Introduction to Part II

Abstract

This Introduction indicates the aim of the two chapters that follow: to illustrate how parliamentary debate provided political economy with its topics of discussion and forms of argument. The particular case studies are the Bullion Controversy and the Corn Laws debate. The first controversy concerned the role of the Bank of England in raising prices through an excessive note issue, and this question came to be examined by writers such as Malthus and Ricardo at an abstract level. But this style of argument was rejected as inappropriate for guiding the deliberations of Parliament in 1810–1811. In relation to the second case, the Corn Laws, c. 1813–1815, the question of whether or not the trade in corn should be free was treated in Parliament as a question requiring casuistical adjudication, a style of argument that Malthus and Ricardo were evidently obliged to adopt, along with other participants. Both topics have traditionally been studied as key moments in the development of economic theory, yet the account developed here suggests that we have typically misread the texts by placing them in unhistorical contexts.