The Sun.
London, England, 1844-01-08 00:00:00

THE CURRENCY.
(From the Morning Post.)
Our monetary laws are attracting, day by day,
a larger portion of public attention. The Times is
disposed to" champion to the utterance" the Currency
Law of 1819. Every attempt on the part of pro-
ducers in this country to escape from the action of
that law our Contemporary describes, somewhat un-
ceremoniously, as an attempt to perpetrate the foulest
dishonesty.
Our Contemporary furnished his readers yesterday
with the following exposition of the objects which the
opponents of the Currency Law of 1819 have in view,
when they recommend a departure from the esta-
blished metallic standard :--
" Their panacea is a depreciated paper currency. A taxed
nation, we understand them to say, requires two currencies,
a metallic and a paper one, differing in value about as much
as the untaxed would from the taxed commodity. The
metal is for foreign exchange, the paper is for home con-
sumption. The balances of foreign trade are to be paid in
the hard cash, English bills and taxes are to be cal-
culated and liquidated in the Government notes ; and
thus, we are informed, we shall at once have a sound me-
dium of exchange with o her nations, while the pliancy of
our national currency allows the English producer to
raise his (paper) price in proportion to his taxation,
without incurring any disadvantage in competition with
the untaxed foreigner. Prices must rise to remunerate
the producer—master or man—for hi, labour and taxa-
tion too ; but prices cannot rise so lung as the cir-
culation—the paper c;reulation of the country —is forced to
retain the value of the precious metal. Sever tl.e two. Let
notes cease to be convertible at any fixed rate of value. Let
paper and gold each take its chance. The nominal prices
(being calculated is paper) will be magnificent. The real
amount of taxes (being payable in paper) will be next to no-
thing. Wages will be high =remuneration handsome—and all
the world prosperous."
This statement by no means furnishes an accurate
view of the opinions of all the opponents of the Cur-
rency Law of 1819. All of these are not advocates of an
inconvertible paper currency. Others ask —and the
Times might,perhaps, be puzzled to answer the ques-
tion--why the value of gold, in respect to some of its
most important functions, should, more than the value
of any other commodity, be fixed by Act of Parliament?
Parliament does not pretend to fix the value of gold as a
marketable article—as an article to be worked up
into plate, or to be used in the arts. Why, then,
should Parliament fix the value of gold, in its
capacity, as a measure of the public and private
debts of the British empire ? If we must have gold
money, or paper money convertible into gold, why
should the debtor classes, and the producing classes,
of the community be deprived of the benefit of a rise
in the market value of gold ? If gold shall, at any
time, rise to the value of 6/. per ounce, in the market
of the world, why should all the paper money in Great
Britain be still convertible; on compulsion, at the
rate of 31. 17s. lOid. ? Is it not clear that, so
long as. a liability so fearful in its nature hangs
over the heads of the issuers of paper money,
they must counteract the effects of that unnatu-
rally low value which the Currency Law of 1819
has affixed to gold, by imparting an unnaturally high
degree of value -to their own paper issues ? The
Bank of England 'cannot supply the producing and
distributing 'classes 'in this country with an amount
of money sufficient to perform fairly the functions of
distribution and production, so long as her issues
remain convertible into gold at a rate below the
average market value of gold. If the Bank of Eng-
land should attempt to do justice to the producing
and distributing classes, by issuing an amount of
money proportioned to the multiplicity and magnitude
of their operations, the Bank of England would be in-
solvent in a week. The Bank is compelled, by the
Currency Law of 1819, to do far less than justice to
producers and distributors, in order that she may,
in conformity with the spirit of that law, do far
More than justice to the creditor classes, to an-
nuitants, mortgagees, and usurers. The Bank is
compelled to regulate her issues, not with reference
to our industrial necessities, but with reference to
that fraudulent value which the Currency Law of
1819 has impressed on gold. That value is at all
times 31. 17s. 10id. per ounce. In the market of
the world gold may be worth 51., 61., or 71. per ounce ;
still must the Bank of England be prepared at all
seasons to supply the public with gold at the rate of
31. 17s. 101 d. The consequence is obvious. The
Bank is, in self defence, compelled to limit her issues,
and to keep her notes as much above the value of the
legal standard, as gold in the market of the world
may happen to be above the value of gold
estimated at 3/. 17s. 104-d. Industry is, by
consequence, paralysed. The necessary appli-
ances to production and distribution are
withheld. Uncertainty hangs over all the operations
of trade and commerce. Sober men are converted,
in their own despite, into speculators and gamblers.
The pressure of public and of private debts is en-
hanced. The value of labour declines. The indus-
trious poor are converted into paupers—and then
treated as felons. Usurers and mortgagees rise to the
rank of princes. Laws are passed to promote the
great work of "cheap production ;"—and then, "the
public" is gravely complimented on its progress in
intelligence and " philosophy !"
The following is the criticism which the Times
hazards on the theory of the enemies of the Currency
Law of 1819
We have only at present space to notice one most singu-
lar fallacy in the curious contrivance for making two and two
equal to five. The " Emancipationists of Industry" seem to
have mystified themselves into a notion that by a kind of
financial legerdemain they can make the same sum
light to those who pay it, and heavy to those who receive
it; Government imposes the taxation necessary for the
purposes of the State; the Emancipationists propose to alle-
viate its weight on the subject by diminishing the value
of the coin in which it is paid. Is it not obvious that this di-
minution of value will render the national revenue unequal to
the objects fur which it is levied, and will instantly necessitate
a proportional increase of amount? Government wants a cer-
tain amount not of its own stamped paper, but of cloth, mus.
kets, timber, cordage, soldiers, sailors, clerks, and Lords of the
Treasury. '1 hese articles have a real and not a nominal
value, and will be paid for accordingly; and if their
prices are raised by Mr. Attwood's depreciation, fresh taxes
must be levied to pay for them. This, indeed, would not ,
apply to the fixed disbursements to which Government is bound.
Such expenses—the interest of the National Debt among the
number--vronld indeed be diminished by the proposed depre-
ciation. But for a nation to evade the payment of a debt by
legislating to chantiethe value of the terms in which the bargain
is expressed, is a piece of rascality not, we trust, in reserve for
any English Parliament."
If by departing from the principle of the Cur-
rency
Law of 1819, taxes should become light—then,
argues the Times, their amount must be increased,
that portion of them which goes to pay the interest of
the National Debt being excepted. So be it. But an
increase in the amount of taxation would, in the cir-
cumstances assumed, fall, not on the producing and
distributing classes of the community, but on
the order of idle consumers. The increase
of taxation would obviously enter into the
prices of commodities—and he ultimately borne by
annuitants, mortgagees, and money-jobbers. It;
besides, taxes should (as they would, of course) rise
in amount, the amount of private debts would not
rise, with a reform of our Currency Laws; and in no
other mode has the Currency Law of 1819 made its
fraudulent character felt so keenly, as in the frightful
extension of that measure of power which the creditor
class exercises over the debtor classes of the community.
To depart, however, from the spirit or the letter
of the Currency Law of 1819, would, according to
our Contemporary, involve the perpetration of a piece
of rascality ! Is the Times prepared to show, that
when the Bank Restriction Act was passed the Legis-
lature pledged itself that the English community
should redeem all its public and private paper debts
—not merely in gold—but in gold estimated at less
than its market value ? Is the Times prepared to prove,
that public and private creditors would have suffered
the slightest injustice if the rate at which paper
money was declared convertible into gold had been
fixed- at 61. per oz., instead of 3/. 17s. 100. Fr
" Rascality" is a strong word • but the Times has
thought proper to make use of it. It may, there-
fore, be worth while to determine whether " ras-
cality" may not more justly be predicated of
those who concocted the Currency Law of 1819,
than of those who seek now to repeal it. Will
the Times deny that the Currency Law of 1819
was concocted by Jew bullionists and jobbers—
by men belonging to the creditor class—and by " eco•
nomical philosophers," the apt tools of usurers ? Will
the Times deny that the Currency Law of 1819
was passed on false pretexts—on false assurances
as to the nature of the results to which it would
lead ? Did not Ricardo—himself a money jobber,
and the oracle of money-jobbers—pledge him-
self that the Currency Law of 1819 would not
depress prices more than four per cent.? Have not
prices fallen, under the action of that law, at least
fifty per cent:, and has not the condition of all pro-
ducers
been abased to an extent corresponding with
the fall of prices ? Had the effects of the Currency
Law of 1819 been anticipated by any considerable
proportion of the people, would any Minister have
dared to introduce such a law into Parliament ? And
does not the utter falsification of all the assurances
of the authors of the Currency Law of 1819 give to
the agriculturists, and traders, and labourers of
Great Britain an indefeasible right to repeal a law
which has fraudulently annihilated one-half of
the value of all labour and of all property,
save property in money ? " Rascality" is, as-
suredly, an awkward term in the mouth of
a defender of the Currency Law of 18191 It is
impossible to avoid noting the gross inconsis-
tencies into which the Times is betrayed when
dealing with certain great public questions. Our
Contemporary deserves high honour for his stern op•
position to the spirit, as well as to the operation, of
the new poor-law ; but can the Times fail to perceive
that the new poor-law is' pervaded by the very
spirit which pervades the Currency Law of 1819 ?
The Times denounces -- most justly and most
powerfully—the tendency of the new poor-law to
lower wages ; but the Currency Law of 1819 has
lowered wages more, we will venture to declare, than
all the other enactments which the oppressors of the
poor ever passed. The Currency Law of 1819—
the agitation in favour of free trade—and the new
poor-law—are all parts of the same grand scheme.