Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume LXII., No. 381, July, 1847

by Various

“De Mortuis nil nisi bonum” is, when applied to individuals, a generous, if not a just rule for our ordinary guidance. But to whatever extent it may be carried in judging of men and their motives, we apprehend that it would be the height of Quixotism to admit a defunct cabinet or an ejected minister to the benefit of any such act of indemnity. The evils which statesmen may commit, either through mistaken policy or egotistical arrogance of opinion, are too serious in their results to be easily or readily forgotten: and no lapse of time whatever can screen from censure those men who have wilfully tampered with the well-being and prosperity of the nation.

It will, we think, be admitted on all hands, that the present ministry, however well disposed, are most wofully infirm of purpose. We make every allowance for the situation in which they found themselves when called to office. However sanguine may have been the dreams of the Whig partisan, he could not, some eighteen months ago, have entertained the slightest idea of that extraordinary combination of chances which led to his return to office; neither do we believe that the leaders of that party ever expected to obtain even a temporary ascendency during the existence of the present parliament. When Lord John Russell and his confederates threw down the gauntlet of Free Trade, they could not have calculated upon the possibility of its being picked up and appropriated by their old antagonist of Tamworth. Well as they may have known, from former experience, the nature of that “tricksy spirit,” they never could have been prepared for that crowning denouement to a drama of political apostasy; and we are certain that no section of her Majesty’s subjects were more amazed than the Whigs when they found themselves again in possession of their coveted quarters in Downing Street. Without plan, and without preparation, we freely admit that they were entitled to a large share of public indulgence. In ordinary times, their administration might even have been productive of good. Schooled by adversity, and instructed by previous failure, they this time put forward in the van no opinions of a revolutionary tendency. They promised to apply themselves in the first instance to the mental and physical amelioration of the people—they offered to become the patrons of educational seminaries, directors of public baths, and inspectors of extended sewerage; and no one could gainsay in these respects the purity of their projected measures. But, unfortunately for them, the necessities of the time required more than sanatory legislation. The prodigious increase of national wealth which was prophesied as the immediate result of the change in our commercial policy and the repeal of agricultural protection, did not arise, like Aladdin’s palace, in one night from the liberated ground. The various and complex questions of Irish policy became all at once merged and confounded in the cry of common famine. The staple food of an unenterprising and improvident people had failed; and the Celts of the western islands, desisting from their absurd denunciation of the Saxon, were fain to supplicate Great Britain, herself by no means exempt from the calamity, for the means of absolute existence.

We do not intend to criticise in detail the means which were adopted by government for the relief of the suffering districts. We believe that they were actuated throughout by a liberal and a kindly spirit; and upon such an occasion as this, it was truly difficult to steer between parsimony on the one side, and reckless extravagance on the other. At the same time it is very evident that they were utterly unprepared for the crisis. They neither adopted an intelligible principle, nor laid down an extensive plan for their guidance. They vacillated every week between one method of relief and another. At one time they were for the promotion of useless works, which could tend to no profitable result, but which were a mere excuse for opening the public coffers to the relief of the starving Irish; at another, they rejected the proposal of Lord George Bentinck for extended railway employment—a scheme which, however objectionable from its magnitude, at least held out a feasible prospect of ultimate reimbursement of the loan. It is right to observe that in this refusal they were strengthened by the co-operation of Sir Robert Peel, their former opponent, but now their confidential adviser; and that the only ministerial measure of which the late autocrat has been pleased to disapprove, was a subsequent veering towards the principle recommended by Lord George, and the concession of a restricted loan towards the promotion of the Irish railways. But, as we have said before, the question of Irish relief was attended with much difficulty. The most experienced and sagacious statesman of the world might have gone astray in providing for a calamity so extended and so new; and, upon the whole, we are not inclined to find much fault with the Whigs in this respect, beyond what is implied by our decided conviction of their weakness, or rather want of purpose.

But, unfortunately for us all—most unfortunately, we fear, for the great bulk of the community—there are other questions not only impending but absolutely pressing upon us at this moment, of even greater vital importance than either Irish famine or British scarcity. It may be that, through the mercy of Divine Providence, these scourges maybe speedily removed. The soil may again be restored to its former fertility; and if such should prove to be the case, we trust that this calamitous lesson against idleness and improvidence will not be forgotten in those quarters where the visitation has been most severely felt. We trust that, in Ireland especially, and in some parts of our own country, both landlord and tenant will be roused to a more active sense of their respective liabilities and duties; and that, notwithstanding the tendencies which are too likely to follow from our late pernicious course of legislation, they will become alive to the conviction that no nation whatever can hope to maintain its independence if it neglects the paramount duty of cultivating and rearing within itself that supply of food upon which its inhabitants must depend for their support. It is not much more than a year ago, since we pointed out the miserable consequences which, in the event of a war or a famine, must ensue from a decrease of the cultivation of the soil, such as was not only contemplated, but openly recommended by some leading partisans of the League. Since then, we have had an opportunity of testing the strength of our actual position under one of those terrible emergencies. Scarcity has come, though not famine in its most gaunt and hideous shape; and not only are our own supplies deficient, but the greatest difficulty has been found in procuring a substitute from elsewhere. Had this occurred in the time of war, not in the season of unbroken peace, when the highway of the ocean is free, it is hardly within the power of man to exaggerate the horror of the consequences.

But, though the heavens may again smile upon us, there are evils of man’s creation which may not be so speedily removed, unless the nation can be brought to a clear sense of the predicament in which they have been placed by the insensate obstinacy and insatiable conceit of one minister, who, though ejected from office, is yet powerful in the councils of the empire. We cannot explain, because we do not understand, the nature of that mysterious and undefinable power which Sir Robert Peel seems to exercise over the proceedings of the present cabinet. We do not know the secret composition of the philtre, or love-potion, which he appears to have given to the Whigs; but we have seen quite enough in the recent discussions in parliament with regard to the monetary pressure which is now in the act of crushing and grinding to dust many thousands of the commercial and industrious classes, to be aware that the Russell ministry are entirely at one with Sir Robert in the maintenance of his favourite crotchet, and that they are prepared to abide by his delusion with regard to the currency, be the consequences to the country what they may.

This question of the currency is at once so vast, and so vital to the interests of every man who has any stake at all in the community—it presents itself at this moment in so alarming, and yet so palpable a shape—that we would be inexcusable were we to remain silent at a crisis when the evils of circumscribed credit and bank restriction are driving the honest trader into the Gazette. Long before the late premier had absolved us, by his unprincipled tergiversation, from all ties of party and support, we sedulously and earnestly protested against his perpetual meddling and tampering with the circulation of the country. In particular we were amongst the first to oppose his wanton, because uncalled for interference with the Scottish Banking System, under the operation of which the country had advanced, without risk or injury, at a ratio which probably never was equalled, and which certainly never was exceeded. We then warned, not only the bankers, but our national representatives, and the public, that if they permitted one single wedge to be driven into the fabric, the stability of the whole was endangered; and we showed that the retention of our one-pound note circulation was, though an important item of profit to the bankers, and of convenience to the public, of little consequence compared with the results which must ensue, if the circulation of the banks was arbitrarily limited, and all extension of credit made to depend upon the possession, or rather the purchase, of a large sum of useless and unprofitable bullion, which, so far from increasing the wealth of the country, must inevitably render it powerless in the event of a commercial panic. We believed then, and we believe now, that history does not afford a parallel instance of so reckless and shameful a disregard of public feeling and opinion on the part of any statesman; and the confidence and perseverance with which Sir Robert Peel proceeded to thrust his measure down the throats of the Scottish bankers, was, in our opinion, little less than a deliberate insult to the country,—because we never can forget this great and pregnant fact, that no grounds for tangible accusation could be drawn, or were attempted to be established, from the practical working of the system. That system was created by a somewhat neglected people for their own convenience, and without any legislative interference at all. It had supplied all the necessities of the country, and had been found perfect in its operation during periods of more than common exigency and distress. It had stood the test of experience successfully at times when the monetary system of England had been proved insufficient for the pressure. It possessed the full confidence of the nation; and yet—we can hardly write the sentence without a blush—it was surrendered after a faint opposition, merely because Sir Robert Peel considered himself an accomplished currency doctor, and was desirous to try the effects of his aurum potabile upon a sound as well as a sickly subject.

The one-pound notes, however, were spared, and the bankers in some degree reconciled to the change by the promise of a future monopoly. Had not that bait been thrown out to them, we can hardly believe it possible that so unnecessary and unpopular a measure could have been carried at all, but, the wedge being once inserted, it has since been driven home to the quick. We appeal now with confidence to the merchants and manufacturers of Glasgow, Paisley, and Greenock—to the landed gentry, who are suffering under the tightening of the screw—to the enterprising tenant, who, under a long lease, is seeking to improve his land—to the trader, dealer, and shopkeeper of every kind throughout Scotland—whether they ever experienced such a monetary pressure as the present. And we ask them further to consider for themselves, and that very seriously indeed—for an evil too long submitted to may grow beyond the reach of a remedy—what is the real cause of this distress, and unparalleled scarcity of money? How is it that, with property of the most undeniable value on their hands, which they are ready to tender in security, they cannot by any means whatever obtain their accustomed credit? And then we ask them to compare the present state of matters with the past, and point out, if they can, any one period or crisis, before Sir Robert Peel was pleased of his own accord to substitute his banking system for that established by the progressive intelligence of the nation, when money could not be obtained and credit given, at fair but not exorbitant rates, for good and sufficient security?

We crave the pardon of our English readers if, in the first instance, we place this point more exclusively in a national view. It is quite true, and we are fully alive to the fact, that, thanks to the crotchet of Sir Robert Peel, England and Scotland are now placed in exactly the same monetary difficulties, and we are not without hope that, on that account, our united efforts to get rid of the nightmare which is stifling us both, may prove more effectual than if either country were struggling singly for liberation. But it must not be forgotten that with us the experiment has been recently made. We are still most vividly alive to the advantages of a system which we ourselves founded, upon principles of mutual support among all classes of the community—under which we have risen and thriven—and which has not been sacrificed on account of any alleged fault or deficiency in its working, or from any intelligible motives of public policy, but simply to gratify the whim and feed the vanity of a minister who considers himself wiser than a nation, and who never can be happy without change. A monetary crisis and a panic are new things to us; for we have hitherto been accustomed to associate public distress with low wages, low prices, and a want of demand for products. But we find ourselves now for the first time in this position, that with higher wages than are the average, more demand for labour than can well be supplied, and more orders on the hands of our manufacturers than can well be executed, we are yet brought to an absolute stand-still for want of money. We go to our bankers with security which is both unquestioned and unquestionable, and we proffer it in security for that which, according to our old ideas, we think that we are absolutely entitled to have on such terms—for money, the life-blood of a commercial community; and we are told that it cannot be given to us! And when we inquire the reasons for such refusal, we are told that the banks cannot afford to increase their circulation; since, under the new system, they are compelled to stock their own coffers with gold for every single note which they issue beyond a given point—and gold to be had must be paid for.

Had we a Pactolus among ourselves, this state of things might possibly be endurable; but, unfortunately, we are not rich in that kind of bullion, and our Mint—somewhat needlessly secured by the Treaty of Union—has since very coolly been abolished. But we have iron and other sorts of produce in abundance, and land tolerably valuable, and stocks of various kinds, upon all or any of which we were wont, in former times, to raise money without any difficulty, and so to make our capital available in the prosecution of our different works. These are now rendered absolutely and practically useless. We cannot raise money upon them, because the bankers cannot afford to buy an exorbitant amount of golden counters to remain in their cellars profitless and unseen; and thus trade is brought to a stand-still, public enterprise is checked, and the market is disappearing from our grasp.

In short, the present system under which the whole of us are groaning, and which, if not speedily abandoned, must land us in irretrievable difficulties, is neither more nor less than a most culpable interference with credit, by restricting the ordinary circulation of the country to a point far below that which is absolutely necessary for its exigencies, and by making any further issue of paper dependent upon the purchase and the hoarding of gold.