John Blackburne, esq. Thomas Berney Bramston, esq. All very respectable gentlemen. Upon this list Mr. Sheridan observed, that ministers in framing it had not preserved the rules of proportion; for his side of the house were entitled to have five and a fraction. The secretary at war rose upon this occasion, and commented at considerable length upon what had been asserted by Mr. Sheridan. The cant of superior purity, and the charge of corruption, was the manner in which the minority had generally thought proper to avenge themselves on, the majority. This was the mode by which they endeavoured to impose upon the public. The smaller number had no right to arrogate to themselves the most perfect rectitude, and charge the majority with the very worst intentions. The charge of corruption against such a body as the house of commons, was in itself absurd and ridiculous. The number who could be supposed to act merely from their interest must be very few. The house of commons did not differ from the country at large in this respect. Mr. Grey said, his honourable friend had been accused by the secretary at war of vilifying the house of commons, and degrading it in the public estimation; but it should be recollected that the ho nourable secretary himself had some time before been the foremost to arraign corruption, but was now become its abettor and defender. He had once strenuously opposed the measures of the present minister, and had spurned his "dirty filth and dowlas;" but had since contracted an intimate alliance with him. Mr. Grey said, with regard to himself, he wished his words to be remembered, should he ever attempt to deviate from his principles," that with the present ministry he would hold no communion, and if he thought his honourable friend (Mr. Fox) in office capable of maintaining the abuses at present prevailing, he would lose his support." There was no salvation for the country, but by a complete investigation of the causes by which it had been reduced to its present situation. There could be no renovation of public credit, without a removal of the causes which had effected its destruction. To accomplish these objects, the most exact economy and the most extensive retrenchments were required. The influence of the crown ought to be diminished, places which were not essential to the purposes of government should be abolished; and above all, and without which nothing could be effected, a reform in the representation must be introduced. Mr. Wilberforce vindicated the dignity and consistency of the ma-. jority of the house, from the aspersions thrown out against them by gentlemen who were in favour of the motion. The opinion of the public was held out as against the sense of the majority of the house, though the fact was directly oppo. site. He recollected that such ar guments were applied to him in 1783, and 84, in 90, and 96; yet when he returned to his consituents, instead of finding the senti meats of the people against him, the absolute reverse was manifest. From the beginning of the war much of the public calamity was owing to the conduct of opposi tion, and to the conduct of those who had proceeded to lengths which the opposition would not avow. The master of the rolls was for defering defering the 'committee now proposed, till the report of the committee which was already appointed had been received; it would be then for the house to consider whether the report was satisfactory; it would be absurd that two committees should sit at the same time and on the same business. It would be equally useless and absurd to appoint a committee that was to investigate and review all the measures since the present ministers entered into administration. This only could be the object of the present motion. Mr. Curwen said, that if any list whatever had been offered to him, he should have considered it as the greatest of insults. It was the object of the ballot that all should exercise their own judgments without influence. He expressed his want of confidence in the ability of Mr. Pitt to guide public affairs at the present momentous crisis. He had no hopes of energy while he governed. The country could only be saved by a man who had the magnanimity to destroy the whole system of ministers, and by a parliament that would receive no lists. Dr. Laurence spoke at considerable length in favour of the motion. tions which had been made to his motion, in a forcible speech of considerable length. The minister," said he, has seized the cash of the bank, and therefore it is that the public mind is agitated. This renders an inquiry into the conduct of the minister as necessary as an inquiry into the affairs of the bank. My banker may be a man of honour, and a solvent man from whom I want no further security; but I want to be secured against robbers who have entered his house, laid hold of all his cash, anđ then declared themselves his partners. I wish to know, whether any man breathing had a doubt of the solidity of the bank before the minister laid his rapacious hands upon the cash there."-He acknowledged that there had lately been a great run upon the bank for cash; but contended that it was the conduct of the minister which caused it. He, together with his associates, struck terror into the public mind by the rumours of invasion; and the order of council on Sunday, and the proclamation on Monday (Feb. 26th and 27), finished what had been begun upon that matter. All this was the natural effect of the system which the minister had pursued in the course of the present war. Men were naturally terrified when these artifices were employed to work upon their imagi nations. The effect of that terror was the giving up to the minister the management of all the interest of the stock of the public creditor. Mr. Fox then observed, that no man had less apprehension of an invasion from the French than he had; he was sanguine as to the favourable result, should so desperate a measure be attempted. An invasion would certainly be a great evil to us; but he maintained, that, if the French should land in this Mr. Banks discussed. the subject with great impartiality; but was against the motion, because he was not sure that the matter to be investigated by such a committee as was then asked for would not branch out into a length that would defeat the object that was now in view, and in which dispatch was so essential. He feared that the investigation by such a committee would require so much time as to be injurious, perhaps fatal, to the object which the house had in view, Mr. Fox replied to the objec country country as great à force as it was practicable for them to land, he should think the mischiefs they could do to the permanent interests of this nation comparatively small, when put in the scale opposite to the mischief which the proceedings of the last two or three days would occasion. He said, he had heard of negative sucsesses in this war; he did not wish to be an egotist, but thought he could say without vanity that he had some negative merit. He had not had the misfortune to counsel this odious, this ruinous war! He had not had the misfortune to lend assistance to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of his fellow creatures! he had not had the misfortune to load his country with hundreds of millions of debt! he had not bad the misfortune to set his name to a proclamation manifesting to the world the bankruptcy of his country! These were his negative merits; he claimed them as his due, and the minister was welcome to despise, while he enjoyed the comfortable reflections which arose out of them." What would have been the feelings of this house (continued Mr. Fox), if ten years ago any man had said, you think your finances very prosperous; yet in the beginning of the year 1797 the chancellor of the exchequer will issue a proclamation to prohibit the bank of England from pay ing any one man in money for a bank note! Would you not have considered such a man as a lunatic?" An inquiry, he asserted, ought immediately to be entered into, to determine the causes which have brought the nation into its present deplorable state. If it should appear, which was greatly to be wished, that this condition brought on by the misconduct of was the minister, then the people would have the consolation to reflect, that their affairs might yet be in some degree retrieved: but if it should turn out, as he trusted to God it would not, that the national affairs had been as well conducted as human prudence could conduct them, the people could expect nothing but inevitable ruin. The only means of ascertaining this was to relinquish all confidence in the minister, and institute an inquiry into that conduct which had brought on so much calamity. Mr. Fox said he had seen by the ma nagement of these two debates that the minister's object was to put off the inquiry into his conduct as long as he could, and also to secure to himself a committee of his own friends, by whom he would be tried. The house divided; for the motion 67; against it 141. Mr. Sheridan then moved, "that Mr. Fox be added to the committee on the affairs of the bank, &c." on which the house divided : Ayes Noes 53 144 Immediately after the bank 'stopt payment by the order of council, the minister introduced a bill into the house of commons, to suspend the law for preventing the bank issuing notes under five pounds. This bill was read a second time on the first of March. It stated that these small notes were to be made payable to bearer on demand. Mr. Grey, Mr. Fox, and Mr. Sheridan strongly contended that the proceedings of the house, by sanctioning the order of council, and passing this bill nearly at the same time, would appear to be absurdly contradictory. For by the bill then before the house, these notes were to be payable on demand; whereas the other regula tion called upon the bank not to pay in specie, until parliament shall make further provision. An order, said they, is issued from the council not legally binding on the bank, to issue paper instead of cash. In the interim parliament is about to give the sanction of its authority to the bank to issue bills payable on demand; and this before the bill for confirming the order of council could be passed. The individual thinks he has the faith of the bank, and gets the bill; the bank refuses to pay in specie, he brings his action, and he must hecessarily succeed at law, unless the parliament makes a retrospective act to cover the bank. The house resolved itself into a committee, in which it was decided, that the bill was to commence on the 2d of March 1797. It was then read a second time and reported. Amount of demands on the bank was The commons received a message from the lords on the 3d of March, informing them that their lordships had passed the bill for removing doubts with respect to the bank issuing bank-bills under the sum of five pounds, without any amendment; and the bill received the royal assent by commission the same day. Mr. Bramstone, on the 3d of March, brought up the first report of the committee appointed to inquire into the state of the bank, the substance of which was as follows: The committee stated, that they had examined the outstanding claims against the bank with the corresponding assets, and found that on the 25th of February, the day to which the accounts could be made up with accuracy, the total Assets, not including the sum of 11,686,8001. of permanent debt due by government, amounted to So that there was a surplus of Since the 25th of February considerable issues had been made, both in bank-notes and government paper; but as these were upon corresponding securities, the balance in favour of the bank was not at all diminished by them. Mr. Bramstone, on the 7th of March, brought up the second report of the committee on the state of the bank, in which the committee stated it to be their opinion, that it was necessary to provide for the continuance and confirmation, for a limited time, of the order in council, and they submitted to the wisdom of parliament to determine the time for which such or der should be continued. 1797. £. 13,770,390 17,597,280 3,826,890 Accord Mr Sheridan, on the 9th of March, previous to the reading of the order of the day, begged leave to make a few observations upon the reports of the committee of secrecy, as they were connected with the business of the day. ing to the report of that committee, the government was represented as a debtor to the bank in various sums, independent of eleven millions, which the committee reckoned as forming so much of the ca pital stock of the bank, when in fact that eleven millions was no debt at all, and a declaration of such a nature was calculated to mislead. Instead of being included in the capital stock of the bank L as a debt, it should have been reckoned, what it really was, as an annuity of 330,000l. per annum, that sum being the stipulated interest for the other, during a certain term of years. If the eleven millions actually belonged to the effects of the bank, and was available at any time, and for any pur pose, that sum might be made applicable, in any exigency, to discharge any demand that might oceur; but that could not be called a debt, where there were no means of claiming the sum so reckoned Government might pay off that sum if it were so inclined, it was true; but it was improbable that it should do so, nor was it then very. likely, that government would pay it off in 8 4, that being the expiration of the 18 years for which it was obtained, when it could retain the use of it for so small an interest as 3 per cent. There was no power in the bank to compel the payment of this money at any period, and the payment of it rested solely on the option of government. The bank, as a corporation, was merely a vehicle for managing the national debt; and so long as the national debt existed, the bank would exist also. It would be a corporation to the end of time. So far then it was evident, that the eleven millions did not form a part of the capital stock of the bank, but only gave it an annuity; and this was an instance, he would not say of inaccuracy or design to misrepresent in the committee, but of a statement in consequence of which a sort of impression had gone abroad, as if that money were immediately applicable to any object of relief. The inquiry would then be of what effects the seventeen millions were composed, which were to defray the out standing engagements of the bank. They consisted of course of cash in hand, of other disposable securities, and of bills which the bank had discounted. He next examined the situation of the bank in respect to government. It appeared by the paper on the table, that government owed 9,964,000 to the bank, which remained as part of their assets, and the permanent securities towards defraying the 13,770,000l. of outstanding demands upon it. He contended that the directors of the bank, upon the present occasion, should have said to government "Why do you not pay us the money you owe us, before you demand a state of our finances? and then we shall be able to satisfy every demand without your interference." About four years before, the bank increased their dividends to 7 per cent. which indicated a growing prosperity. In 1795, the bank undertook to subscribe one million towards the loyalty loan of eighteen millions. If government perceived that the bank was suffering a gradual decrease, they ought to have taken some measure to have paid the debt, or some part of it, which it owed to the bank, to prevent the inconveniences which had since arisen. It appeared as if government had entertained some desire to reduce the bank to such a situation; because, instead of paying what they owed they took another million from it. If the present difficulties were foreseen, why did the government shut the door, when the books of the subscription to the loyalty loan of eighteen millions were open, and when people from every part of the kingdom came forward with their money and were disappointed? Why instead of closing the account at eighteen |