be equivalent to the legal coin of the realm, brought upon the author a good deal of ridicule. Notwithstanding Canning's declaration that no assembly of reasonable men could be persuaded to give their concurrence, all the resolutions were passed. On Sidmouth eventually joining the Perceval administration, Vansittart was at first suggested as lord treasurer and chancellor of the exchequer for Ireland (Colchester, Diary, ii. 372); but the assassination of the prime minister on 11 May gave him a chance of higher office, and he was appointed chancellor of the exchequer on 20 May 1812.
Vansittart came into office at one of the most embarrassing periods in the history of English finance. The plan of his first budget, which was presented on 17 June 1812, was due to his predecessor; but Vansittart made new proposals for taxation, preferring additions to the existing taxes on male servants, carriages, horses, dogs, agricultural and trade horses, to Perceval's proposed tax on private brewing establishments. On 3 March 1813 he brought forward, in a number of resolutions in the House of Commons, a ‘new plan of finance’ (published 1813 under title ‘The Outlines of a Plan of Finance’), dealing with the sinking fund. Under this plan, by repealing portions of the sinking fund bill, 42 George III, c. 71, it was believed the great advantage could be secured of keeping in reserve in time of peace the means of funding a large sum in case of renewed hostilities. The plan was adversely criticised by Huskisson, and Tierney said he was warranted in asserting that he had not met a single man who understood it; but the resolutions were agreed to seriatim on 26 March 1813 (Hansard, xxv. 350). This scheme was the first specimen of similar contrivances by Vansittart, all burdened with mysterious complications, which, after first winning from the public a puzzled admiration for the ability of their author, eventually brought him into disrepute. The main feature in the budget of 1813 was a general twenty-five per cent. increase of the customs to raise an extra 1,000,000l. required by the ‘new plan of finance.’
Hopes of relief to the burdened taxpayers which the peace excited were disappointed by the budget of 1814. The chancellor of the exchequer found himself obliged not only to maintain the war taxes, 20,500,000l. in amount, but also to raise immense loans for the sinking fund, which he insisted on maintaining. The difficulty of providing sufficient specie for the wants of the army and for the payment of foreign subsidies was successfully met by employing Rothschild to collect with great secrecy bullion for the continent (Addit. MS. 31231, f. 14). During Castlereagh's absence in Paris in 1815 the administration was represented by Vansittart in the commons. He somewhat prematurely on 23 Feb. 1815 explained what new taxes were about to take the place of the property tax (speech published in the Pamphleteer, No. xi.); but the escape of Napoleon made provision necessary in the budget of 14 June 1815 for the enormous expenditure of 79,893,300l., which was again met by a renewal of the war taxes and the issue of further loans. In this year the taxation of this country reached an unprecedented total.
On 12 Feb. 1816, in committee of supply, the chancellor of the exchequer presented his financial policy for a period of peace. This was to consist of a diminution of taxation and ‘a system of measures for the support of public credit.’ His proposal, however, to reduce instead of abolish the property tax was treated as a breach of good faith, the contention being that it was entirely a war tax. Numerous petitions strengthened discontent existing in the house, and the minister's motion for the continuance of the tax was rejected on 18 March (Hansard, pp. 33, 481). Vansittart thus found himself deprived of 7,000,000l. of revenue on which he had calculated; and on 20 March, owing to the pressure of the country members, he announced the discontinuance of the war malt tax. The loss of 2,700,000l. from this source, and about 1,000,000l. from other duties repealed, he appears to have regarded as of little consequence, ‘as recourse to the money market was now necessary.’ To make up for the loss of taxes producing some 18,000,000l., he made additions to the post dues and excise, and a considerable increase on the soap tax. For this last he was caricatured as ‘Startling Betty’ by appearing in the wash-tub. Payment of debt by the sinking fund to the amount of more than 14,000,000l. was in the budget provided for as usual by further loans.
In the debates on the consolidation of the British and Irish exchequers, Vansittart thought himself precluded from taking part as an interested party; he was strongly in favour of the consolidation, which was agreed to on 20 May 1816.
A new method of raising money was propounded in his budget speech of 14 May 1818. He proposed the issue of 27,000,000l. at three and a half in the place of a similar amount of three-per-cent. stock, and recommended this unusual process as not increasing the nominal capital of the debt, and as affording facilities in the future for a
