The Sun.
London, England, 1839-07-09 00:00:00

I fixed principle of banking, notwithstanding its engegernent
in the Charter that it would abide by some fixed ride.
The country lost more in one month by the system than
• •it would gain in twenty years.. The issuing of paper mo-
• ney ought to be placed entirely under the control of
Par!iament. He thought a Select Committee should be
appointed to inquire into all the facts and determine upon
the best course to be pursued, in order to place the system
on a firm and solid basis, and prevent those changes which
now so frequently occurred, and produced such ruinous
fluctuations in the value of property.—( Hear, hear.)
Mr. T. ATT WOOD said he almost entirely concurred
in the speech of his lion. Friend the Member for Co-
ventry, but wished to say a few words in explanation of
one point in which his Hon. Friend appeared to him to
have been in error. His Hon. Friend was quite correct
in ascribing the distress which had so often prevailed in
this country to the action of the Bank, but he ( Mr. Att-
wood) believed it was utterly impossible for the Bank to
have acted otherwise; that the Bank was a mere instru-
ment in the hands of the Government, and that thus it
was that it had ruined thousands and hundreds of thou-
sands of families in its own defence. 'The Government
had compelled the Bank to relax the screw upon the
currency, In 1816 Lord Liverpool carried the continua-
tion for two years of the Bank Restriction Act, which
would have expired in 1817, with a view of increasing the
circulation of the Bank, which increased from 23,000,000/.
to 30,000,000/. This relieved distress and brought a pros-
perity, which soon, however, passed away ; the Bank were
compelled to relax their issues, and on the distress that
followed to 1822, he need not express his opinions,
which were well-known. Lord Castlereagh, to his
surprise, found the country in a state of distress,
and proposed in one day five monetary measures, maintain-
ing that it was a monetary distress. Of these five mea-
sures one was to renew the 11. note Act for eleven years,
which meant, for ever. Another was to enable the Go-
vernment to borrow 10,000,0001. for the dead weight from
the bank. Another to borrow 3,600,0001. from the Bank,
(to force the circulation). Another to lend money to the
East India Company and to landowners on mortgage. And
if these measures had not been adopted the country would
have been thrown into a most dreadful state of anarchy. If
the country were not governed ill, there would have been
no call for Radical Reform. He (Mr. Attwood) was a
Radical, but he only desired to use Radicalism as a means
of promoting the prosperity of the country ; and if he
found the lower classes able to maintain themselves
the House would have no trouble with him as a Radical.
—( A laugh.) He believed the Bank of England had
always done its duty. He had not found that the Bank
Directors had, as they might have done, made dishonest
fortunes. —( Hear, hear,: from Sir J. R. Reid.) When Mr.
Jeremiah Harman and the Bank Directors had remon-
strated with Lord Grenville, who was as ignorant as a
hog on these matters—( Laughter)—and said that they
thought' the country could not bear the system—Mr.
Jeremiah Harman, one of the best men in this world, or in
any other world—(Laughter)—received from Lord Gren-
ville the answer—" Mind your own business—what
have you to do with the country—leave that
to the Government ?"—(" Hear," from Mr. Warburton.)
The stoppage of the Bank of England would involve the
stoppage of the Exchequer. and the stoppage of either, or
both, would involve the discharge of every workman in
England. It might be said that this would be recovered
front—that there had been a general stoppage in
America. There had been, and it had not yet been
recovered from—but the system of banking there
was totally different from the system here. Every
individual in that country had a direct interest in the sup-
port of the Banks, but there was nothing of the sort here.
The ruin produced would be so enormous that it would be
impossible to distinguish between that which had been oc-
casioned by the act of the Government, and that which
was the consequence of previous insolvency ; and besides,
the depreciation in the value of all kinds of property would
be so great, that a manufactory worth 20,000/. previously,
would then be worth not more than 50/. All would be
alike insolvent, and there would not be the slightest hope
of escape from the most awful revolution. He would now
state to the House how that panic had passed away. He
( Mr. Attwood) had prepared one-pound notes for three
weeks before they were wanted. Doubtless the lion.
Member for London would tell the House that the Bank
had found a parcel of one-pound notes in a box ; they had
done so, but that was only to the amount of half a million ;
but he bad prepared a quantity long before, and if the Bank
had not kept their clerks pretty active in signing the notes
a dreadful crisis would have arisen. These notes were
issued by the special order of Lord Liverpool, who had
consulted him (Mr. Attwood) on the subject, and he had
advised his Lordship to have them issued instantly,
and they acted like a wet blanket on the panic.
He told the 'Minister that they wanted a mass of money to
meet the mass of debt. He told him that he ought to
throw ten millions of 1,000/. notes into the circulation, and
he did throw nine millions by the issuing Exchequer bills
and the purchase of Consols, and this in eight days; and this
the Bank did as the organ of the Government. He did not
blame the Bank for this, but he did blame them when, only
two months after, Lord Liverpool came down to the House
and brought in a Bill for abolishing the one-pound notes,
which was a violation of public faith ; he did blame them
for not on that occasion saying to the Government, " No
more of these tricks—you owe us thirty-six millions ster-
ling ; pay us this in sovereigns ; you set the first example,
and pay your debts in standard gold." If such had been
the language used by Lord Liverpool and Mr. Huskisson,
they would have looked surprised ; for if they had put up
the Crown of England to auction, and all the land of Eng-
land with it, and thrown in India to boot, and given twelve
months' notice of the sale, they could not have raised
thirty-six millions; and yet these men thought they were
imposing no hardship on the Bank in compelling them to
raise two thousand millions. In 1826, 1827, 1828, and
1829, the country was in a state of suffering; and in 1829
the Political Union was formed on this basis, that it was a
great iniquity to force the people to pay debts, taxes, and
rents which had been contracted in a paper currency, in a
standard of gold. In 1833 the Noble Lord had brought
forward other measures ; he had been compelled to relax the
screw. Ile had said before that, that it was too late to retreat;
but on that occasion the Government did retreat—they had
retreated in 1816, 1822, 1825 ; and in 1823 Lord Spencer
was again compelled to relax the screw, when, as the Right
Hon. Baronet expressed, he twisted into the Bank Charter
Bill the clauses, ono authorising the Bank to lend money to
the Government, another making Bank-notes a legal ten-
der, and another authorising the formation of Joint-stock
Banks, which deluged the country with paper in 1834,
1835, and 1836, and to which the country had been in-
debted for its prosperity during those years. This measure
it was that enabled the Government to stay the march of
anarchy, and to give contentment during those years.
All his constituents of Birmingham were perfectly
contented during that period, but the cause of it was not
known except to statesmen. It was generally by the peo-
ple attributed to the Reform Bill. The public press knew
the true cause, but wilfully concealed it. How was the
adversity of 1837 produced ? The public press had been
incessantly calling on the Bank to reduce their issues, and
in 1836, the Bank had been compelled to force back the
sovereigns from going abroad—the Bank had played the
butcher. It had butchered tens of thousands of human
beings—it had produced what was called the City fever,
or the monetary fever, but what he called the Peel fever—
he believed the Bank had actually produced the death of
thous inds.—( A laugh.) Honourable Gentlemen thought
he was exaggerating, but he would appeal to many Phy-
sicians and Surgeons who could bear out the truth of what
he had stated. This measure had, besides depriving
millions of bread, injured in a greater or less degree every
merchant in England. The exchanges had been forced in
oar favour, but with all this misery they had not been
enabled to force back a sufficient supply of bullion. The
iron interest and the coal trade were in a comparative
state of prosperity owing to the immense demand for the
supply of railroads ; and the shipping interest also was in
a comp 'natively prosperous state, but every other branch
of trade and commerce was suffering the most unbearable
distress, which the people could not endure much longer ;
they were killing them by inches, and the lion. Member
for Leicester (he would not be Member for Leicester
again—that laugh would throw him out)—was laughing
at the idea of the Bank killing people.—( No, no, from Mr.
Easthope.) Ile begged the Hon. Gentleman's pardon
for having stated that he did so. —( A laugh.) Perhaps
it was not at his statements, it was only at his manner that
they were laughing.—( Cries of " Hear," and laughter,
but he would warn them not to push the screw beyond
endurance with a view to get back gold. They had no
right to get back gold, no man had any honest right to
have an ounce of gold in his possession ; they had retraced
their steps and they must retrace their steps; there was no
fraud in doing so, the fraud was the other way. His consti-
tuents, out of three days' work, were now compelled to pay
in the shape of taxes, out of three days' work a week, more
than, twenty years since, they paid out of six days' work a
week. When the Bill had passed it was said that it could
not make a difference of more than four per cent., but
he had shown that it made a difference of more than 400
they
this
coulda fraud?not
g, o
on Theyin hadblin
blindness
muchbli d
for per2coeynt as not
ears, w
but helonger, and if they would not rectify the evil themselves,
—t
nature would do it in a manner not so agreeable to them.
The Bank had recently been applying the screw, they had
raised the rate of interest, 5} percent.; why did they not
instead of doing this, say to the Government, " You owe us
thirty millions—pay us." If they had said this to the
Chancellor of the Exchequer, they would have done good
to the country. If they would take his advice, he would
say, keep the currency affluent, let the gold go abroad if it
will ; when you come to the bottom of your purse issue one
pound notes—( Hear, hear)—and when you cannot pay in
gold you shall have a Restriction Act.—( Ironical cheers.)
He hoped they would not press the screw too far, or they
would produce an insurrection which, when it happened,
would be touch and go. It would not produce a civil war,
but a scene of universal confusion. When the war ended
in 1815, they were told that all the distress was owing to
surplus food, surplus population, and over trading ; that they
were like flies in a honey pot, smothered by abundance.
That was the Argument !held in 1816 and 1819, but now
they talked about emigration, for the purpose of getting,
rid of the surplus mouths. The Joint-stock Banks had
done something towards prepping up the country, notwith-
standing the great outcry that had been made against
them. Now, all the blame was thrown upon the Bank of
England. He was surprised that lion. Members would
not open their eyes, and look to the real truth. Parliament
had been for 22 years attempting an impossibility, viz., that
I
the a Faring 800 millions of debt in gold. lie wished to
support this ;netuire, not with a view of criminating the
i3an
for the purpose. of inquiring into the
of the e
ofl FA
esr.eet of which 34. ik.l,(it be to show that every act
h Bank of gogtstnd had been e oenpelled by the law.
Now, with respect to the asses of the Bank of 1.4471;,n4, be
did not believe then; the Bank had in Threadneedle-street
more than 1,000,00 Q of sovereigns. It was utterly impossible
that they could by any
,chance bawa :pore than 2,000,000
of bullion in their coffers, unless the Bank 4 !rance had
lent them money as it did le 1625. Snell Fae,ia,g !nV
attto
of things, was it right that the Benlf thould victimise nue
people to get back the gold ?—( [fear, ima.r.) if there
were to be any victims let them be the Government. He
trusted the Bank of ;ngland would relax the screw, and
instead of increasing to pcil!ice their discounts to three
per cent. In conclusion he Legere: to say that he would
cordially support the motion of his Hole. Frietid the
Member for Kilkenny, lie had intende4 ;to Kaye 41. oyo