What was the issue in the land-bank controversy?
Seiichiro Ito
(Ohtsuki City College, Japan)
Introduction
In 1694, the year of the foundation of the Bank of England, John Briscoe
presented his idea of a land-bank in his well-known pamphlet, A discourse on
the late funds, which turned out to be the announcement of the launch of the
so-called land-bank controversy lasting several years producing literally
uncountable numbers of pamphlets. The realisation of Briscoe’s idea came
in the next year with the project of the National Land Bank, though it would
end up a failure. Examining the controversy this land-bank project
triggered may lead to the conclusion that as a fund of credit land was
unrealistic and impractical in comparison with money and that this
controversy revealed the difficulty and incoherence of the idea of a land-bank
itself. This was how land-bank projects in this period have been understood
by historians such as J. K. Horsefield (1960), even though he illustrated in
great detail what significant roles those land bank projects played in the
British Monetary Experiments for increasing money-supply with support of
various newly designed credit institutions. However, re-examining the
pamphlets and reconsidering the arguments in them make it possible to find
another story. Now that we know the reality of credit relation in sixteenth
to seventeenth century England was based on a vulnerable socio-moral
nexus, such as reputation and opinion, which C. Muldrew elucidated as the
Economy of Obligation, we never fail to see the fact that the land-bank
projectors at the end of the seventeenth century still strived to acquire safe
and reliable institutional credit being free from vulnerability and
scepticism.1 What projectors struggled for was not just profitability or other
economic advantages, but also verification of their own honours and honesty,
which were supposed to prove the reliability of their projects and then
benefit as its result. This is explained by the projectors’ persistence in
claiming their authorship of the idea of project. The question about whose
project was original has been referred to but just as an episode in the
1
See Ito (2011).
premature stage of the controversy concerning banking. But, in fact, this
was the issue about which projectors, such as Briscoe, J. Asgill, N. Barbon,
and H. Chamberlen, were strongly concerned.
The rivalry between
‘monied-men’ and ‘landed-men’ was the framework which was exploited by
the Briscoe side, who insisted that the fund of the bank should be mainly
land, to blame the plagiarism and distortion of the original design done by
‘monied men’, who argued that the principal content of the fund must be
money. This rivalry was not the one between two economic interests, that is,
so-called landed interest and so-called moneyed interest, which D. Rubini
(1970) tried to overlap with the political conflict, such as country and court.
The social framework in which the land-bank projectors were struggling was
not necessarily fit for the post-Financial Revolution picture, where the
nation was split into those two economic interests over who should pay the
interest of public debt. What was at the top of the list for the land-bank
projectors was neither the simply economic benefit nor the political interest
but the reliability and feasibility of the project.
1. Obstructions to Briscoe’s project
Briscoe’s project must have been well-known and stimulating at least in
some sense, for it let someone write a parody of it, which is a pamphlet
entitled, Proposals for supplying the government with money on easie terms.
This title comes from the subtitle of Briscoe’s A discourse on the late funds of
the million-act, lottery-act, and Bank of England (1694). This pamphlet
was published under the name of John Briscoe, but ‘with a suplement to his
Explanatory dialogue thereupon’. Although the year of publication printed
on the cover-page was 1694, as Horsefield suggests, it seems to have been
issued in 1695.2 As a parody, it may have had to pretend to be published the
same year as Briscoe’s Discourse was. The ‘suplement’ coming after the
original proposals quoted from the Discourse, though there are some slight
differences, 3 consists of a dialogue between two characters, that is
‘Free-holder’, the persona who attacks Briscoe’s project, and ‘Philangus’, who
is the writer of the original proposal, Briscoe. The Free-holder asserts that
Concerning the year of publication of this pamphlet, see Horsefield (1960), p. 184, note
16.
3 Horsfield infers that the alterations were done by Briscoe himself, revealing ‘the
chameleon-like quality’ of Briscoe’s ideas. Horsefield (1960), p. 185.
2
Briscoe’s proposals will put the trade of the country in the disaster. The
essential difference between metal money and the bill of credit Briscoe
proposes is that the latter wants ‘an intrinsick value’ (Proposals, [1695], p.
10). By intrinsic value the Free-holder means the ‘esteem which is put upon
any Specie, by reason of some Vertue or Value in the thing it self,
incorporated in the Very Specie’. According to him, the bills of Briscoe’s
project does not have any such ‘Innate or Native Value’, but, instead, they
must be made valuable ‘by the Inscription, or Signature’, which ‘shall intitle
them to reach Lands’. The Free-holder makes a distinction between gold or
silver and bills or paper-money: the former is ‘valuable without any Stamp,
or Inscription’; the latter ‘can only pretend to an extrinsick value, by virtue of
the Inscription’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 10).
In the argument of the
Free-holder the crucial point was not only whether it has intrinsic value,
that is, a certain content of precious metal, or not. The reason of his
rejection of the bills of credit was rather moral and social than material.
The Freeholder argues:
‘It will not be an easie thing to perswade the multitude to trust, their all in
the hands of Men, of whom they have not any personal knowledge, doubts
will arise whether these Commissioners or Agents, may be honest, or able’
(Proposals, [1695], p. 11).
It seems that for the Free-holder gold and silver cannot be replaced by
other things. They must be acquired and maintained somehow. It was a
significant question ‘whether it be probable that we shall get Gold and silver
by Trade, if it be carried on by the use of your Bills’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 11).
The perspective of the Free-holder is based on the so-called balance of trade
theory: the export of the native products should be more than the import of
the foreign goods. The Free-holder feared that the bill of credit will
‘occasion a lavish Expence[sic] of foreign Commodities at home’, which would
lead to the negative result of the balance of trade (Proposals, [1695], p. 12).
In short, ‘this imaginary Treasure, must in a course of Years, consume our
real treasure’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 13).
First of all, that the bills are just ‘Bits of Paper’ appeared the fundamental
reason of the Free-holder’s scepticism of the project. In his words, ‘You will
not so easily perswade them[= the landed men] … that Paper Money, is
better than Silver Money’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 15). For the Free-holder
goldsmith’s notes which practically circulated at that time also should be
rejected as the new type of money for the same reason as Briscoe’s bills of
credit. Both are just debts. Even though they are current in the market,
‘the last taker’ of the notes must become a loser (Proposals, [1695], p. 16).
A ‘good title’ of land did not appear to the Free-holder to be a sufficient
condition to make good currency. While Philangus points out that not only
goldsmith’s notes but also mortgages ‘often pass from hand to hand’
(Proposals, [1695], p. 17), the Free-holder rejects both Briscoe’s bills and
mortgages because the former has ‘but a bare Security at best’ and the
latter have usually ‘a double Security’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 18). The
Free-holder insists that what is needed in the practices of trade is
running-cash, not such uncertain, problematic paper credit. Furthermore
he reveals that what Briscoe proposed as an advantage of his project may
turn to be its weak point: ‘those that must take your Bills will not have
opportunity, to look into the Titles or Value of the Lands, nor to have
personal knowledge of the Trustees.’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 18) Land
security and the organisational support of the project, which was supposed to
enhance the reliability of Briscoe’s bills, did not seem to the Free-holder to
function properly without the appropriate accesses to the necessary
information.
The Free-holder did not deny the utility of paper money.
He
acknowledged that it was, in fact, widely used in actual dealings. At the
same time, however, he noted that paper credit, such as bonds, mortgages,
and bills, was accepted ‘only as a pledge to gain time for the payment of
Money’. Therefore, it appeared a fundamental problem for the Free-holder
that, though Briscoe’s bills were just ‘Paper credit’, it was intended to be
‘Paper Money’ which means the final means of payment (Proposals, [1695], p.
22).
The lowness of the interest rate in Holland, which had been admired in
England since the controversy in the late 1660,4 was also mentioned and the
position of the Free-holder concerning this subject was cleared. He took the
view that the other factors, such as being ‘more Laborious, Industrious, and
Parsiomonious’, than the low interest rate, which was supposed to be
brought ‘by the use of Paper-money’, are the main causes of the Dutch
4
See Ito (2008).
success.5 In any case, paper credit was not the reason of the prosperity of
the Dutch economy. His comment that ‘arguments to lower the rates of
Interest, are frequently used, to create wrong notions in matters referring to
Trade’ was his clear expression about his position in the controversy as well
as a sarcasm turned toward Briscoe’s project which tried to make use of this
issue (Proposals, [1695], p. 25).
In the latter half of the pamphlet, the privileged status of silver as money
was repeatedly maintained by the Free-holder, while Philangus often argues
that various types of non-silver money have been used. Taunting the
Free-holder who does not accept as money copper with the stamps given by
the government, Philangus rebut him: ‘You argue contrary to what has been
frequently practised’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 30).
Interestingly the
Free-holder rejects here even gold as the standard. Asserting that it is a
‘mistake’ that ‘a Standard had its original from the consent of Nations’
(Proposals, [1695], p. 31), he puts silver in the superior position as ‘a
Standard’ because ‘it is a metal in its nature so excellent for uses, that it
would supplant all other metals’ (Proposals, [1695], p. 32). The superiority
of silver to other metals was not only that ‘it has an Intrinsick Value,
incorporated in the very metal, by the esteem of Mankind’, but also that it is
durable, malleable, devisable, and plentifulness (Proposals, [1695], pp. 33).
Thus the author of this pamphlet took the anti-credit view, reminding us of
Locke’s position over this issue. However, the discussions launched by
Briscoe’s pamphlet went on in a more complicated way.
2. Briscoe’s project started
After his sensational debut in the controversy, or, we should say, the
declaration of the start of it by him, with his famous pamphlet, A discourse
on the late funds (1694), despite the hindrances as we have seen above, he
moved to the realisation of his speculations. As the introductory phrases of
the minutes of the National Land Bank explains, Briscoe’s Discourse ‘came
in too late’ and ‘there could be no probability of settleing it’ in the house of
commons in the year of 1694/5 (Minutes of the National Land-Bank. 1695-6,
In another place, also denying Philangus’s argument that Briscoe’s project will lower
the interest rate, the Free-holder briefly replies that ‘Riches and Plenty are
appropriated to Labour and Industry, grounded upon Honesty and fair Dealing.’
(Proposals, [1695], p. 41)
5
fo. 2) However, Briscoe, who had already been involved in the management
of some companies, such as the Company of Copper Miners in England and
the Company of Merchant Adventurers,6 began his bank-project ‘without the
Assistance of an Act of Parliament’ (Briscoe, The Freehold Estates of
England, [1695], p.1.) and called for subscription to the proposed land-bank
in some pamphlets. One of them is a pamphlet entitled The Freehold
Estates of England, or England it self the best Fund or Security . It is a
proposal for ‘the best fund or security’, which the author argues cannot be
other than land. Briscoe’s emphasis was naturally on the advantage for the
freeholders. However, his appeal to them to become the subscriber was not
necessarily persuasive but rather sounded unconfident and even begging.
The freeholders, Briscoe argues, will enable him to realise the beneficial
project ‘by subscribing, and settling their Estates in Trust upon credible and
substantial Persons of their own naming’. (Briscoe, The Freehold Estates of
England, [1695], p.1.) The feasibility of the project here relied on the
credibility of the subscribers. The enumeration of their names, as we will
see in the following, was the tactic the bank proposers in this period made
use of when trying to make their projects look trustworthy. This will
explain why in every land-bank project during this controversy the list of
subscribers was repeatedly printed.
And, in fact, Briscoe’s above-mentioned proposal showed how
indispensable this personal credibility was in this project. Most of the
notices on this proposal were concerning the administrative details such as
how, where, and who manages the bank, which are supposed to improve the
reliability of the bank:
‘an Account shall be publish’d in Print every Month of the yearly value of the
Estates Subscribed’; ‘a list of the Subscribers shall be Printed Alphabetically,
with the several yearly Values by them and each of them Subscribed, and
timely Notice given to the several Subscribers, to meet together in some
publick place within the Cities of London or Westminster, to choose by the
Majority of Votes, such and so many credible Persons as they or the Major
part of them shall think fit to be Trustees[sic] of all the Estates to be settled
on such Trustees in Trust for the aforesaid Purpose’; ‘the Subscribers shall at
the same time in like manner, choose such and so many, to be Directors or
6
See ‘Briscoe, John’, ODNB.
Managers, and one or more Treasurer or Treasurers … as the major part of
the Subscribers shall think fit’. (Briscoe, The Freehold Estates, [1695], p.1.)
Who is ‘credible’ and who is ‘fit to be Trustee’ were clearly considered the key
factors for the project’s success. The information about all these rules of
management was thought to be appeal for subscribers.
In another proposal entitled An account of the National Land-Bank, which
includes almost the same bank-proposal as one in The Freehold Estates of
England, Briscoe sounds more theoretical, reiterating the logic and using the
vocabulary of his Discourse: money is the medium of trade; trade cannot be
carried on without money; money has to carry ‘an intrinsick Value’, which
means the content of pure metal in a coin; because silver and gold are the
medium of trade, if there are not sufficient gold and silver, trade will be ‘at a
Stand for want of Money’, ‘except some other Medium be establish’d, or such
Defect supplied by Credit’; but, if there are not a ‘Valuable Fund to answer it’,
such credit is unsecure; therefore ‘our Credit for want of a certain Fund hath
been generally unsafe’; then, it is necessary ‘to establish some secure Fund of
Credit to supply the Want of Money, or else we must expect a Decay of our
Trade.’ In this way Briscoe leads to the conclusion that what was most
required in the situation is a ‘secure Fund’.
He proposes here ‘to make the
Lands of England, or rather England it self , a Medium of Trade and
Commerce as it conveys an intrinsick Value, or a Fund of Credit as it is the
most undoubted Security’ (Briscoe, An account of the National Land-Bank,
[1695], p.1.)
However, while Briscoe here also insists on the ‘Advantage of the Landed
Men’, the point stressed in this proposal was again about who and how keeps
the reliability of the system: ‘the whole Trust and Government’ of the
proposed bank was ‘in the hands of such whom the Landed-Men themselves
shall nominate and appoint; and from whom they may expect just and candid
Dealing’ (Briscoe, An account, [1695], p.1.). But, expressing his uncertain
feeling about the success of the project, Briscoe requests the subscribers not
to be ‘too inquisitive into my Methods of management’, until ‘a competent
number of Subscriptions’ make him have ability to realise the project.
(Briscoe, An account, [1695], p.1.) This kind of concern about the feasibility
of the project ironically demonstrates that all depends on the public opinion
about reliability of his plan.
3. Where is money?
The obsession about money, which was a typical phenomenon of the so-called
mercantilist economy,7 was also seen in the discussions between Briscoe,
and Asgill and Barbon. To a supposed question, ‘Where will the Money be
found to answer the Bills of Credit?, Briscoe replies: ‘I do not think my self
obliged to acquaint every impertinent Querist’. (Briscoe, An account, [1695],
p.1.) Following this evasive answer Briscoe makes unpersuasive excuse,
which is similar to his answer to the question about the method of the
management of the bank, that he will not feel necessity of answering it, ‘till
time shall have so ripened things, that I may at the same time be ready to
put my Proposals into execution.’ And then he dares to say, ‘I can
demonstrate to any Gentleman, That Money cannot be wanting’. (Briscoe, An
account, [1695], p.2.) Asgill and Barbon, quoting the exact sentences from
Briscoe, accused Briscoe of his insufficient and inappropriate explanation:
such an answer must have been done ‘when the Necessities of the
Freeholders, seeing no Hopes of Relief, may make them willing to believe any
thing.’ (The freeholder's answer to Mr. John Briscoe's proposals, 1695, p.1.)
According to Asgill and Barbon, when many land-bank projects appears and
people get used to the idea of them, it cannot ‘be imagin’d, that the
Freeholders will … enter their Estates upon so great Uncertainty, and be
called Impertinent, if they ask where and when they shall have the Money.’
(The freeholder's answer, 1695, p.2.)
Thus Briscoe’s answer to the
‘impertinent Querist’ ended up giving the impression of ‘great Uncertainty’,
which the people living in the vulnerable world should most try to evade.
Barbon and Asgill warned the readers not to subscribe Briscoe’s bank: ‘since
the chiefest part’ of his proposal concerning the money reserve is ‘to be a
Secret’, Briscoe’s project will ‘amuse’ the readers. Barbon and Asgill adds
that in the case of Briscoe’s bank subscription books, which were usually
supposed to be a device to improve the credibility, appears to rather help
decreasing it. A small number of subscriptions would generate scepticism
about the reliability of the project and it seemed, in fact, ‘probable from the
Number of Subscription Books plac’d in several parts of the Town’. This
A classical study about the mercantilist views on wealth and money is Viner (1937), ch.
I and II.
7
pamphlet concludes that ‘Mr. Briscoe ought to know that the Lands of
England are of too great a Value to be Stock-jobb’d, and the Freeholders too
considerable to be call’d together to Subscribe to Uncertainties.’ (The
freeholder's answer, 1695, p.2.)
In an Advertisement replying the same question as above, which is ‘Where
will there be Money found to Circulate the proposed Bills of Credit? ’, Briscoe
again hedged on the answer to this question:
‘The procuring Money to answer these Bills is part of the Method which I
have to lay before those Directors who shall be chosen by the Subscribers,
which I think is not reasonable for me to discover till I am in a Capacity to
put it in Execution’. (Briscoe, Advertisement. I have been desired by some
Gentlemen … [1695.], p. 1.)
Instead of giving the explanation of how to gather the cash reserve, he
claimed that the ‘Substance of my PROPOSAL’ was in illustrating the
procedural and organizational matters, such as what subscribers, trustees,
and directors do. For him the priority of the project was not in showing
their holding of cash but in emphasising the reliability of the institutional
aspects of the bank, even if his strategy did not look successful.
4. Who is the first?
Who is the first proposer was the subject which every land-bank projector in
this controversy was concerned about. While Briscoe says that ‘a late
printed paper publish’d by Dr. Barbone, intituled, An Account of the
Land-Bank’, consists of what ‘the Author hath mostly collected out of my
Writings’ (Briscoe, An account, [1695], p.1.), Barbon, in a pamphlet entitled
The freeholder's answer, claims that ‘all the seeming-useful parts of Mr.
Briscoe’s Proposals for a National Bank are directly taken from the
Settlement of the Land-Bank’ of two years ago. (The freeholder's answer,
1695, p.2.)
Briscoe rebutted this. In Mr. Briscoe’s reply, the question about money
reserve, which was one of the essential issues in The freeholders answer, was
no more essential. He replaced the question with another issue: reputation.
Briscoe begins his replay to ‘a silly Pamphlet’ of ‘Libcoln’s-Inn Undertakers’,
that is, Barbon and Asgill with trying to cause the damage to their project’s
‘reputation’, without ‘Scurrilous Expressions’ but with sarcasm. His attack
was twofold. It was, firstly, against the reputation of ‘Lincoln’s-Inn
Undertakers’, or ‘the first Promoters’ Briscoe calls; secondly, against the
freeholders or gentlemen who are supposed to become the subscribers to the
bank.
First, the anonymousness of the pamphlet of the ‘Undertakers’, Briscoe
suggests, almost tells the lack of ‘reputation’ of the author. As Briscoe was
not ashamed to print his name on his proposal, so no subscribers of his bank
‘have ever wish’d ( as several of the Subscribers to the Lincoln’s-Inn Bank
have done ) That the first Promoters had been Men of clearer Reputation.’
(Mr. Briscoe's reply, p.1.) Secondly, Briscoe says, the ‘Undertakers’ do not
trust gentlemen who support their bank, because of the lack of gentlemen’s
‘reputation’: ‘it is the Gentleman’s Estate they trust, and not the Gentleman
himself, or rather he trust them with his Estate wherewith to raise
themselves a Reputation; Without which they well know no Body will credit
them, nor their Bill.’ (Mr. Briscoe's reply, [1695], p.1.)
Briscoe’s attempt to ruin the reputation of his rivals persistently continues.
To the suggestion by the ‘Undertakers’ that the number of subscribers to
Briscoe’s bank is small, he replies: ‘I have already Subscriptions for the value
of five times more than you can pretend to’. Briscoe asserts that it is just
their ‘Grievance’ (Mr. Briscoe's reply, [1695], p.1.). However, the problem of
the originality was the most crucial point for Briscoe. Briscoe reproduces
his conversation with ‘a Subscriber to the Lincolns-Inn-Bank’ on the 26th
June: the subscriber ‘would fain have a Coalescence’; Briscoe answered him,
‘I had no reason to come under those who had built upon my Foundation’; a
subscriber replied, ‘I acknowledg[sic] they have borrowed their Methods from
you; but when a Man hath once published what he knows in Print, it is no
longer his, but any Man’s that will make use of it’; then Briscoe vehemently
told him, ‘If I left my Door open all night I might indeed expect to be robb’d,
but would not believe any honest Man would join in the Robbery’. (Mr.
Briscoe's reply, [1695], p.1.)
Thus the secret of money reserve, which had
originally been the issue, ended up never being revealed, except that he
pointed out that in his rival’s plan ‘they must circulate 1000l. Bills with 100l.
in Money’, calling them ‘Conjurers’. (Mr. Briscoe's reply, [1695], p.2.)
5.
Moneyed men versus landed men
At the end of this short but intense rebuttal, Briscoe clarifies the difference
between two projects, that is, Briscoe’s and Barbon and Asgill’s: ‘The
National Land Bank is properly so called, the Fund being Land’, and it
appoints ‘Landed Men’ to be its trustees, governors, and treasurers; on the
other hand, ‘The Lincolns-Inn Bank assume the Name of a Land-Bank
improperly’ because money is its fund and it appoints ‘Monied Men’ as its
trustees and directors, the landed men having ‘no Vote, not so much as for a
Door-keeper.’ (Mr. Briscoe's reply, [1695], p.2.) This contrast of two projects
shows the essence of this controversy in some respects: the points to
distinguish one from the other were, firstly, the difference of the contents of
funds, that is, money or land, and, secondly, the administrative procedures of
two banks, that is, who should become the trustees, the governors, the
treasurers and the directors.
The quality of the security was also a significant factor on which the
credibility of the bank hinged. That the security of a land bank is safe and
reliable because it is the land of England itself was a familiar argument
which was often used by land-bank projectors. The same was also found in
the pamphlet of Asgil and Barbon: ‘The Land of England is the Security they
give, no Bill being to be Issued but what has a reference to a Mortgage; so
that the Land of England becomes the Fund of Credit, and consequently this
Undertaking may properly be stiled a Land Bank’. However, their project
was fundamentally different from Briscoe’s. As Briscoe asserted, it was
obvious that the last resort of the bank of Asgil and Barbon was not land but
money, when they say as follows: ‘the whole Stock of Money is a Fund of
Insurance for all Bills, in Case of bad Titles’. ([Asgil and Barbon?], A letter
from a citizen of London to his friend in the country, [1695] , p. 1.) But, at
the same time they also argue that the land-security of the bank would be
enhanced by registration of land: ‘the Title being once ascertain’d and
Register’d, they may make their Land a Quick Stock, which will be more
useful than a Bank of Money lying by’. ([Asgil and Barbon?], A letter, [1695] ,
p. 1.) Registration of estates and credit based on it had often been discussed
particularly after the Interregnum. Although this pamphlet gives just a
simple suggestion with no details, without a doubt this call for registration
was on the context of those discussions. Registration would be a powerful
support to improve the credibility of the security of the bank.8
However, the quality and content of security were not the only and
primary concerns in this pamphlet. Its focus seems to have been more on
the inequality of interest-money at borrowings in Briscoe’s bank between
‘Monied Men’ and ‘Landed Men’: ‘there is so great an Inequality in Interest,
between the Land and Money Subscribers, that can admit of no
Reconciliation’. While moneyed men have to pay six percent, landed men
can borrow ‘for nothing’; ‘it being plain that as the Interest of the Money’d
Man Advances, the Interest of the Landed Man Sinks.’ But, what is
interesting and characteristic of this controversy was that this problem is
eventually attributed to the failure in the procedure of the management. In
Briscoe’s bank, the author 9 insists, ‘the Difference’ concerning the
management will endanger ‘the whole design’; ‘for the Borrowers, who are
the Land Subscribers, being the Majority, must consequently have the
greater share in the Management; and then it will follow, that the Money of
the Lenders, must be disposed of at the will of the Borrowers.’ And then the
author concludes that Briscoe’s ‘Undertaking’ is ‘altogether Impracticable’.10
While William Tindall and Briscoe later, as we will see, tried or, at least,
pretend to try to reconcile two groups’ benefits, here this author decisively
stood by the side of ‘Monied Men’. The land bank which is proposed to solve
the ‘Inequality’ must be established ‘by a Deed of Settlement Executed by
Trustees chosen by the Subscribers’ who has already paid the ‘great part of
the Money subscribed.’ The author resolutely says, ‘The whole Stock is to
be in Money’. Then, why is it called a ‘Land Bank’? He replies:
‘The Methods for employing this Stock, and all the Money the Bank shall
have Credit for, are plain and easy; They lend Money at Three and a half per
Cent. to all Freeholders, and others that have occasion to Mortgage their
Lands and Houses; and who may as they please take up any Sum not
exceeding Three Fourths of the Value of the same: All things are here
avoided, that might breed Confusion, by different Interest of Land and
See Ito (2009). ‘Law Reform’.
An Advertisement suggests that ‘A Letter from a Citizen of London to his Friend in
the Country, &c.’ is, in fact, ‘a Letter from the Projector John Asgill to the Projector
Nicholas Barebone’. Advertisement. The Projectors of the Money-Bank, …, 1695?, p. 1.
10 Indeed, Minutes of Briscoe’s bank shows that they persisted in keeping the
bank-committee under the control of the landed men with majority of votes. See
Minutes.
8
9
Money Subscribers; and indeed, the whole Undertaking seems to be no more
than a Society of Men, who have agreed to be Contributors to raise a Stock of
Money, ready to be lent to all that bring a good Security, of either Land or
Houses, at Three and a half per Cent. per Annum: And there appears no
more Difficulty in the Management, than what every Man meets with, who
disposes of Money the same way.’ ([Asgil and Barbon?], A letter, [1695] , p. 1.)
Here is clear that the stock of this proposed bank was substantially money.
Land was needed just as the good security for lending money. Now that it is
obvious that this bank was by the side of ‘Monied Men’, one can instantly
understand why an ‘Advertisement’, which is considered to be by Briscoe,
called it ‘Money-Bank, nick named the Land-Bank’. (Briscoe, Advertisement.
The projectors of the Money-Bank, [1695?], p. 1.)
6. Reconciliation
Plagiarism, or the originality of the project, remained a contentious issue but
in a different manner. In the spring of 1696, it appeared to be well-known
that the projectors of the ‘Land-Bank’ and the ‘National Land-Bank’
‘consulted with Dr. Chamberlain, with whom they pretended to join in his
Land-Credit, but robb’d him of some Notions he had’. (Tindall, Some remarks
upon the Bank and other pretended banks, 1696, p. 1.) A projector, William
Tindall, found in these forerunning projects not only the robberies of ideas
but also a conflict between ‘monied men and landed men’.
Tomdall’s own project intended to unite the benefits of two groups. He
argues that the king may be served with enough money not by the existent
banks ‘but upon a Real Land-Fund, or a Money and Land-Bank; by
Reconciling the Monied and Landed-Men, Increasing Trade, Supplying the
Defects of Money, the Improvement of Land, to / the great Benefit of the
Publick, and of every individual Member of it’. (Tindall, Some remarks, 1696,
pp. 1-2.) The reconciliation between two classes, he assures, will produce a
good effect: if moneyed men and landed men agree, ‘by a regular and honest
Managery they may let the Landed-Men have Money on their
Freehold-Estates at 3l. 10s. or 3l. per Cent. per Annum, they being Trustees
for their own Money; and their own and others Lands, makes[sic] all others
that deal with them safe, and get 10 if not 20l. per Cent. by the Money-Stock,
and inrich and make the Landed Men easy by the improving their Estates.’
(Tindall, Some remarks, 1696, p. 2.) And then, he reveals that his own
project, ‘a Money and Land-Bank’ will issue adequate and good money, that
is, bank-bills, though Tindall does not give a clear definition of it.
However, his supplementary explanation and some excuses concerning
this bank show what mattered for these projectors in this period. For
instance, he admits, ‘their Bills will pass more current than Money; but at
first must be negotiated with Money, till it’s better understood and put in
Practice’. (Tindall, Some remarks, 1696, p. 2.) Here we can see the
obstinacy of the ‘second nature’ which bothered Briscoe. Briscoe once said,
‘Custom is very prevalent over Mens Minds; and it is not unfitly said to be a
second Nature’ (Briscoe, A discourse on the late funds (2nd version), 1694, p.
21-22, emphasis in original).
People who were accustomed to cash
transaction were reluctant to use credit. Fear of unfamiliar things was
synonymous with easiness of custom. Only practice could overcome it:
‘these few years last past the Badness of our Money made the Bills of very
ordinary Goldsmiths as well as Bankers ... pass, and better approved than
either Silver or Gold’. (Tindall, Some remarks, 1696, p. 2.) To Tindall,
people’s understanding and acceptability which only time can generate
seemed to be the key factors to the success of the project. Tindall reiterates
his doubt about the people’s acceptability to an unfamiliar thing: ‘when once
understood, [it] will be more preferable than Money; but it being a new thing,
it will require 3 or 4 years to put it in Practice’. (Tindall, Some remarks, 1696,
p. 2.); ‘without Money to make them circulate, it will not easily be put in
practice under 2 or 3 years; in which time the Usurers, and the Money and
Landed-Men, may be hard upon us tho’ we pay but 3l. 10s. or 3l. per Cent.’
(Tindall, Some remarks, 1696, p. 3.) Tindall’s explanation of his project
makes an answer to the question Briscoe evaded. Tindall may say, on
behalf of Briscoe, that, as time goes by, people will trust such a new system of
credit relying only on land, and then you will not do have to worry about the
cash reserve, even though for a while you have to endure the difficulty of the
transitional period.
Tindall’s own proposal, however, was not the final version of credit whose
fund was supposed to consist only of land. It was an indispensable but
tentative measure at this moment. In his project landed men and moneyed
men both ‘have their Shares in the Managery, and in the Profits of a Money
and Land-Bank, which the Monied-men of the Bank will accept of.’ He
accepted the reality. Therefore, in this stage, Tindall was confident that
‘this is true and honest without Tricks’. (Tindall, Some remarks, 1696, p. 3.)
At the ending part of the pamphlet he nevertheless remind that all these
chaotic situation of currency have to wait for people’s ‘Understanding’ of such
a new thing: ‘There hath been much Gidiness[sic] in Print about the Subjects
of Banks; and there may be Counterfeit-Money, Bills, and Bad Titles: Those
are Bug-Beats to fright Children, but there are Men of Understanding can
prevent all these Fooleries, by Managery.’ (Tindall, Some remarks, 1696, p.
4.)
7. Trade and credit
Needless to say, the administrative and socio-moral aspects of projects were
not the only topics with which pamphleteers were concerned. Economic
topics, such as interest rate and trade, could be the central issues. A
pamphlet criticised Briscoe’s idea from the point of view of moneyed men who
are supposed to benefit from high interest rate, making use of a convenient
and popular term in this period, ‘the Publick Good’. The first question was
about reducing the interest rate, which was not necessarily a substantial
topic in Briscoe’s proposals of 1694. Even if the interest rate was reduced
and land value was increased, the author says, ‘it would be but an imaginary
not real Improvement to Lands’. (Reasons offered against the intended
project, commonly called the national land-bank, [1695?], p.1.) The second
point was the harmfulness of abating interest rate to the property in form of
money: the reduction of the interest ‘doth manifestly invade the Properties of
all such who are possessed of personal Estates by sinking the very
inheritance of their Money, to which every one hath as much a Right by the
Law as to his Lands, and particularly the Daughters and younger Children
of most Families in England’’. (Reasons offered, [1695?], p.1.) Thirdly,
according to the author, the industrious people ‘will suffer much thereby, for
that the Stocks and Effects of all Traders are to be valued by Mony’. Also
using the term, ‘intrinsick value’, which was favoured by Briscoe and his
rivals to improve not only beneficial but also reliable appearance of their
projects, the author insists that ‘the Stocks and Effects of all Traders will be
in proportion of so much less intrinsick value, as the Interest of Mony shall
be reduced’. (Reasons offered, [1695?], p.1.) The phrases with which the
author swears at Briscoe’s project are just relentless and endless: ‘no ways
consistent with the Publick Good, nor yet with Common Justice’; ‘manifestly
injurious to the rightfull Propererties of others’; ‘the discouragement of
Industry’; ‘the specious and plausible, but false Pretences’; ‘an evil design for
the Publick under a good name’. (Reasons offered, [1695?], p.1.)
Briscoe rebutted to this criticism, naming his opponent ‘Usurer’, which
was a traditionally more repugnant term than ‘moneyed man’: ‘I fancy our
Usurer will not be able with all his Rhetorick to perswade the Freeholder
that this is but an imaginary, and not a real Improvement of his Estate’.
(Briscoe, An answer to a late pamphlet intituled Reasons offer'd against the
intended project, [1696], p.1.) According to Briscoe, those who would
become gainers when interest-money was not reduced to three percent and
kept six percent were the ‘Usurers’.
However, Briscoe makes also another type of self-defence, which may be
persuasive to the modern economic theorists. He tries to remind ‘the
Usurer’ of Briscoe’s definition of money as ‘a Medium of Trade’: ‘our Usurer
throughout his whole Pamphlet values Money only as it yields high Interest,
and not as it is a Medium of Trade, or as Gold and Silver are convertible to
other Uses’. (Briscoe, An answer, [1696], p.1.) Being sceptical of ‘the
Lawfulness of all Usury’, Briscoe asserts that it is ‘the Usurer’ who ruins the
country’s people and trade:
‘our Usurer laying aside all Considerations how Money may be improved in
the Way of Trade, or by any other laudable Undertaking, he forms all his
Arguments in favour of high Interest, which is so destructive to Trade, a Bar
to Industry, and the very Bane and utter Ruine of Families, nay of Kingdoms,
high Interest being a certain Concomitant of Poverty, and brings Ruine and
Desolation with it wheresoever it comes.’ (Briscoe, An answer, [1696], p.3.)
Conclusion
As the controversy still continues it is difficult to say some conclusive words
at this stage. But, what I tried to describe in this paper was the
conversations on paper between pamphleteers and the issues there.
Whether the fund of the proposed banks should be money or land was of
course the most essential question. However, the points the projectors
stuck to were multiple and social. Plagiarism and the originality of ideas
remained their major concerns. The conflict between moneyed men and
landed men has always been discussed with the institutional aspects. It
was not so simple as it was overshadowed by exclusively political factors,
such as country versus court or tory versus whig. It was a series of
conversations over honour and reputation.
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