Were the trade and industry of England to decay, the amount of taxes might so far diminish, as to prove insufficient to pay the interest of the national debt, and defray the expence of government. Were the people to be blown up into a spirit of revolt against taxes, the same event would probably happen. In either case, the natural and immediate consequences of the bankruptcy would probably follow one another in this manner:
1mo, Every creditor of the state would become poorer in proportion to the diminution of his income.
2do, Consumption and the demand for work would diminish in proportion to the part of that income withheld, which the creditors annually expend for these purposes.
3tio, Trade would directly suffer, in proportion to that part of the said revenue yearly thrown into it by the public creditors at present; and it would consequently suffer, in proportion to the hurt resulting to private credit, from the consequences of the bankruptcy.
The creditors then would lose all, the trade of England would be undone, and the multitudes who live in consequence of the demand for their industry from the one and the other, would be reduced to misery. These immediate effects would first manifest themselves in the capital. The consequences would soon be felt all over England: a diminution upon the consumption of the fruits of the earth; a stagnation of that commerce which is carried on between London and the country (which we have seen to be equal to the amount of all the taxes and land-rents spent in London) would soon throw every thing into confusion. But taxes would be abolished: of that there is no doubt. Let a deliberate bankruptcy take place without any abolition of them by law, they would soon sink to nothing, from the utter impossibility there would be found to pay them.
A total bankruptcy, therefore, coming upon England, either from a decay of her trade, or a disturbance in collecting the public revenue, would have the effect of plunging the nation into utter ruin at home: what might be the consequences from abroad, I leave to the reader’s sagacity to determine.
Let me now suppose a bankruptcy to take place from a deliberate act of power, with a view of expediency.
The difference between the two consists only in this; that in the first, all the consequences we have mentioned would follow one upon another, without a possibility of preventing them: in the other, a plan to prevent them might be concerted.
Let me then suppose, that government shall find it expedient, at any time, to use a spunge for the public debts; that they shall fear no external bad consequences, either from the resentment of those states who may be hurt by it, or from the ambition of others who may profit by it; that they shall cooly resolve to sacrifice the interest of all the creditors in favour of the whole body; and that they shall deliberate upon the plan to be followed, in order to bring about so great a revolution, without essentially hurting any interest in the state, that of the creditors alone excepted.
In that case, I imagine, they would begin by ordering the amount of all that is paid to the creditors, to be set apart as a fund for the execution of the plan.