cultivation of the soil. 
 
 Now, I have, here, an account of the annual average 
 quantities of certain articles of agricultural produce ex- 
 ported to Great Britain in triennial periods, ending, re- 
 spectively, 5th January, 1810, 1820, 182G, and 1830:— 
 
 In the period ending 1810, there were exported, on an 
 average, 
 
 Oxen. Sheep. Swine. 
 
 19,376 10,203 9830 
 
 In that ending 1826, the numbers were. 
 
 Oxen. Sheep. Swine. 
 
 57,395 62,819 73,912 
 
 Wheat CQrs.) Oats and Oatmeal (Qrs.) 
 In 1810 . . . 61,097 673,895 
 
 1826 . . . 375,781 
 1830 . . . 525,619 1,697,509 
 
 Now, I ask with confidence, after this statement of facts, 
 what becomes of the assertion, that, in Ireland, cattle have 
 vanished from the fields— that the plough is idle — that the 
 land is left without manure — and that production is rapidly 
 B 2
 
 20 
 
 on the decline ? The Honourable Gentleman then referred 
 to the progress of crime in England ; and here again he can 
 find no other cause for the increase of crime, but the Bill of 
 1819, and the contracted currency. I pass by, of course, 
 the eloquent declamation on the evil of increasing crime. 
 I find it utterly impossible to deny that where criminals 
 increase, morality is probably on the decline ; or to contest 
 the fact, that hardened criminals are dangerous members of 
 society, whose numbers ought, if possible, to be reduced. 
 We are all agreed upon these truths ; but the point at issue 
 is this: — Has the increase of crime varied inversely with 
 the increase of paper; and can you fairly charge, on the re- 
 storation of the standard, the additional number of criminal 
 committals? Here, again, I refer to the only authentic 
 data — the official returns. They prove that, during the war, 
 and since the war, there has been an increase of crime ; but 
 they warrant a presumption that there must have been 
 other causes of that increase in operation, besides contrac- 
 tions in the currency. The committals for crime in Enijland 
 and Wales were as follow, in the several years I shall men- 
 tion : — 
 
 Committals in England and Wales. 
 
 Years. 
 
 Criminal Committals. 
 
 1811 
 
 5337 
 
 18)3 
 
 7164 
 
 181.5 
 
 7818 
 
 1816 . . . . 
 
 9191 
 
 1818 
 
 . 1.3,567 
 
 1820 
 
 . 13,710 
 
 1821 
 
 . 13.115 
 
 1822 
 
 . 12,241 
 
 1823 
 
 . 12,263 
 
 1825 
 
 . 14,437 
 
 Now, of these years, the Honourable Gentleman has 
 mentioned two in splendid contrast to all others — years 
 when paper was abundant — when there was a full demand 
 for labour — when prices and profits were high. The years 
 were 1818 and 1825. Now, surely, according to the theory 
 of the Honourable Gentleman, crime ought to have dimi- 
 nished in those years. But what was the fact.' Why, 
 that, in 1818, the criminal committals were more numerous 
 than in any preceding year, with one exception ; and that, 
 in the year 1825, they were more numerous than in any 
 preceding year, without a single exception. Now I have 
 no theory on this subject. I do not maintain that crime 
 increased because paper issues increased ; but 1 doubt the 
 soundness of the Honourable Gentleman's theory^at least, 
 I altogether deny his facts, that crime decreased as paper 
 issues were extended. I am well aware of the rejoinder to
 
 21 
 
 these statements. " We have no confidence in official docu- 
 ments: they may be fabricated, and, at any rate, they are 
 Jitterly unworthy of credit if they be referred to to disprove 
 the distress which we know to exist." But, surely, our 
 inquiry turns not upon cases of local distress ; but upon the 
 tjeneral condition of the country ; and how can he form any 
 judijment of that condition, except by a reference to official 
 returns, to the general aggregate of the varied transactions 
 of the whole country? It was just in this spirit that the 
 Member for one of the Ridings of Yorkshire made an 
 attempt to answer the able and unanswerable speech of the 
 Vice-President of the Board of Trade. 
 
 The Right Honourable Gentleman justly observed, that 
 in order to ascertain whether the people be really suffering 
 under distress of a character such as that which has been 
 represented, you must not take particular instances of indi- 
 vidual or local distress, and thence infer their general 
 existence ; but you must look at official documents to ascer- 
 tain the increased or decreased amount of comfort at dif- 
 ferent periods, as exhibited in the consumption of articles 
 of general use. Now, what were the individual cases 
 which the Honourable Gentleman, the Member for the 
 North Riding of Yorkshire, offered, to refute the reasoning 
 of the Vice-President of the Board of Trade? He selected 
 three places in order to prove, from the distress there pre- 
 vailing, the general suffering of the country ; and the three 
 fair criteria which he assumed were Oldham and the dis- 
 tricts near it, Macclesfield and Whitby. Admirable selec- 
 tions for the purpose ! The first is a district in which 
 there are probably more hand-loom weavers than in any 
 other, and was therefore wisely selected as affording in- 
 stances of individual distress. Macclesfield, it is well 
 known, has been greatly injured by the establishment of the 
 silk manufacture in Manchester. The greater amount of 
 capital, and the larger command over labour and improved 
 machinery which Lancashire possesses, must necessarily 
 render it a very formidable competitor with other places, 
 and Macclesfield among the rest. The rapid progress of 
 civilization, and the development of mechanical skill, have, 
 I fear, a tendency to produce cases of local distress, by 
 attracting manufacturing industry from places where it has 
 heretofore flourished to more favoured spots ; but these 
 vicissitudes (lamentable as their effects are in particular 
 cases) may be indications of general prosperity and im- 
 provement, rather than of general suffering and decline. 
 And Whitby, too ! True — we gave it a Member last year ; 
 but then we all admitted it to be in a declining state, from
 
 22 
 
 the local operation of some causes which had led to a 
 transfer of its trade. 
 
 Sir, I consider by far the most important consideration 
 connected with this question to be, its bearing upon the 
 condition of the labourina; classes. One of the main mo- 
 tives for introducing the Act of 1819 arose from a deep 
 conviction that a constantly depreciating standard was 
 working the ruin of those classes. I was satisfied by evi- 
 dence and by reasoning that when you depreciate the stand- 
 ard, the prices of the necessaries of life rise much faster 
 than the wages of labour ; and I was convinced that one of 
 the main causes of the gradually declining condition of the 
 industrious classes arose from depreciated paper currency. 
 A constant effort is now made to impress upon those classes 
 a belief that their distress has arisen from the restriction on 
 paper ; but I hope they are beginning to understand the true 
 nature of the question, I, too, make my appeal to them. If 
 you can enlist them on your side, no doubt you will have an 
 important ally: if you can convince them that the restora- 
 tion of inconvertible paper, or a recurrence to a depreciated 
 standard, will be for their advantage,— if, in addresses to 
 political unions, you can successfully denounce those who 
 are favourable to the maintenance of the standard as ene- 
 mies to the labouring classes, — you will, no doubt, materially 
 advance the object you have in view. But I appeal, confi- 
 dently, to the industrious classes of society. I tell them, their 
 true friends are they who resist a depreciation of the 
 standard, and who maintain the payment of their wages in 
 money of the present value, from the conviction that if that 
 value be lowered, the price of necessaries will increase much 
 more rapidly than the pay of labour. The most affecting 
 statements have been made of the condition of certain classes 
 of the manufacturers. One Honourable Gentleman in par- 
 ticular, the Member for Oldham (Mr. Fielden), gave a de- 
 tailed account of their state in that district with which he is 
 more immediately connected. Sir, it is impossible to deny 
 that that is a district in which there exists severe distress. It 
 contains a large body of that particular description of manu- 
 facturers who used to gain a livelihood by working at the 
 hand-loom. I know something of their condition, and am 
 ready to admit that it is one deeply to be lamented. The 
 Honourable Gentleman, who made this statement, says that 
 he employs 3000 power-looms, and that nothing would 
 make him more miserable than the reflection that by the 
 use of that machinery he had contributed to the distress of 
 the hand-loom weavers. Then, Sir, the Honourable Mem- 
 ber must make up his mind to be miserable ; for nothing is
 
 23 
 
 more true than that the sudden improvement and universal 
 use of machinery, and especially ofthe power-loom, have had, 
 a considerable effect upon the condition of those who lived 
 by manual weavins. The Honourable Gentleman says that 
 the power-loom has been known many years. Why, so was 
 steam navigation known before it was applied; but it is' 
 only within a few years that the power-loom has been 
 brought into almost universal use. The hand-loom weaver 
 (I speak of some parts of Lancashire with which I am ac- 
 quainted) was frequently a small farmer who resided at a 
 distance from a town, cultivating a small portion of land for 
 the subsistence of his family, and earning a part of his 
 livelihood by working at The hand-loom. When the power- 
 loom was brought into use, that man was placed in a situa- 
 tion of peculiar disadvantage ; for hand-loom weavmg could 
 not compete with that of ihe power-loom, and the main 
 spring of his industry was broken. But this is only another 
 instance in which the application of mechanical ingenuity and 
 capital to the perfection of machinery, and the progress of 
 social improvement, have, by the rapidity of their effects, 
 depressed a particular class. It is, surely, absurd to argue 
 from that depressinn that the whole country is in a declining 
 state. But I ask whether the Honourable Gentleman has 
 given the truth, and the whole truth, with respect to the 
 condition of Oldham? 
 
 I have before me the account of the Poor Law Commis- 
 sioners, and it is certainly much at variance with that ofthe 
 Honourable Gentleman. I have seen, too, a letter, which 
 appeared in the public papers, written from Oldham — the 
 letter, apparently, of a writer whose information is extensive 
 and authentic, — giving an account of the demand for labour, 
 generally, and its remuneration in that parish. The writer 
 signs hmiself " An Elector of Oldham," and writes thus: — 
 
 Perhaps no town in Britain has increased in a greater ratio 
 than Oldham, none where fortunes have been accumulated with 
 greater rapidity; nor is there any town where, taken collectively, 
 the working classes are more comfortable in their circumstances, 
 or obtain a better remuneration for their labour. Distress, 
 from particular circumstances, does exist in Oldham, and one 
 main cause of it is the great influx of labourers and artisans from 
 neighbourhoods not enjoying the same prosperity and advan- 
 tages that Oldham possesses. Another cause, and that a prin- 
 cipal one, is the circumstance of the power-loom supplanting the 
 hand-loom, or, in other words, the hand-loom weaver is contend- 
 ing with the power-loom in producing an article at as cheap a rate. 
 The weavers are, however, finding by sad experience that this 
 is the case, and, as fast as circumstances will allow, are quitting 
 their original trade and adopting others. This class of men (taking 
 them as a body, a very exemplary and worthy one) are many of 
 them in a very destitute situation ; few of them can earn more
 
 24 
 
 than from 5*. to 7s. per week. Science may sometimes, as it does 
 in this instance, destroy capital and abridge labour, but it is to 
 reproduce it, not only with an immense increase, but with a great 
 additional advantage and comfort to society at large. The regular 
 wages paid here to those whose occupation is generally considered 
 as receiving the minimum of remuneration — the labourers— is 
 2s. Gd. to 35. per day. Bricksetters' labourers are paid 2s. 8d. per 
 day, with an allowance of three pints of beer per day. Brick- 
 setters 3s. to 3s. 6d., with the same allowance of beer ; and if either 
 labourers or setters work what are termed " over-hours," that is 
 before seven o'clock in the morning, or after six in the evening, 
 such time is always paid for in the same proportion ; so that a 
 labourer may obtain 3s. 4d. per day, and setters 3s. 9d. to 4s. 4|d. 
 Joiners, masons, carpenters, slaters, and other artisans, generally 
 are paid not less than bricksetters, with the same allowance of 
 beer. That these prices are paid throughout the borough, I could 
 bring hundreds of witnesses to prove. Hats were formerly the 
 staple trade of Oldham, but of late years have been greatly super- 
 seded in extent by that gigantic branch of commerce — the cotton 
 trade. The hatters, as a body, are fairly paid, some branches of 
 the trade extravagantly, and all tolerably well employed. In the 
 cotton-mills the men's wages are from 15s. to 30s.; women and 
 children's from 2s. M. to 8s. or 10s. Although the population 
 of the township of Oldham has increased from 16,690 in the year 
 1811, to 32,381 in the year 1831, still the amount of poor-rates 
 levied is no more in the pound than it was at the former period; 
 and in the years 1816 and 1817, they were nearly double the 
 present amount. In the year ending March, 1832, there was levied 
 in England, for poor-rates, 8,255,315i. 12s., out of which there 
 was expended for the relief of the poor, 6,731,131/. 10s.; conse- 
 quently the amount of relief, taking the population at 13,086,675, 
 would be 10s. 'dkd. per head, averaging the whole of England. 
 The amount paid the poor in Oldham in the last year, was 
 3313L 13s. Id., or averaging 2s. 0§(i. per head ; thus shewing, that 
 if the amount expended in relieving the poor is any criterion of 
 the situation of the working classes, Oldham stands but at one- 
 fifth proportion when put in comparison with the rest of England. 
 Since the time of the panic, in the years 1825 and 1826, a period 
 in which many towns have been retrograding, there has been 
 expended in public improvements (and we have no corporation, 
 or anything like it, to promote such expenses), upwards of 
 100,000/. 
 
 This statement is exactly confirmed by the Report of the 
 Commissioners. They say that Oldham has, at a former 
 period, suffered, from causes which they mention, con- 
 siderable distress ; but that, with the exception of the hand- 
 loom weavers, it is in an improving and prosperous con- 
 dition. The faihire of a bank in the neighbourhood, after 
 the panic of 1825, was one of the main causes of the distress 
 in Oldham ; and it is because the permission again to issue 
 1^. and 21. notes would lead to the same circumstances 
 which produced that failure, that I now pause before I con- 
 sent to a proposal for their re-issue. 
 Sir, I have made it an object of care to inquire what is
 
 25 
 
 the condition of artisans in the midland districts; and I 
 have, here, an account of the rate of wages paid, at present, 
 in several towns in Litchfield, Coventry, Birmingham, and 
 other places, to the following descriptions of workmen : 
 carpenters, masons, bricklayers, plumbers, plasterers, and 
 painters. I take Birmingham; in that town they are as 
 follows : — 
 
 
 s. d. s. d. 
 
 Carpenters 
 
 . from 3 4 to 4 2 
 
 Masons 
 
 .36 40 
 
 Bricklayers 
 
 .34 3 10 
 
 Bricklayers' labourers 
 
 .22 26 
 
 Plasterers . 
 
 .34 40 
 
 Painters 
 
 .36 60 
 
 Plumbers . 
 
 .40 50 
 
 The rate of wages in other towns varies but little from the 
 above. Some small reduction must be made from this 
 amount of wages in the case of carpenters, masons, and 
 bricklayers, on account of the expense of tools which they 
 have to provide ; but the rate of wages appears ample to 
 ensure, with present prices, a decent and comfortable main- 
 tenance for the workman and his family. What is the 
 object of this motion — the object distinctly and in terms 
 avowed by the Member for the North Riding of Yorkshire 
 (Mr. Cayley) ? To raise prices; — no doubt that is the in- 
 tention, and will be the effect of it. How can any one 
 doubt that the workman who now earns wages of from 
 3*. 6g?. to 4*. a-day, has a much greater command over the 
 necessaries and comforts of life than he would have, were 
 you to increase the currency, and raise the prices of pro- 
 visions and all other articles? I believe it to be a fact 
 established by official papers and returns of the quantities 
 of articles of general use consumed, that the condition of 
 the labouring classes is greatly improved since the period 
 when we had an inconvertible, unrestricted paper currency. 
 If you compare the consumption of ho])S, of malt, of tea 
 and coffee, at different periods, you will find that the in- 
 dustrious classes have now a much greater command of 
 those necessaries of life than they had before. If the fact 
 be so, I call on you, as you value the true interests of the 
 people, to pause before you lend your sanction to any scheme, 
 the avowed purpose of which is to increase the price of the 
 necessaries of life. 
 
 If this Committee be appointed, when will its labours 
 terminate ? It is not a Committee to adjust the details of 
 some plan, on the principle of which those who support the 
 Committee are agreed, but a Committee without a plan, 
 and the members of which entertain principles the most con- 
 flicting. Let us survey the course of this debate, and see
 
 26 
 
 whether, amona: the advocates of inquiry, (I say nothing of 
 the opposers, of whom, I suppose, some portion will be on 
 the Committee,) there is that uniformity of general views — 
 that we may expect from their labours any early remedy for 
 our distress. The Honourable Gentleman who spoke first, 
 the author of the motion, was wise enough to produce no 
 plan — to avoid the sugo;estion of any specitic remedy. He 
 complained, indeed, that the monetary system was mani- 
 festly defective; for the population had increased, — the pro- 
 duce had increased, — but we had tied down the standard, 
 and prevented its increase. The Honourable Gentleman 
 might just as well complain that " roads have increased — 
 new countries have been discovered, — but, alas ! the yard 
 and the mile remain of the same length as before." We 
 hear of an "antiquated standard;" as if the standard had 
 got decrepid throui^h ase. You might as well say that the 
 pound weight or the quart measure was too antiquated for 
 present use. A definite weight of metal is as much a 
 standard, a measure of value, as either the one or the other. 
 If the Honourable Gentleman does not mean the standard, 
 but the amount of currency, he is totally in error in sup- 
 posing that the currency cannot vary in amount — cannot 
 accommodate itself to the growing wants of the people — 
 because the standard is invariable. Every improvement in 
 the economical use of money is a variation in the amount 
 of the currency ; and the Honourable Gentleman's objec- 
 tion, if it be worth anything, is fatal to any standard at all. 
 The Honourable Gentleman, however, contented himself 
 with the attempt to shew that the present system is charge- 
 able with every imaginable evil ; but, as 1 before said, he 
 wisely abstained from the suggestion of any remedy. 
 
 He was followed by the Member for Oldham (Mr. Cobbett), 
 who was ready to agree with him in his vote, but totally 
 abjured his principles. I must say that I never was more 
 disappointed than by the speech of the Member for Oldham. 
 He began by claiming peculiar indulgence for himself on 
 account of his profound study of the whole subject, and 
 because no man ever made a speech upon it, containing 
 right principles, which was not borrowed from him. " The 
 Noble Lord," he says, "made a good speech; but, then, it was 
 all copied from me." I think 1 may assure the Honourable 
 Member that he need not entertain any fears of plagiarism 
 in respect to the speeches which he delivers in this House. 
 I have heard nothing from him, on any occasion, for which 
 he may not reckon on a copyright which will never be in- 
 fringed. So little did his observations refer to the question 
 before us, that while he was engajied in their delivery, an 
 ingenuous young Member, who entered the House at the
 
 27 
 
 time, inquired from me " whether the currency question was 
 over?'" I said "No; this is the currency question." He 
 replied, " I thought, from his speech, that it was ihe navy 
 estimates." All that the Honourable Member could pro- 
 duce on this question of the currency was, the notes of an 
 old speech which he had intended to make on the navy esti- 
 mates. The Honourable Member wants no depreciation 
 of the standard, — he will have no issue of paper— {." rotten 
 paper" — I fear he said in the hearinsj of the Member for Bri- 
 mingham.) " Oh, no; give me," he says, "the King'scoin, 
 with the Kms's imasre upon it." There is something so 
 amiable in his loyalty that one would forgive his errors, even 
 if he be wronsr. Still he consents to go into the Committee, 
 the object of which is to depreciate the standard, and all the 
 remedy he proposes for all our distresses and all our evils, is 
 to cut down every estimate, and every expense, to the level 
 of 1 792. " And yet," says the Honourable Member, " Eng- 
 land ought to assume a high tone, and till poor Pitt was 
 corrupted by the Whiijs, she did assume a high tone ; Spain 
 and France were not allowed to have navies, and they ought 
 not to be allowed to have navies ;" — but hovv we are to main- 
 tain this high tone, and control the naval force of Europe, 
 with the Estimates of 1792, the Honourable Member did 
 not clearly shew. I should like to ask him, how would he 
 deal with the possessions that have been acquired since 
 1792,— with the Cape of Good Hope, and Malta, and the 
 Mauritius? The Honourable Gentleman says that we had 
 a most successful war; that we annihilated the naval force 
 of all our enemies : — and yet he is surprised that we have 
 more admirals at the end of that war than we had at its 
 commencement ! This Gentleman was the second speaker 
 in favour of the motion ; the third was the Member for 
 Knaresborough, who says that the plan of the Honourable 
 Member for Oldham (of course, one of his colleagues in the 
 Commiitee) is a plan of confiscation, rapine, and blood. 
 His remedy was the total abolition of coin, and the payment 
 of bank-notes in bars of gold. The fourth speaker was the 
 Honourable Member for Wolverhampton. He says, main- 
 tain the standard, but throw every burden on the land; the 
 land had, he observed, escaped every charge, and it was but 
 right that it should be made responsible, now, for the national 
 debt. Then came the Honourable Member for the North 
 Riding of Yorkshire. His remedy, we know, is a rise of 
 prices. 
 
 The Honourable Gentleman, the Member for Birming- 
 ham, has nut yet spoken ; 1 know not whether he still adheres 
 to the plan which he recommended in 1S17 for an unlimited 
 deprecirttion of the standard, and whether he still maintains
 
 28 
 
 the proposition which he then maintained, that you always 
 ought to take the market-price of bullion as the criterion of 
 value, and that you might go on issuing bank-notes, and 
 raising that market-price, even until you made the guinea 
 I)ass for lOOZ. or 200/., without causing injury to any one — 
 except, possibly, the public annuitant, who should take care 
 of himself, or of whom the Government might lake care. 
 
 Mr. ATTWOOD. — Provided you raised prices to the war 
 level only. 
 
 SIR ROBERT PEEL— I believe there was no such 
 qualification ; but if there was, it makes no difference. Now, 
 perhaps, it miglit be right to add to the Committee some 
 opponents of these six or seven Gentlemen ; but send even 
 them, alone, into a Committee, with the opinions they enter- 
 tain, to consider this question, — to examine all the other 
 questions which I have mentioned, — and I should like 
 to ask what probability there would be of any practical 
 remedy ? You find a patient labouring under every disease ; 
 and for his cure you send for physicians entertaining totally 
 opposite opinions on his case. Sangrado is summoned 
 from Oldham, and Cuchilla from Birmingham. But what 
 will be the condition of the patient meanwhile? why he will 
 be utterly neglected, while the enraged doctors are debating 
 about their principles, and cuffing each other. 
 
 Will the country believe that the real object of the Com- 
 mittee is any other than a depreciation of the standard ? 
 What will be the consequence on commercial transactions? 
 Will any man sell an estate ? If there be a prospect that 
 in two months the sovereign will pass for 25*., will not every 
 man get the sovereign as soon as he can ? If you send it 
 forth to the world that you will have a vague inquiry, which 
 will probably end in depreciation, the consequence, the 
 inevitable consequence, will be, ruin to every debtor — to the 
 class you intend to benefit. All debts that can be exacted 
 without delay, will be,^and justly ; for the debt, ifcontracted 
 within the last eighteen years, was contracted in the improved 
 currency. Every man who enforces the payment of such 
 debts due to him will have not only law, but equity and 
 honesty on his side. What will be the condition of the banks 
 which have undertaken to discharge their promissory notes 
 in gold, and to receive deposits of gold from their customers ? 
 Will not the depositors demand their deposits, and the 
 holders of notes press for payment, without delay? Again, 
 will any man advance 20,000/. in sovereigns, on a mortgage, 
 when he is certain of being repaid in a depreciated currency? 
 The question at issue is not depreciation or no depreciation. 
 The Vice-President of the Board of Trade, in so describing
 
 29 
 
 it, has stated it too unfavourably for his own argument ; 
 the question is, whether depreciation shall be ultimately 
 effected after a tedious protracted inquiry ? That is quite 
 a different question from sudden depreciation. Such depre- 
 ciation is bad enousih, but, as the result of a lingering 
 inquiry, it would be the greatest curse that was ever in- 
 flicted. What is the country suffering under ? I believe 
 it to be suffering partly from the a<;itation connected with 
 the political excitement of recent times, partly from a state 
 of doubt and suspense as to the final settlement of great 
 questions atfectino; our commercial policv. The Bank 
 Charter is still under consideration, the East and West 
 India questions are not yet arranged ; if to these causes of 
 restlessness you are going to superadd doubts as to the 
 standard, — if this be your remedy for calming the excite- 
 ment that prevails, and mitigating the doubt and suspense 
 that hang upon other unsettled que>tions, — for God's sake 
 close your doors, and de[)art to your homes; for your 
 sittings here will throw chaos into worse confusion. 
 
 Sir, I shall now conclude. The subject is far from ex- 
 hausted — but there are limits to the patience of the House. 
 Before I sit down, let me make an earnest appeal to those 
 whom I address, to weigh well the consequences of the 
 vote they may give. If they foresee that injustice will be 
 done by the unsettlement of the contracts cf twenty years, — 
 that confusion will arise — that commercial dealings will be 
 paralyzed by doubts as to the future value of the currency ; — 
 above all, if they see cause to apprehend that the wages of 
 labour will not rise in any corresponding ratio with the rise 
 of prices, and that, therefore, the condition of the labourer 
 will be depressed, — let them reject the plausible appeal, 
 " that distress ought to be inquired into," and refuse to do a 
 great public wrong, though it l)e covered with a specious 
 veil. I say respectfully, but firmly, that thisis the manly 
 course — this, the true fulfilment of a high and sacred trust. 
 Doubtless, much consideration is due to the feelings and 
 wishes of your constituents. To them you owe — as was 
 truly said by that illustrious man, who, in comprehensive 
 and philosophical views of all public affairs, and of the great 
 principles of social government, surpassed all the statesmen 
 who preceded him or who have followed — as much as some 
 of them n.ayhave exceeded him, in the practical application 
 of official knowledge and experience — " to them ycu owe," 
 says Mr. Burke, *' the sacrifice of your time, and your plea- 
 sures, and your repose. But to them you do not owe the 
 sacrifice, in the weightiest matters, of your mature and con- 
 scientious judgment." That judgment is not their property, and
 
 30 
 
 you abandon the first of duties, if, in deference to the wishes, 
 you consent to sacrifice the interests of your constituents. 
 
 For what is it, Sir, that we are sent here? For what is it 
 that we are placed on the mountain top, but that we may em- 
 brace a wider horizon within our view, and penetrate further 
 than those upon the plain, through the mists and darkness 
 which hang upon the future. Perform your duty — shew 
 that you are not engas;ed in a mere " scuffling local agency," 
 — that you are fit to be intrusted with the destinies of an 
 empire ; and you will find your reward — my belief is, in the 
 applause of your constituents — but, unquestionably, in the 
 approbation of your own consciences. If you suffer, you 
 will suffer in a noble cause, and you will be repaid with 
 ample interest of honour and reputation for any temporary 
 loss of popular favour. Read the controversy between Mr. 
 Burke and his constituents in 1780, and judge of your re- 
 ward by your own feelings of admiration and envy towards 
 the repulsed and rejected candidate. They told him, " that 
 his impolitic stubbornness would cost him his seat." Ifyou 
 hear the same language, be prepared with his dignified 
 reply — 
 
 I wished to be a Member of Parliament, to have my share of 
 doing good and resisting evil. I deceive myself most grossly, if I 
 would not much rather pass the remainder of my life hidden in 
 the recesses of the deepest obscurity, feeding my mind even with 
 the visions and imaginations of sucli things, than to be placed on 
 the most splendid throne, tantalized with the practice of all 
 which can make the greatest situation any other than the greatest 
 curse. 
 
 He stood before his constituents accused of no venality — of 
 no neglect of duty — of no sacrifice of their interests to his 
 ambition, or to their own hasty and inconsiderate views. 
 The accusation against him was, that he had preferred to 
 their wishes the dictates of his own humane, delil)era1e, 
 enlightened judgment, and the true interests of the consti- 
 tuents themselves. Follow his example, and you may truly 
 say with him, if you are obnoxious to a similar charge — 
 
 In every accident which may happen through life — in pain, in 
 sorrow, in depression and distress — 1 will call to mind this accusa- 
 tion, and be comforted. 
 
 But my conviction is, that a different fate is reserved for 
 you — thatjuster views are now taken of the duties which 
 you are called upon to fulfil, and that the true way to secure 
 the applause and lasting confidence of your constituents, is 
 to claim, for yourselves and for them, the right to abide, in 
 high matters like this, by the dictates of your own deli- 
 berate conviction.
 
 LONDONi 
 
 Printed for the Proprietors of the " Mirror of Parliament," 
 
 3, Abingdon Street, Westminster.
 
 1.1