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Mr. Dent contended, that no man could calculate the evil which fuch a precedent might bring upon the public. In 1779, and 1780, there was a loan, the fubfcribers to which loft very confiderably, the discount upon their stock being very high before the first depofit was made; he thought the ftockholders then were equal friends to their country as thofe who fubfcribed to the loyalty loan. That loan was a fpeculation, on which the fubfcribers entered with the ufual expectation of gain or lofs, like any other fpeculation. Mr. W Smith, Mr. Tierney, and Mr. Baftard, urged the evil tendency of fuch a precedent, and conjured the committee to reflect upon the state of the country before they gave fanction to a measure fo unprecedented and fhameful in its nature, and fo ruinous in its confequences.

When the committee divided on the question, there appeared Ayes 40-Noes 26.

This bufinefs was difcuffed again by the house of commons on the 1ft of June, when the injuftice of it was fo ftrongly urged by the members who oppofed it, that the chancellor of the exchequer carried the refolution by a majority of a fingle vote, namely, 36 to 35. This question was therefore not resumed during the feffion.

A fubject immediately connected with the two budgets, and materially affecting the finances of the year, was the funding of the navy and exchequer bilis *.

This fubject was fubmitted to the house by the chancellor of the exchequer, on the 28th of October; the object, he said, was to remove out of the market a large maís of floating debt, which, in confe

quence of having fallen to a confiderable difcount, tended materially to injure public credit, to obftruét the intercourfe of commerce, and impede the fources of the national profperity. At the commencement of the war regulations had been adopted, that navy bills which haď b-en iffued before for an indefinite period, thould become payable at the expiration of fifteen months, bearing in the mean time an interest of 4 per cent. In confequence of this new arrangement, there was neceffarily a certain proportion of outstanding navy bills, payable at different periods, at the end of each month, and all these were payable either in 1797. or early in the next year. Such being the cafe, Mr. Pitt came forward to offer, what he termed fair and equitable terms, to the holders of these bills, viz. to take stock for their amount, and thereby to convert them into funded debt. If, as he propofed, they were funded down to the latest period, the whole number of navy bills amounted to almost twelve millions, of which the earliest would be due within a month from the prefent time, and the lateft within fifteen months. As they would become due at periods thus difproportionate, it was reasonable to divide them into different claffes, and to offer different terms to the refpective holders, calculated according to the time at which the bills were payable. It was to be confidered, that the house were giving, to the holders of navy bills, funds which were immediately difpofable for money, according to the rate at which they stood in the market, in lieu of bills fubject to a certain difcount, and at the fame time bearing an intereft of

* See the policy of this meafure most ably difcuffed in a pamphlet published by the sarl of Lauderdale, entitled “ Thoughts on the Finances of Great Britain," &c.'"

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He propofed that the holders of navy bills fhould have their option of three kinds of stocks, with the following abatements on the present prices :

For the first clafs

of 2 per cent. in the 3 per cents.
of 3 per cent. in the 4 per cents.
of 4 per cent. in the 5 per cents.

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The bills to bear interest till the 12th of December, and the dividends to commence with the refpective funds, viz.

The 3 per cent. confols

from November laft.

from Michaelmas last.

The 5 per cents.

The 4 per cents.

According to this fcale the average of the bonus upon all the claffes of bills ftood as follows:

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The chancellor of the exchequer then ftated, that, in addition to the outstanding navy bills, there were alfo exchequer bills unfunded to the amount of two millions and a half. Thefe exchequer bills did not become due till the 5th of July, but he thought it advifable to put them on the fame footing as the navy bills. He therefore propofed to fund them at the rate of one and a half per cent. intereft, which correfponded nearly with the terms allowed for the different claffes of navy bills.

He concluded with moving for provifion to be made for fatisfying all the bills payable at the navy office which had been made out, on or before the 27th of October, 1796, amounting to the fum of 11,993,1671. 19s. 9d.

Mr. Huffey strongly contended that the terms offered to the billholders were extravagant in the extreme, as the man who took government bills at 14 per cent. discount, purchased into the 3 per cents. at 49. He thought that the conduct of minifters was highly reprehenfible in incurring debts which they had not the means of paying off.

Mr. Fox rofe, and obferved, that in the first budget of the preceding feffion the house had heard of a million and a half of navy bills; in

the next they heard of four millions, and now they were told of a fum exceeding ten millions. He contended, that the house had a right to know in the firft place what intereft those who received government bills in the month of September at 14 per cent. discount would receive if they chofe to fund them in the 5 per cents. He took 14 as the medium of the discount. Thofe who about fixty days before had advanced 861. had now a claim of 100l. In the first inftance then, they gained the whole 14 per cent. difcount; in the next place they received 5 per cent. for they were to be allowed 2 per cent. upon the then market price, which was 88, befides the 4 per cent. interett, which they had during the fixty days. With the discount and intereft, therefore, they actually had at the rate of 1031 per cent. per annum intereft for their money!

Before he agreed to a measure fo extraordinary and expenfive, he wifhed to have fome stronger reafons than thofe he had heard; by the plan then before the house an addition. of 11. 18s. per cent. was to be paid upon the fecurities of government. Taking this extraordinary allowance as applying to the whole fum to be funded, it would make an additional charge to the public of 240,000l.

Mr.

Mr. Pitt, in his reply, defended the measure as the best which could be adopted under the exifting circumftantes. He then produced feveral criterions of the general profperity of the country, notwithftanding the preffure of temporary embarralfment; first, that while the funds were fenfibly affected from the fcarcity of money, the revenue ftill continued high, and, during a period of war, approached very nearly to what it had been in the moft flourishing æra of peace. Secondly, the credit of British mer chants remained on the moft refpectable footing, and this reputation was fupported not by confining themfelves to a contracted fcale of trade, but by launching into the most extensive operations of commerce. But it was evident, that in proportion to the extenfion of trade, and the increase of capital, the expenditure became greater.

When the first question had been put and carried, the fecond queftion was propofed, that provifion be made for. fatisfying all the exchequer bills made out by virtue of an act of the preceding feffion of parliament for enabling his majefty to raife the fum of 2,500,000l. for the uses therein mentioned. This was alfo carried, and bills were foon afterwards introduced into the house of commons conform able to these resolutions.

Mr. Huffey, on the 21ft of December, while the house was in a committee on the bill for the more fpeedy payment of navy, tranfport, and victualling bills, objected to the regulations therein mentioned, which, in his opinion, would not enable the public to go to the market with advantage, but would, on the contrary, have the effect of encouraging injurious fpeculation.

The chancellor of the exchequer

faid, that all the bill enacted was,, that a navy bill fhould not run more than three months. The intereft was calculated as nearly as poffible at the rate, of 5 per cent. He contended, that the mode of payment propofed by the bill would be perfectly agreeable to the parties concerned. The bill was then read a firft and fecond time, and agreed, to.

The first India budget was introduced in o the house of commons by Mr. fecretary Dundas, on the 20th of December. He faid the accounts which he had to state would not take up a confiderable portion of time, because they were comprised in a narrower compafs than upon former occafions, in confequence of fome regulations which he had introduced into the accounts of eftimates from the prefidencies abroad. The papers were upon the table for the information of the committee; and for the fake of elucidation he brought forward the refults of the accounts applicable to each fettlement, feparately; and then he introduced the accounts of all the fettlements combined; afterwards the feparate accounts of the. Eaft India company at home were brought forward; and, lastly, an enumeration of them all, the foreign and domeftic being combined in order to deduce the general refult. He proceeded to enter into the neceffary details, obferving that he had divided his ftatements into three claffes. The first class, according to his ufual practice, confifted of the average statements of the three last years, with a view of enabling the committee to judge of the paft. The other account was to lay before the committee a comparifon of the estimates, and actual amounts of the charges and revenues of the last year; and the third

clafs

main free; a people whom the right honourable gentleman now confidered as capable of maintaining peace and amity, who had now fnorted away the undigested fumes of the blood of their fovereign, and with whom he had now condefcended to treat.

But the propofition did not go to negative the fupplies; it was intended to fufpend them till the wound given to the conftitution was made whole. He moved an amendment, that the fecond reading fhould be poftponed till the next day, and he would then move the house to refolve that the minifter had been guilty of a high crime and misdemeanor.

Mr. Wilberforce was averfe to poftponing the paffing of the refolution, even till the morrow, on the score of propriety and policy. The nature of the vote of credit, he faid, had not been futficiently commented upon; it would be found to convey an impreffion that minifters were authorifed in employing it in fuch a manner, or on fuch measures, as the ftate might require. This conftruction was fo literally obvious on the face of the bill that it could not be contested.

Upon this a queftion arofe, whether the mode in which minifters had applied the money was, or was not, neceffary to the caufe in which the nation was embarked.

He thought that the mode in which the money had been applied was a proper one; the reprefentatives of a generous nation would not make the faving of the Germanic empire the fubject of cenfure.

At

the time the money was remitted the emperor was on the verge of a great precipice, and all Europe in danger of being ruined by his fall. To that feafonable fupply might be attributed, in a confiderable degree, the good reception lord

Malmbury met with from the directory of France: and had that tranfaction been publicly known at the time of its completion, it might have injured our public credit. Gentlemen, he faid, might rant about the excellencies, the wounds, and the death of the conftitution; but it ought to be remembered, that thofe to whom they addressed their medley effufions, were more fincere fupporters of freedom than they.

Mr. York contended, that the affiftance given to the emperor was out of a fum of money granted by a vote of credit to defray any extraordinary expences which might accrue; and as thofe extraordinaries were not then voted, it was confequently a feparate confideration. Yet the oppofition fide of the house had propofed a negative to the resolutions of the committee of ways and means, on the principle that the money granted by the vote of credit in a former year was mifapplied, and thereby to poftpone the fupplies neceffary for the current year.

Mr. Curwen declared, that the fafety of the British conftitution was involved in the question then before the house. The commons were always confidered as the guardians of the public purse, and in that view this question was more important to them than if the threatened invafion had been put in execution, and the French actually at our doors, Suppofing the affiftance given to the emperor to have been inftrumental in faving Germany, ftill the British conftitution was not to be deftroyed on that account; the minifter had various opportunites of pleading fome neceffity to parliament for informality in granting that af fiftance, or he might have applied for a bill of indemnity.

The mafter of the rolls and lord

Hawbury defended the conduct of adminiftration

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