Note 67 — Chapter II · DEMOCRACY AND REPRESENTATION
Reading edition
The great depression of 1847–51 was not wholly caused by the fiscal change. It was largely due to reaction after the railway mania, as Disraeli pointed out in a speech of 1879. It was followed by a rise in wages, due, not to Free Trade, but to the large imports of newly discovered gold; and by an increased purchasing power which was due to Peel’s large abatements of the tariff.