On the Bank Charter Act of 1844

Abstract

Since the passing of the Bank Restriction Act in 1797, nearly two hundred statutes have been enacted by the British Parliament, bearing wholly or partly on the subjects of Banking, Bankers, and the Currency; being an average of about three acts of parliament yearly, for a period of sixty years. This prolific legislation seems to indicate the want of any fixed and definite principle influencing the legislators during that period, in relation to these matters; and of any uniform well-matured course of action among our leading statesmen. And when we examine the comparatively limited number of their statutes which bear directly upon the regulation of the currency, we discover that they do not form a harmonious code developing gradually a well-ordered system, founded upon sound and fixed principles, and matured by experience. On the contrary, nearly all the Currency Acts were devised to meet some pressing emergency, so that they are found to deal with only a portion of the subject, and to constitute in the aggregate a specimen of legislative patch-work rather than a consistent and uniform system.