PITT’S FINANCIAL STATEMENT.
The house went into committee to consider the financial affairs of the country, on the 17th of February, when Pitt made a speech representing the country as in a nourishing condition, almost unprecedented. The revenue had increased so much, he said, that government would be enabled to take off taxes, bearing chiefly upon the poor, to the amount of £200,000, and to apply an equal sum more to increase the sinking-fund for paying off the national debt. He proposed to take off the additional duty on malt; the new duties on male and female servants; the duties upon waggons, wains, carts, and other such carriages; the taxes on houses containing less than seven windows; and a halfpenny in the pound of the duty upon all candles, except wax and spermaceti. These propositions were agreed to without a division. Sheridan only questioning the truth of Pitt’s financial statement, which he did more from the force of habit, and by way of opposition, than from any just cause. On the same day, in a committee of supply, the house granted £400,000 to his majesty, to be issued and paid to the governor and company of the Bank of England, to be by them placed to the account of the commissioners for the reduction of the national debt. So far as Pitt’s statements on this occasion related to the actual condition of the finances of the country they were doubtless correct; but his sentiments on the future were too soon proved to be fallacious. He remarked:—“From the result of the whole, I trust I am entitled to conclude that the scene which we are now contemplating, is not the transient effect of accident, not the short-lived prosperity of a day, but the general and natural result of regular and permanent causes. Though we may yet be subject to those fluctuations which often occur in the affairs of a mighty nation, and which it is impossible to calculate or foresee, yet, as far as reliance can be placed on human speculations, we have the best ground, from experience of the past, for looking with satisfaction on the present, and with confidence toward the future.” Pitt, indeed, expressed his deep conviction that there never was a time when a durable peace might more reasonably be expected than at the present moment. And yet there never was a time when war was manifestly more imminent. England was, in truth, on the verge of a war which was to increase the national debt more than any in which she had been yet engaged. The nation was taught to entertain brilliant hopes at the opening of this year, but at its close those hopes were dashed to the ground. They were called upon to indulge in visions of a total release from national debt; but it was soon found that this debt was to increase by a sure and rapid process. Pitt himself soon discovered that he might be wrong; and hence, being apprehensive that in the case of a new and protracted war, requiring large additions to the public debt, the sinking fund might not operate with sufficient effect to prevent a national bankruptcy, he subsequently proposed, that, whenever a loan should be hereafter made, one per cent on the new stock thus created, besides the dividends, should be raised and applied in the same manner, and under the same regulations as the original £1,000,000. This bill passed the commons without any particular opposition; but in the upper house it was violently reprobated by Lord Chancellor Thurlow as a provision likely to answer no good purpose, and as exhibiting an extraordinary degree of arrogance, by dictating to future parliaments, and prescribing to future ministers a mode of action to be adopted some thirty years hence. He remarked:—“None but a novice, a sycophant, a mere reptile of a minister, would allow this act to prevent him doing what, in his own judgment, circumstances might require at the time; and a change in the situation of the country might render that which is proper at one time inapplicable at another. In short, the scheme is nugatory and impracticable; the inaptness of the project is only equalled by the vanity of the attempt.” This bill, however, passed into a law, and was adhered to in the numerous loans advanced during the whole of the revolutionary contest. About the same time Pitt brought another measure into the house, which indicated that his views were undergoing a change as to the long continuance of peace; this was a proposition to raise £812,500 by means of a lottery. But in this he met with decided opposition. Great surprise was expressed that, in a time of profound peace, he should have recourse to a method of levying money so extremely injurious to the morals and habits of the people. Instances were adduced in which state-lotteries had led to robbery and suicide; and a petition was presented from the grand jury of Middlesex, earnestly praying the house to take the subject into consideration. These representations produced such an impression, that a motion was forthwith carried for a committee to inquire into the evils arising from lotteries.
GEORGE III. 1792-1793