ÉLIE DE BEAUMONT
"...la foi publique mere du crédit" — Élie de Beaumont

AM | @HDI1780

Thanks to the indispensable help of Google Books, I have found yet another Eighteenth-century document on the 'institutional theory' of credit markets: the June 1771 Lettre sur l'état actuel du crédit du gouvernement en France, published by lawyer Jean-Baptiste Jacques Élie de Beaumont (1732-1786) [wiki] (*). The context is important: Maupeou's judicial coup has just taken place, and the Parlements are on the brink of open rebellion.

Meanwhile, Diderot has penned his remarquable letter to Princess Dashkoff on the importance of (what we would now call) 'judicial independence' [see]. It is interesting to note that Beaumont mentions "les deux Indes" (p. 27). More importantly, he establishes a clear link between the risk of despotic government and market perceptions about the stability of property rights, with grave (potential) consequences on the supply of credit.

This idea, it goes without saying, features prominently in Histoire des deux Indes. Here's Élie de Beaumont: "C'est détruire l'autorité, que de vouloir la rendre arbitraire, illimitée; parce qu'alors on lui ôte sa principale base, la confiance publique" (p. 32). Alexandre Deleyre uses the same words to describe the effects of a public bankrupcy: "Alors est perdue sans retour la base de tous les gouvernemens, la confiance publique" (HDI 1780, xix.11). There are many more important paralells between Maupeouana, Beaumont and Histoire des deux Indes.

(*) Maupeouana, Vol. 4. Paris: 1775, pp. 13-47 [see].
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