Thoughts on the mechanism of societies

by marquis de Charles Casaux

Ninthly, If the nullity of the burden depended on the equality with which it should be divided, and if this equality should depend on an addition to the supposed burden, might it not be expected (not from the tricks of customary seduction, or from the shorter method of authority, but from all the means calculated to enforce conviction) that the nation would find herself less aggrieved by an additional tax, which would tend to equalise the weight, than she could be by an increase of taxes laid for the purpose of effecting a reimbursement, which, upon a second thought, no one can wish for?

Tenthly, Before the regulation alluded to, wheat was, in France, one third or one half cheaper than it is at this day; the rest of the other productions of the earth stood in the same proportion: in England, at that very time, the price of wheat differed very little from what it now is. How could England then maintain a competition—a combat, as it were, of exportation, against her natural enemy (the French industry), so lightly, so advantageously armed by the low price of the commodities in France?—If the maxim is as just as it is held sacred, surely France must have derived a prodigious benefit from the barricadoes by which the exportation of wheat was prevented, even from one Province to another, in order that it should be in all at the lowest possible price:—it follows also that England, already compelled by her taxes, her internal monopoly, and her riches, to raise the price of her wheat at home, must have undergone dreadful inconveniences, by availing herself, as she has ever done, of the least dearth abroad, to make that very wheat dearer in England, whilst she was going to diminish its price wherever scarcity had made it excessive.

Eleventhly, If France has obtained such wonderful advantages from her internal as well as external barriers, it is not in respect to her agriculture; her agriculture has clearly lost, not only that part of the value in her productions, of which she was daily deprived by this barrier, but also the encouragement which a gradual increase in the price of the productions would have occasioned, to increase their quantity: it is therefore by the exportation of the products of her industry, which, being sold at a price below that of all other nations, have procured her in money that prodigious balance of exported goods, which the wretched state of the national cultivator did not permit him to pay for:—but observe, that the French exportation, carried on with that advantage (pretended to be so very considerable) of the low price of national commodities, brought no more money to France, than that which she wanted for the five articles I have mentioned before, when treating of the balance of England. This matter I hope I shall set in the fullest blaze of evidence.—But, on the other hand, observe also that England, by an exportation carried on with the utmost regularity, under the supposed disadvantage of her commodities being rated much higher than those of her competitors, a rate which she even increased herself, by the exportation of wheat, which she encouraged by premiums—by premiums, destructive of the sacred maxim; observe, I say, that under that disadvantage, in spite of those inconsistencies, as fortunate as they are real and palpable, England, nevertheless, has not failed to procure the money wanted for the five articles, the only ones that can give any value to money.—Shall it be said that France would have obtained a balance in money much less considerable, if she had not kept her prices so low, if she had acted with less respect to the maxim?—Shall it be said, that the balance in money would have been far more favourable to England, had not the price of her commodities been so high at home; if she had more consistently acted upon the maxim; if, above all, she had prohibited the exportation of wheat, which is so often lamented, and even sometimes so loudly complained of by her manufacturers?—This indeed would be to appropriate great merit to the resource of hiding money under ground, when we cannot flatter ourselves with the thoughts of having too much of it, but at the expence of agriculture: but no matter; let us see whether the inference be just.

Twelfthly, Had France been indebted to the disparagement in the prices of her commodities, for the advantage of procuring the money wanted for the five articles before mentioned, she would have found herself in the impossibility of answering that want, as soon as, by the new regulation, those commodities were restored to their natural value, as soon as the liberty of exporting wheat had raised its price almost to the level of that which it bore in England.—Now will it be said, that ever since the landed revenue in France has risen from 40 to 50 per cent. by an advance in the price of commodities, less bullion has been spent by the French in plate, in gilding, and other articles of luxury?—Will it be said that France stood in need of the money necessary to settle in cash with her foreign correspondents, when this resource from circumstances became preferable to the mode of paying in bills of exchange?—Will it be said that she fell short of it for all those Jewish and miserable operations, or for that reciprocally beneficial smuggling with her neighbours?—Will it be said, that her circulation, which, beyond any doubt, required a more considerable mass of money, as soon as her revenue had tertiated, has suffered by that necessity of a higher balance, become impossible (according to the maxim) as soon as it grew indispensable?—Will it be said, that her industry has lingered away as soon as her agriculture has been more able to enliven it?—Yet all these absurdities must be admitted, or it must be acknowledged that the price of commodities may be tertiated, or doubled in a nation, not only without injuring industry, whose business it is to keep within the kingdom all the money wanted for circulation, but even with securing to the nation a more considerable balance in money, since it must become so whenever the price of every thing is raised one third, and perhaps more than one half.—The sacred maxim therefore has not even common sense, when applied to the internal trade of the State.

Thirteenthly, If France, who has not the assistance of paper-money, did actually procure so clearly to herself an annual balance more considerable in money, as soon as she had tertiated her revenue, it follows that England must, really, have experienced a competition much more disagreeable, from that very circumstance from which, according to the maxim, she had less reason to fear it; for whilst the price of commodities was below par in France, it is clear that having no national vortex, she required less money for the circulation of a revenue of 100 than for one of 150: it was therefore more to the advantage of England, in spite of the maxim, that the commodities should be at a low price in France, than to have them raised 50 per cent. The sacred maxim then is destitute of common sense, when applied to foreign trade, to the competition abroad.

Fourteenthly, But if the circumstance which drove France to the necessity of acquiring a greater balance in real cash, stood at a very small distance from another circumstance by which England was compelled to procure one still more considerable, for a general re-coining of her guineas; and if France and England have done each other no material injury in this kind of competition, (this is proved by the fact, since both nations have equally and certainly, ever since, procured the annual balance which they wanted); may it not be fairly concluded, that England has been no loser, by a revolution in the price of wheat, which enriched France by tertiating her revenue, and forced her to receive annually, in cash, a balance far greater than she did previous to that revolution?

Fifteenthly, Now if England, since the revolution in the French prices, has obtained as much bullion as she wished for, or rather all that which she could lay out on the five articles of her common expenditure, and for the additional circumstance of a re-coinage, whilst on the other hand France had all her wants supplied with the greater ease, may it not be inferred that England could have gained nothing, even upon the supposition that the annual supply of money, become necessary to France, had been less considerable, that is to say, even if the French commodities had remained in their former state of disparagement?

Sixteenthly, If that increase of prices in the landed revenue has not been restrained to France; if it be a fact, as all travellers pretend to have observed, that all the other parts of Europe have experienced the same revolution, the same encouragement, the same success, except the difference produced in some places by the singularity of certain laws; may it not be concluded, that although England has lost nothing by the revolution, although France has proved a gainer by it, other nations have also enriched themselves, namely, one tenth, those where the prices have been advanced a tenth; a ninth, those where the prices have been raised one quarter; one half, those where the prices have risen one half, &c. independently of an increase still more essential, viz. that of the quantity of the productions of the earth, which always closely follows that of their prices.

Seventeenthly, Were one to reflect, that this increase in the prices, in regard to the productions of the earth, is always followed by a similar increase with respect to the products of industry, which thereby receives the same encouragement; if, after examination, no one can harbour any doubt of the fact; would it be an easy matter, even with the help of the sacred maxim, to persuade any nation, whose prices have been doubled, to reduce the nominal of her revenue from 20 to 18, in order to get the advantage in the competition with another nation who, by some disagreeable circumstances, should have been obliged to raise her products from 20 to 22, as England is compelled to do? Would not one, on the contrary, conjecture that every wise nation will follow the advice of the American of Philadelphia, i. e. that she will not hesitate to raise equally her own products from 20 to 22, certain, as she will be by this means, to give fresh encouragement both to her agriculture and her industry, and not to hurt in the least the interest of the nation whom those disagreeable circumstances should have compelled that rise from 20 to 22; compelled, I say, without procuring for her that encouragement which cannot spring from such a rise, but in as much as it is not necessitated by taxes?