Considerations on the Trade and Finances of this Kingdom and on the Measures of Administration, with Respect to those great National Objects since the Conclusion of the Peace
- SIGNED 4to
- London: J. Wilkie, 1766
London: J. Wilkie, 1766. 4to. (10 1/16 x 7 3/4 inches). 119, [1] pp. Later tree calf-backed marbled boards, spine lettered gilt, top edge gilt. Several manuscript corrections in the text in a contemporary hand.
A rare contemporary defense of post-Seven Years’ War imperial policy by the Treasury secretary who helped frame and defend the Sugar and Stamp Acts.
Published anonymously in 1766 and now firmly attributed to Thomas Whately, this pamphlet surveys Britain's trade, the national debt and public revenues after the Treaty of Paris (1763), and argues for the administration's program of tighter customs enforcement and new revenue measures in the American colonies. It is one of Whately's principal economic tracts, complementing his more pointed colonial pamphlet of the previous year, "The Regulations Lately Made concerning the Colonies...Considered" (1765), which offered the fullest contemporary defense of the Stamp Act and the doctrine of virtual representation. A barrister and MP, Whately served as Secretary to the Treasury under George Grenville (1763-1765), where he had a central hand in shaping revenue policy toward America; contemporary and modern accounts credit him with drafting the text for the Stamp Act as well as articulating its justification in print. He later served as Under-Secretary of State (1771-1772). His papers became entangled posthumously in the famous Hutchinson letters affair, when documents from his files, transmitted to Benjamin Franklin, helped ignite the political crisis that preceded the Revolution. Beyond its fiscal case, Considerations surveys Britains commercial relations with the American colonies and stands as a key argument for imperial taxation at the critical juncture of 1766, when Parliament repealed the Stamp Act but simultaneously passed the Declaratory Act, asserting full authority to legislate for the colonies.
Kress 6402; Sabin 103122; Goldsmith's 10157; Higgs 3757.
A rare contemporary defense of post-Seven Years’ War imperial policy by the Treasury secretary who helped frame and defend the Sugar and Stamp Acts.
Published anonymously in 1766 and now firmly attributed to Thomas Whately, this pamphlet surveys Britain's trade, the national debt and public revenues after the Treaty of Paris (1763), and argues for the administration's program of tighter customs enforcement and new revenue measures in the American colonies. It is one of Whately's principal economic tracts, complementing his more pointed colonial pamphlet of the previous year, "The Regulations Lately Made concerning the Colonies...Considered" (1765), which offered the fullest contemporary defense of the Stamp Act and the doctrine of virtual representation. A barrister and MP, Whately served as Secretary to the Treasury under George Grenville (1763-1765), where he had a central hand in shaping revenue policy toward America; contemporary and modern accounts credit him with drafting the text for the Stamp Act as well as articulating its justification in print. He later served as Under-Secretary of State (1771-1772). His papers became entangled posthumously in the famous Hutchinson letters affair, when documents from his files, transmitted to Benjamin Franklin, helped ignite the political crisis that preceded the Revolution. Beyond its fiscal case, Considerations surveys Britains commercial relations with the American colonies and stands as a key argument for imperial taxation at the critical juncture of 1766, when Parliament repealed the Stamp Act but simultaneously passed the Declaratory Act, asserting full authority to legislate for the colonies.
Kress 6402; Sabin 103122; Goldsmith's 10157; Higgs 3757.