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I. On the First Parliamentary Committee of Insurance; with Remarks illustrative of other facts connected with the History of Insurance; II. A Review of some Recommendations of the Select Committee of the House of Commons on Assurance Associations, 1853
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 August 2016
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page 301 note * Vide the fourth of its six charters,—viz., of the above date, 48 Geo. III.
page 301 note † Vide “An Act to enable the Corporation of the Amicable Society for a perpetual Assurance Office to lend Money upon Mortgage for the purpose of Investment, and also to confer other powers upon the said Society”—8 VICT., cap. viii.
page 302 note * Vide ante, and p. 130.
page 302 note † Privately printed, London, November, 1806, small 8vo., pp. 80. Sir F. M. Eden, Bart., was the first chairman of the Globe Insurance Company, and author of the learned and remarkable work entitled The State of the Poor; or, an History of the Labouring Classes in England from the Conquest to the present period, &c. 3 vols., quarto. London, 1797 Google Scholar. For further particulars respecting his labours as regards insurance matters, vide subsequent remarks, passim, and Appendix to the present article, No. II.
page 303 note * The only copy I have met with is the one in my own possession, which has been the most important source of reference for many of the facts reviewed in this article.
page 303 note † Vide Journals of the House of Commons, vol. xix. of reprint of 1803, pp. 355, 357, 358, 361, 365, 366, 368 Google Scholar.
page 304 note * The Select Committee of the House of Commons on Marine Insurance which sat in the session of 1810—and whose Report, dated 18 April, 1810, was ordered by the House of Commons to be reprinted, 11 May, 1824—examined thirty-six gentlemen, including representatives of the chartered Companies, merchants, brokers, and others interested in the business, and resolved, that it was their opinion “That the exclusive privilege for marine insurance of the two chartered Companies should be repealed, saving their charters and their powers and privileges in all other respects, and that leave should be given to bring in a Bill for this purpose.”
page 305 note * The whole was to he paid within ten months from the date of the charters. Particulars as to the default in this respect on the part of the Corporations are contained in Sir F. Eden's pamphlet.
page 305 note † This means ten per cent., in addition to the instalments of the £300,000 in default.
page 306 note * The power here given was not fully acted upon, the paid-up capital of the Royal Exchange Office being at the present time (1854) £689,220, stock, and that of the London Assurance £425,000 (vide Wetenhall's Stock List).
page 306 note † This is an imperfect definition of the clause, which contains a more important feature, viz. (using the words of the Act) :—“And that no person which shall be governor, director, or other officer of either of the said Corporations to be erected as aforesaid, shall for that cause only be disabled from being a member of Parliament, nor shall in respect of such share or shares be or be adjudged liable to be a bankrupt within the intent and meaning of all or any the statutes made against or concerning bankrupts; and that no stock in the said respective Corporations shall be subject or liable to any foreign attachment by the Custom of London or otherwise, any law or statute to the contrary notwithstanding.” It is only reference to the charters that would show whether similar exemptions from the bankruptcy statutes apply to stockholders who are not governors, directors, or other officers; but it is remarkable that the above clause was not worded in a more inclusive manner. As an example of a much more precise and general exemption in an Act of Parliament as to an insurance charter, vide the 14th section in the Act 39 Geo. III. (1799), usually called the “Globe Charter Act,” but which was not eventually acted upon, exempting all members of the projected Corporation, to which that Act empowered the King to give a charter, from any liability to the statutes respecting bankrupts which could otherwise arise by reason of their being members of the Corporation. Respecting the Act just referred to, vide post, p. 315.
page 309 note * Vide page 89 of the second Number.
page 311 note * * Louis XVI.
page 316 note * Quoted in a previous part of this paper, p. 313.
page 316 note † In addition to the treasurership of the funds of such Societies and classes, the Act extended its operation to the funds of Tontine Societies and other institutions for granting future advantages.
page 317 note * Eden devoted much time, trouble, and expense in procuring statistical and other details on the position of these and other Societies affecting the welfare of the poor and labouring classes. There is an interesting chapter on Friendly Societies, in his great work on the poor referred to in a previous note of the present paper. I have somewhere seen the remarks that work contains on the early origin of these Societies, and his own comment and translated passages of Hickes's Thesaurus, misquoted, and without acknowledgment.
page 319 note * The “land tax,” which by an Act of Parliament passed in the previous session was made perpetual, was purchasable at twenty years' purchase, or five per cent.; but at the time of the proposal of the Globe charter, the British Funds gave six per cent. to the purchaser, and, rallying in price soon afterwards, still gave five per cent. nearly, for some years. (F. H.)
page 321 note * Present—The Lord President, Lord Glenbervie, Mr. Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir William Wynn, Sir William Scott, and Mr. Corry.
page 323 note * Sir Theophilus Metcalfe, Deputy Chairman of the Globe Insurance, moved the second reading, supported by Chancellor of the Exchequer Lord Henry Petty (the present Marquis of Lansdowne), Mr. Alderman Combe, Mr. Paull, and Mr. Alexander; and opposed by Sir John Anderson, Sir W. Curtis, Mr. Grenfell, and Sir C. Price, on the ground that the Bill would be an infringement upon the rights of the London and Royal Exchange Assurance Corporations. All the above spoke on the occasion.
page 324 note * An Act of the following year, 1825 (6 Geo. IV., c. 19), repealed the Act of 6 Geo. I., c. 18 (the heads of which Act, commonly called the Bubble Act, have been recited in a previous part of the present article, page 305), so far as to substitute the dealings and judgments of the common law for the liability to and extreme penalties of the statute of præmunire, happily never revived in any other enactment.
page 332 note * Seventy-second Session, c. 308.
page 333 note * Enrolled in the Court of King's Bench, Hilary Term, 1765.
page 334 note * i.e., 100,000 dols. to 150,000 dols.
page 335 note * Vide Assurance Magazine, vols. i., ii., and iii., &c.
page 338 note * This may have been the intention, but it certainly was not the performance, Act of 1844.—F. H.
page 344 note * In confining the preceding estimate to male lives, it may be observed that the proportion of insurances on female lives is always a small branch of business, and confined to such narrow limits as not to add much to the numerical estimate as to the field for insurance.
page 346 note * Vide page 329, ante.
page 349 note * (Vide ante, page 312.)
page 351 note * How much of the capital was finally paid up and invested cannot easily be traced. The Company and the State may both have made profits from confiscation of shares on which instalments were not paid up. In my copy of the Arrêt of 27 July, 1788, there is a manuscript extract from the Journal de Paris du Vendredi, 8 Aoút, 1788, which runs thus :—“Compagnie Royale d'Assurances sur Vie. Jugement de MM. les Prevôts des Marchands et Echevins de la ville de Paris, qui homologue deux délibérations de la Compagnie Royale d'Assurances sur la Vie, et ordonne la vente des reconnaissances de portions d'inéréts des actionnaires et souscripteurs qui seront en retard des paiemens de l'appel et de la souscription, et n'y auront pas satisfait au 15 de ce mois pour tout delai.”
page 352 note * The concessions for both Companies were granted to De Gesmes. The name of M. E. Claviere appears at the end of the prospectus of the Life Company as the Administrateur Gérant.
page 353 note * This appeared in 8VO., 1788, pp. 80, with the epigraph of “De salute publicá nil desperandum,”
page 353 note † Enfin, il etait sollicité vivement par Pinchaud, dont les intérêts étaient fortement engagés dans ceux de la Chambre d'Accumulation (Mem. de Mirabeau, Vol. V.). And, referring to the subsequent defence of the Chambre d'Accumulation, at the sitting of the Constituent Assembly of 3 March, 1791, Dr. Gouraud observes, “Mirabeau eut le triste courage de mettre sous la protection de son éloquence le désastreux projet.”
page 355 note * (Vide page 322, ante.)
page 358 note * Horace.
page 359 note * Authorized either directly by patents for exclusive trade, or indirectly by the dispensing power of the Crown, which was discovered to be a very efficient mode of enacting monopolies. When the statutes laid the manufacturer of any particular commodity under restrictions, the Sovereign, by exempting one person from the laws, gave him in effect the monopoly of that commodity.
page 359 note † Reign of Elizabeth, c. 7.
page 359 note ‡ Smith's Wealth of Nations (5th Edition), iii. 146–148 Google Scholar.