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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 cover

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 524: PITT’S FINANCIAL STATEMENT.
By Edward Farr
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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.

PITT’S FINANCIAL STATEMENT.

Pitt opened the budget on the 7th of November. The money he required was £27,945,000; and among the ways and means which he proposed was a loan of £18,000,000. There seems to have been a universal spirit of loyalty in the house, for all that was said by Pitt as to the courage and resources of the nation, and our capability of withstanding the power of France and our various enemies, was loudly cheered, while Fox, who opposed him, was heard in dead silence. The propositions were agreed to, and this loan was soon followed by a second of equal amount, and including a vote of three millions for the Emperor of Austria. On opening the budget, Pitt stated that ministers had made an advance of £1,200,000 to the emperor; and on the 13th of November, Fox moved “That his Majesty’s ministers, having authorised and directed at different times, and without the consent and during the sitting of parliament, the issue of various sums for the services of his Imperial Majesty, and also for the service of the army under the Prince of Condé, have acted contrary to their duty, and to the trust reposed in them, and have thereby violated the constitutional privileges of this house.” At first Pitt admitted that it was an irregular act, but afterwards he attempted to bring what he had done within the authority of the ordinary vote of credit, and endeavoured to find a principle in other discretionary and indefinite expenditures. Pitt was manifestly in a dilemma; but he was rescued by the Hon. Charles Bathurst Bragge, who moved as an amendment to Fox’s resolution, to the effect that the advance made to the Emperor, “Though not to be drawn into precedent but upon occasions of special necessity, was, under the peculiar circumstances of the case, a justifiable and proper exercise of the discretion vested in his Majesty’s ministers by the vote of credit, and calculated to produce consequences which have proved highly advantageous to the common cause, and to the general interests of Europe.” This amendment was carried by a majority of two hundred and eighty-five to eighty-one.