The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria

Chapter 463: RELIEF GRANTED TO MERCANTILE MEN.

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About This Book

The volume traces British political, parliamentary, and military developments from the accession of George III through the early nineteenth century, chronicling changes of ministry and cabinet, debates over colonial taxation and the American conflict, parliamentary controversies involving figures such as Wilkes and Warren Hastings, questions of Catholic relief and slave-trade abolition, and responses to the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, including major naval and continental campaigns, the union with Ireland, and domestic legislation on finance, civil liberties, and parliamentary reform.

RELIEF GRANTED TO MERCANTILE MEN.

At this period, through the spirit of commercial speculation, there occurred an unusual number of bankruptcies. A select committee was appointed by the commons to investigate this subject, and it was discovered that large issues of paper money and a scarcity of coin had induced bankers to suspend their usual discounts, in expectation of which merchants had formed engagements they could not meet. As a remedy for this evil an issue of exchequer-bills to the amount of £5,000,000 was recommended, under commissioners to be nominated for the purpose of lending portions to those merchants in distress who could give security. This bill was objected to as ineffectual against failures, and as opening a way to the exercise of improper patronage by government, but it was carried, and the relief proved beneficial.