- Errata—vol. III.
- Defence of Usury; Showing the Impolicy of the Present Legal Restraints On the Terms of Pecuniary Bargains; In Letters to a Friend.
- Letter I.: Introduction.
- Letter II.: Reasons For Restraint—prevention of Usury.
- Letter III.: Reasons For Restraint—prevention of Prodigality.
- Letter IV.: Reasons For Restraint—protection of Indigence.
- Letter V.: Reasons For Restraint—protection of Simplicity.
- Letter VI.: Mischiefs of the Anti-usurious Laws.
- Letter VII.: Efficacy of Anti-usurious Laws.
- Letter VIII.: Virtual Usury Allowed.
- Letter IX.: Blackstone Considered.
- Letter X.: Grounds of the Prejudices Against Usury.
- Letter XI.: Compound Interest.
- Letter XII.: Maintenance and Champerty.
- Letter XIII.: To Dr. Smith, On Projects In Arts, &c.
- A Manual of Political Economy: Now First Edited From the Mss. of Jeremy Bentham.
- Chapter I.: Introduction. *
- Chapter II.: Analytical Survey of the Field of Political Economy.
- Chapter III.: Of Wealth.
- Chapter IV.: Of Population.
- Chapter V.: Of Finance.
- Chapter VI.: Operation of a Sinking Fund On the Production of Wealth.
- Chapter VII.: Noscenda.
- Observations On the Restrictive and Prohibitory Commercial System; Especially With a Reference to the Decree of the Spanish Cortes of July 1820.
- Preface.: Observations, &c.
- Section I.: Nature of the Prohibitory System.
- Section II.: Mischiefs of the Prohibitory System.
- Section III.: Causes of the Prohibitory System.
- A Plan For Saving All Trouble and Expense In the Transfer of Stock, and For Enabling the Proprietors to Receive Their Dividends Without Powers of Attorney, Or Attendance At the Bank of England, By the Conversion of Stock Into Note Annuities.
- Introduction.
- Chapter I.: Plan For the Creation, Emission, Payment, and Eventual Extension, of a Proposed New Species of Government Paper, Under the Name of Annuity Notes.
- Chapter II.: Form of an Annuity Note. (see Table II.)
- Chapter III.: Comparison of the Proposed, With the Existing Government Securities, &c.
- Chapter IV.: Grounds of Expectation, In Regard to the Proposed Measure.
- Chapter V.: Financial Advantages.
- Chapter VI.: Advantage By Addition to National Capital.
- Chapter VII.: Advantage By Addition to Commercial Security.
- Chapter VIII.: Particular Interests Concerned.
- Chapter IX.: Rise of Prices—how to Obviate.
- Chapter X.: Reduction of Interest—proposed Mode Compared With Mr. Pelham’s.
- Chapter XI.: Moral Advantages.
- Chapter XII.: Constitutional Advantages.
- Chapter XIII.: Recapitulation and Conclusion.
- Appendix A.: Government Ought to Have the Monopoly of Paper Money, As Well As of Metallic Money.
- Appendix B.: Paper Money—causes Why Not Circulated By Government Without Interest, As Well As By Individuals.
- General View of a Complete Code of Laws.
- Chapter I.: General Division.
- Chapter II.: Relations Between the Laws Concerning Offences, Rights, Obligations, and Services.
- Chapter III.: Relation Between the Penal and Civil Code.
- Chapter IV.: Of Method.
- Chapter V.: Plan of the Penal Code.
- Chapter VI.: Of the Division of Offences.
- Chapter VIII. Titles of the Penal Code.
- Chapter IX.: First General Title of the Civil Code, * of Things.
- Chapter X.: Second General Title of the Civil Code. of Places.
- Chapter XI.: Third General Title of the Civil Code. of Times.
- Chapter XII.: Fourth General Title of the Civil Code. of Services.
- Chapter XIII.: Fifth General Title of the Civil Code. of Obligations.
- Chapter XIV.: Sixth General Title of the Civil Code. of Rights.
- Chapter XV.: Seventh General Title of the Civil Code. of Collative and Ablative Events.
- Chapter XVI.: Eighth General Title of the Civil Code. of Contracts.
- Chapter XVII.: Ninth General Title of the Civil Code. of the Domestic and Civil States.
- Chapter XVIII.: Tenth General Title of the Civil Code. of Persons Capable of Acquiring and of Contracting.
- Chapter XIX.: Of the Particular Titles of the Civil Code.
- Chapter XX.: Of Elementary Political Powers.
- Chapter XXI.: Of Elementary Political Powers— Subject Continued.
- Chapter XXII.: Plan of the Political Code.
- Chapter XXIII.: Plan of the International Code.
- Chapter XXIV.: Plan of the Maritime Code.
- Chapter XXV.: Plan of the Military Code.
- Chapter XXVI.: Plan of the Ecclesiastical Code.
- Chapter XXVII.: Plan of Remuneratory Laws.
- Chapter XXVIII.: Of Political Economy.
- Chapter XXIX.: Plan of the Financial Code.
- Chapter XXX.: Plan of Procedure Code.
- Chapter XXXI.: Of the Integrality of the Code of Laws.
- Chapter XXXII.: Of Purity In the Composition of a Code of Laws.
- Chapter XXXIII.: Of the Style of the Laws.
- Chapter XXXIV.: Of the Interpretation, Conservation, and Improvement of a Code.
- Pannomial Fragments.
- Chapter I.: General Observations.
- Chapter II.: Consideranda.
- Chapter III.: Expositions.
- Chapter IV.: Axioms.
- Nomography; Or the Art of Inditing Laws: Now First Published From the Mss. of Jeremy Bentham.
- Chapter I.: The Subject Stated.
- Chapter II.: Relations.
- Chapter III.: Proper End In View.
- Chapter IV.: Imperfections Primary.
- Chapter V.: Explanations Relative to the Imperfections of the Second Order.
- Chapter VI.: Of Remedies. *
- Chapter VII.: Of Language.
- Chapter VIII.: Of the Perfections of Which the Legislative Style Is Susceptible.
- Chapter IX.: Of Forms of Enactment.
- Appendix. Logical Arrangements, Or Instruments of Invention and Discovery
- Equity Dispatch Court Proposal; Containing a Plan For the Speedy and Unexpensive Termination of the Suits Now Depending In Equity Courts. With the Form of a Petition, and Some Account of a Proposed Bill For That Purpose
- Section I.: Purpose Explained. Jeremy Bentham to the Honest and Afflicted Among Equity Suitors.
- Section II.: Equity Suitors’ Petition For Dispatch Court. to the King’s Most Excellent Majesty, —
- Section III.: Dispatch Court Bill—some Account of It.
- Section IV.: Information Requisite From Petitioning Suitors.
- Equity Dispatch Court Bill: Being a Bill For the Institution of an Experimental Judicatory Under the Name of the Court of Dispatch, For Exemplifying In Practice the Manner In Which the Proposed Summary May Be Substituted to the So Called Regular Sy
- Editor’s Note.
- Preface.
- Preamble.
- Part I.—: Judiciary.
- Section I.: Judge Located, How.
- Section II.: Remuneration.
- Section III.: Registrar, &c.
- Section IV.: Eleemosynary Advocate.
- Section V.: Judges’, &c. Deputes.
- Section VI.: Judge’s Powers—exemptions—checks.
- Section VII.: Prehensors and Messengers.
- Section VIII.: Consignees; * Or Say, In-trust-holders.
- Section IX.: Grounds of Decision For the Dispatch Court Judge.
- Section X. ‡: Suits’ Comparative Suitableness; and Order of Cognizance.
- Section XI.: Auxiliary Judges and Accountants.
- Section XII.: Sittings, Times Of.
- Part II.—: Procedure.
- Section XIII.: Definitions. *
- Section XIV.: Examination of Solicitors.
- Section XV.: Initiatory Examination of Parties, &c.
- Section XVI.: Appropriate Intercourse, Constant and Universal, Secured.
- Section XVII.: Mutual Security For Forthcomingness of Persons and Things. ‡
- Section XVIII.: Evidence-procuring Money, How Provided.
- Section XIX.: Subsequential Evidence, How Elicited.
- Section XX.: Execution, How Performed.
- Section XXI.: Equity Court Costs, How Disposed Of.
- Section XXII.: Dispatch Court Costs, How Disposed Of.
- Section XXIII.: Eventual Retrotransference of a Suit to the Equity Court.
- Section XXIV.: Expense of the Court, How Provided For.
- Supplemental Sections:—
- Section I. Or XXV.: Bankruptcy and Insolvency.
- Section II. Or XXVI.: Henceforward Dispatch Court.
- Schedules to the Bill.
- Plan of Parliamentary Reform, In the Form of a Catechism, With Reasons For Each Article: With an Introduction, Showing the Necessity of Radical, and the Inadequacy of Moderate, Reform.
- Introduction.
- Section I.: History of the Ensuing Tract—alarming State of the Country and the Constitution.
- Section II.: Most Prominent Present Grievance, Gareisoning France.
- Section III.: Causes of the Above and All Other Mischiefs:—particular Interests Monarchical and Aristocratical, Adverse to the Universal—their Ascendency.
- Section IV.: Sole Remedy In Principle—democratic Ascendency.
- Section V.: Remedy In Detail: Radical Parliamentary Reform: Elementary Arrangements In This Edition of It—their Necessity.
- Section VI.: Differences Between This and the Original Editions of Radical Reform.
- Section VII.: Virtual Universality of Suffrage Further Considered.
- Section VIII.: Virtual Universality of Suffrage—its Undangerousness.
- Section IX.: Freedom of Suffrage Further Explained—seductive Influence—its Forms, Instruments, &c.
- Section X.: Bribery and Terrorism Compared.
- Section XI.: Purchase of Seats—in What Cases Mischievous—in What Beneficial.
- Section XII.: Secresy of Suffrage—its Importance Further Developed.
- Section XIII.: Exclusion of Placemen, &c. From the Right of Voting—mischievousness and Profligacy of the Opposite Arrangement.
- Section XIV.: Universal Constancy of Attendance—its Importance.
- Section XV.: Representatives—impermanence of Their Situation—its Importance:—objections—their Groundlessness.
- Section XVI.: Moderate Reform—its Arrangements—their Inadequacy.
- Section XVII.: Trienniality Inadequate;—annuality Necessary.
- Section XVIII.: Interests Adverse to Adequate Reform—support Given By Them to Moderate, to the Exclusion of Radical: Tories—whigs—people’s Men.
- Catechism of Parliamentary Reform; Or, Outline of a Plan of Parliamentary Reform; In the Form of Question and Answer; With Reasons to Each Article.
- Section I.: Ends to Be Aimed At On the Occasion of Parliamentary Reform.
- Section II.: Means, Conducive Towards These Ends.
- Section III.: Means—their Uses, With Reference to Their Respective Ends.
- Section IV.: Means Conducive to Aptitude In Members: I. Placemen Not to Vote, Nor to Be Seated By Election.
- Section V.: Means, &c. Continued.—ii. Placemen Seated By the King, With Speech and Motion, Without Vote.
- Section VI.: Means, &c. Continued.—iii. Elections Frequent—annual.
- Section VII.: Means, &c. Continued.—iv. Speeches Authentically and Promptly Published.
- Section VIII.: Means, &c. Continued.—v. Attendance, Punctual and General, Secured.
- Section IX.: Inconveniences Incident to Elections, and Election Judicature.
- Section X.: Election Inconveniences—means For Their Removal.
- Section XI.: Collateral Advantages, Referable to the Situations of Electors, Placemen, Lords, &c.
- A Sketch of the Various Proposals For a Constitutional Reform In the Representation of the People, Introduced Into the Parliament of Great Britain, From 1770 to 1812.
- Radical Reform Bill, With Extracts From the Reasons.
- Preliminary Explanations.
- Title of the Proposed Act.
- Preamble.
- Section 1.—: Seats and Districts.
- Section 2.—: Electors, Who.
- Section 3.—: Eligible, Who.
- Section 4.—: Election Offices.
- Section 5.: Election Apparatus.
- Section 6.—: Promulgation of Recommendations In Favour of Proposed Members.
- Section 7.—: Voters’ Titles Pre-established.
- Section 8.—: Election, How.
- Section 9.: Election Districts and Polling Districts, How Marked Out.
- Section 10.—: Vote-making Habitations, How Defined.
- Section 11.—: Members’ Continuance.
- Section 12.—: Vacancies Supplied.
- Section 13.—: Security For the House Against Disturbance By Members. †
- Section 14.—: Indisposition of Speakers Obviated.
- Appendix, Including General Explanations.
- Radicalism Not Dangerous. Extracted From the Mss. of Jeremy Bentham. *
- Part I.—: Introduction.
- Section I.: Radical Reform Bill Recapitulated.
- Section II.: Persuasion of the Dangerousness of Radicalism—cause of It, and of the Vituperative Expression Given to It.
- Section III.: Terms of the Accusation,—speeches From the Throne, 16 Th July and 21 St November 1819.
- Section IV.: The Accusation In General Terms—counter-averment.
- Section V.: Plan of This Defence.
- Part II.—: Deference From the General Nature of the Case.
- Section I.: Conditions Necessary to a Man’s Embarking In Such a Design.
- Section VII.: Concurrence In Any Other Extensive Plan of Spoliation Impossible.
- Section VIII.: Concurrence of Any Constituted Authorities Impossible.
- Section IX.: Accomplishment Impossible—design Impossible.
- Section X.: The Talked-of Spunge No Proof of the Design.
- Part III.—: Defence From Experience In the Case of the United States.
- Part IV.: Defence From Particular Experience In the Case of Ireland: Years 1777 Or 1778, to 1783.
- Section I.: Analogy Between This and the Previous Case.
- Section II.: Democratic Ascendency, How Produced.
- Section III.: Fruit of Democratic Ascendency a Golden Age.
- Section IV.: Coincidence of Its Characters With Those of Radicalism.
- Section VI.: Extinction of Democratic Ascendency and Reform—restoration of Monarchico-aristocratical Ascendency, and Its Consequences.
- Conclusion.
SECTION X.
ELECTION INCONVENIENCES—MEANS FOR THEIR REMOVAL.
Question 35. In what way do the above-mentioned means promise to be conducive to the removal of the inconveniences attendant, as above, on elections and election-judicature?
Answer. As to expense,—by striking off at one stroke all expenses whatsoever; except such as are comparatively inconsiderable,—such as those incurred in the publication of advertisements by the candidates, and those incurred incidentally on the occasion of previous meetings.
To render this effect apparent, the slightest glance at the above-mentioned sources of expense will suffice.
1. Loss of time, idleness, drunkenness, and riots, have for their cause large concourses of people, with entertainments given to electors by candidates, or their friends. But any such large concourse of people will have no object: nor (votes being secret) will any man be at any such expense in giving entertainments, the receivers of which may, for aught he can know, be composed, in as large a proportion, of his adversaries, as of his friends.
2. The expense of conveyance and refreshment, in the case of distant voters, will be struck off altogether. For, there cannot be any pretence either for offering or receiving money on that score, when the utmost effect that could be expected from the longest journey may equally be produced by a paper put into the post.
3. As to lawyers, clerks, and other agents, neither on the occasion of the collecting the votes at the place of election, nor on any such occasion as that of an election-committee of the House, can there be any use or room for any such assistance. All that the returning officer will have to do, is—out of the boxes denominated from the several candidates, to count the number of voting-papers that have been put into each box: observing only whether the sum mentioned by the collector as received, be really in each instance either equal to, or greater than, the minimum required by the law to constitute a qualification.
As to vexations,—such as those from the obligation of serving on election judicatories, and from the delays attendant on such judicature,—there would be no such vexation, because there would be no such judicature: and there would be no such judicature, because there could be nothing to try:—unless, by possibility, and that without probability, any such offence should be committed, as, by the collector, a refusal to sign and deliver the duplicate receipt on the voting-paper;—or, by a postmaster, a suppression of a multitude of such papers at the post-office; or, by a returning officer, a false return,—respecting this or that one out of a small number of matters of fact, all of them simple, and in their nature either of themselves notorious, or easily made notorious.
For the purpose of punishment, prosecutions for any such offences would of course be left to the established dilatoriness of the technical mode of procedure pursued in the ordinary courts. But, for the purpose of applying an immediate parliamentary remedy to a false return, a single day’s sitting of a Grenville-Act committee of the House of Commons, would suffice.
Question 36. If, in the instance of each elector, the disposition made by him of his vote were thus to be placed altogether out of the reach of the public eye,—so that a vote may be refused to the most worthy, given to the most unworthy of all candidates, and that without danger, and consequently without fear of shame,—might there not be too much reason to apprehend, that considerations of a purely selfish nature would become generally predominant?
Answer. No: not to any such effect as that of seating a candidate really and generally deemed less worthy, to the exclusion of a candidate really and generally deemed more worthy: which effect is the only practical bad effect the case admits of.
If, indeed, matters were so circumstanced, that, by voting in favour of a candidate deemed by themselves comparatively unworthy,—or, to cut the matter short, in favour of any candidate whatsoever,—it were possible for the majority of the electors in any district to obtain, each of them for himself, any considerable private advantage, which, by the open mode of voting, he would be deterred from aiming at:—were this really the case, it were certainly too much to expect, that they should, the greater part of them, commonly forego any such advantage: and,—if such sacrifice of public interest to private were accordingly repeated in a considerable proportion of the whole number of electoral district,—the inconvenience to the public service might be found sensible and considerable.
But when, by the shortness of a man’s time in his seat, and the multitude of the persons, to each of whom, at the hazard of being betrayed by any one of them, and this without any tolerable assurance of his giving his vote in favour of the briber, the bribe would be to be offered,—when by all these means together, the obtainment of a seat by bribery is rendered, as it would be, to so unprecedented a degree improbable,—it does not seem possible to divine by what means a candidate, generally deemed the less worthy, should obtain an effectual preference, to the exclusion of one generally deemed the more worthy.
On the other hand, in the case of the open method hitherto in use, the effect of it is, on every occasion, to force electors,—and that in a number to which there are no limits,—to give their vote in favour of the less worthy, to the exclusion of the more worthy, candidate,—on pain of suffering, each of them, some personal inconvenience, to the magnitude of which there are no limits.
And this power,—which, by means of some such relation as those between landlord and tenant, between customer and dealer, between employer and person employed, in a word, between patron and dependent, men of overswaying opulence possess and exercise over men less favoured by the gifts of fortune,—this power of forcing men to vote against their consciences, has been termed “the legitimate influence of property,” and spoken of as that foundation-stone, by the removal of which, “the subversion of the constitution” would be effected.
If, in the event of his voting in favour of him who, in his estimation, is the less worthy candidate, in preference to him who in his opinion is the more worthy candidate, a man sees no prospect of advantage to himself, nor of disadvantage in the contrary event,—it seems not too much to hope and expect, that his vote will most commonly be in favour of that candidate who, in his opinion, is the more worthy candidate.
If conscience will not do this, it will do nothing. But assuredly, the less deeply men are led, or lead themselves, into temptation, the more likely they will be to be delivered, or to deliver themselves, from evil.
The less it is that the law expects from every man, the less it will expose itself to disappointment. Less than the disposition to do good,—so far as it is to be done by serving the public, in such cases, and in such cases only, in which it can be done without an atom of loss or other inconvenience to himself,—cannot surely from any man be expected.
Question 37. Any such mode of voting by a mixture of writing and printing,—is it not—in comparison of the good old mode of voting, practised by the wisdom of our ancestors, viz. voting by word of mouth—an innovation, and that a signal one?
Answer. In one point of view, it is an innovation—in another, not. Considered as an art in general use, the art of writing must,—to whatsoever purpose applied, and consequently when applied to any such purpose as this,—be acknowledged to be an innovation, and that a very signal one: then comes the art of printing, which, especially when considered as an art in general use, is a still more sweeping one. These arts being innovations, it cannot but be an innovation to apply them—whether to the purpose in question or to any other purpose. But if these be innovations, they will not, it is hoped, be placed in the class of mischievous ones.
On the other hand,—if in this, as in other matters, the wisdom of our ancestors be considered as consisting in the employing, for each purpose, at each point of time, the best and most convenient method in their time known and practicable,—there is not, in the mode of voting here proposed, any innovation at all, much less a mischievous one.
Our ancestors employed the most convenient mode practicable, in employing the word-of-mouth mode: we, their posterity, employ the most convenient mode practicable, in employing the written and printed mode.
Thus doing, we may therefore be said, and with truth, to take the wisdom of our ancestors for our guide.