近代早期英国的土地银行

The Scheme and Practice of the Land Bank in the Early Modern Britain

17世纪90年代,英国曾经兴起创建土地银行的热潮,先后有3套创建方案得以实施,但最终都以失败告终。制度设计缺陷、货币短缺状况恶化、少数辉格党大臣暗中阻挠等是导致金融革命时代土地银行创建失败的原因。辉格派史家一直以来将土地银行的设想塑造为托利党用来对付辉格党英格兰银行的阴谋,这种将土地银行创建和失败归结为党派政治原因的观点不符合历史事实。成立土地银行是为了解决货币短缺,扩大货币流通量的问题,用抵押土地的方式发行信用货币的思想出现很早,成立土地银行的倡导者并非土地拥有者或从事与土地相关的职业,这些都说明土地银行的失败与党派政治关系不大。

There was an upsurge of establishing land bank in Britain in the 1790s;three schemes were implemented,but they all failed.The reasons for the failure of the land bank in the financial revolution era were the defects of system design,the deterioration of currency shortage,and the secret obstruction of a few Whig ministers.Whig historians have always portrayed the idea of the land bank as a conspiracy of the Tory Party to deal with the Whig Party’s Bank of England.This view that the establishment and failure of the land bank were attributed to party politics is not in line with historical facts.The purpose of establishing land bank was to solve the problem of currency shortage and expand the circulation of money.The idea of issuing credit currency by mortgage land appeared very early.The advocators of establishing land bank were not landowners or engaged in land related occupations.All these show that the failure of land bank had little to do with party politics.