The Industrial Revolution

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 1027928145

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-159926

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Cunningham, William http://d-nb.info/gnd/128907487

Title:: The Industrial Revolution

Place of publication:: Cambridge

Publisher:: The University Press

Year of publication:: 1922

Scope:: xxii S., S. 404-886

Digitisation:: 2021

Collection:: Economics Books

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136 PARLIAMENTARY COLBERTISM A proposal for raising the money had been approved by a committee of the House of Commons? and would in all probability have been carried into effect, but for the inter- vention of Locke, who denounced it in vigorous terms. He succeeded in impressing Montague, the future Lord Halifax, who was framing the scheme for re-coinage®; and as a result, the new coins were issued at the old denominations. The hopes of the bankers and moneyed men, who had hoarded new silver in the hope that the value would be raised, were balked®; and the landed men, who had let their lands on terms calculated in defective coins and subsequently re- ceived payments in the amended coin, would be gainers by the fact that the old denomination was retainedd, It is at nd the old all events obvious that it was much more convenient to keep ae to the old denominations; the difficulty of counting up any retained Jaro0 payment in coins worth 3s. 14d. each would have been considerable’. The difficulties which arose from the scarcity of money were distinctly aggravated during the process of re-coinage®, when a large number of pieces were necessarily withdrawn from circulation. Five country mints were established? to facilitate the process of recoinage. Sir Isaac Newton was at 1 One of the resolutions reported by the committee on 12 March 1695 was in favour of raising the new silver crowns 18 0/, 80 as to pass for 5/6. Ruding, 11. 36. 3 Thorold Rogers, First Nine Years, 44. » The crucial decision was taken om 20th October 1696, when the House decided not to alter the denomination of the coins (C0. J. x1. 567). After this, according to Haynes, the new money which had been hoarded began to come into circulation much more rapidly, p. 149. 4 Tt is said that Montague only succeeded in carrying through his scheme because the landed men were convinced that it was to their interest to retain the old denominations, and after he had purchased a considerable amount of support trom other members of the House of Commons. The arguments pro and con are clearly stated by Kennett, Complete History, m1. 505. Among the most effective writers on Lowndes’ side was Sir R. Temple, who argued that to “keep up an old Standard under an old Denomination below the value of Bullion is the greatest Folly imaginable,” Some Short Remarks upon Mr Locke's Book (1696), p. 8. In a rejoinder E. H. argues that raising the value of the coin would certainly bring about a rise in the price of commodities, Decus et Tutamen (1696), 23. Ruding comments severely on the wrongheadedness of the Chancellor in being guided by Locke's view, Annals, it. 58. 5 Lowndes, Essay on Amendment, p. 214; Macculloch, 4 Select Collection o Tracts on Money, and criticism by Haynes, 203—235. ¢ Sir John Dalrymple, Memoirs, 1790, Part mx. book 1v. p. 86. 7 At Exeter, Bristol, Chester, York, and Norwich. A.D. 1689 —1776. was 1m- genious but tncon- ventent in the re-coinage

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