Professor of Political Economy at the University of Oxford
Leon Levy maintains that the impression of one of Nassau's earliest friends in the legal profession was that he began the study of political economy at Oxford (Levy 1943: 76). According to an obituary notice in The Cornhill Magazine, Senior had said to his daughter that he was about twenty-five when he determined that he would ‘reform the condition of the poor in England' (Thackeray 1864: 253-256).
During his pupillage, Senior made a number of friendships with distinguished people in London and had also been introduced to Whately's associates and friends at Oriel College. In 1815, Whately succeeded in publishing his first article on Jane Austen's novels in the October issue of the Quarterly Review. Perhaps driven to emulate his close friend, Senior also published his first article on the early novels of Sir Walter Scott in the same journal in January 1817. He continued to write and publish essays on fiction in various literary journals until the late 1850s (Senior 1864).Soon after being called to the Bar, Senior resolved to remain as a conveyancer rather than seek his fortune as an attorney; this would also free him to pursue work in other fields such as politics or literature (see Levy 1970: 96). Having already made a connection with the Quarterly Review, he now joined its staff as a reviewer and contributed five articles between July 1821 and July 1822. One of these was his first article on political economy—a review of the Corn Laws and agricultural distress which appeared in the Quarterly Review in 1821. Levy (ibid.: 110) maintains that there is no doubt that it was this article which persuaded James Mill to recommend Senior as a member of the newly established Political Economy Club, to which he was elected unanimously in February 1823. The following year he was one of the early members of the Athenaeum Club, a private members' club in London.
In 1825, Senior was elected to the Drummond Chair of Political Economy at the University of Oxford. This was the first professorship in political economy in the country and the first time that the subject had been given recognition as part of the curriculum of an English university. Senior was a strong candidate for the professorship. His publications in the Quarterly Review and membership of the Political Economy Club plus his support from important Oxford figures—including Whately at Oriel and Martin Routh, the long- serving President of Magdalen College—were significant. Moreover, statutory requirements relating to Oxford degrees and residence disqualified most recognised economists of the time, such as Malthus, Torrens, James Mill, McCulloch and Tooke. Given the speed of events, it was not until 1827 that Senior had prepared enough material to begin lecturing. Nevertheless, he found time to write an article on “Some Ambiguous Terms Used in Political Economy” (Senior 1826), which was added to the appendix to Whately's Elements of Logic, published in Encyclopedia Metropolitana in 1826. The article contained ‘the germs of Senior's theory of interest and capital formation' (Levy 1943: 112-113).
Senior was required to give at least nine lectures in every course and he offered four courses between 1826 and 1830.[27] The other requirement under the founder's terms was the publication of one lecture per year, but Senior managed to publish twelve in all during the period of his professorship. They were: An Introductory Lecture on Political Economy (Senior 1827); Three Lectures on the Transmission of the Precious Metals from Country to Country (Senior 1828a); Two Lectures on Population (Senior 1829); Three Lectures on the Rate of Wages (Senior 1830a); and Three Lectures on the Cost of Obtaining Money (Senior 1830b). Senior also delivered Three Lectures on the Value of Money at Oxford University in 1829 which were published later (Senior 1840). Levy argued that these lectures increased Senior's reputation not only among economists but also among wealthy clients which, in turn, enhanced his increasingly profitable conveyancing business especially in connection with large estates (see ibid.: 123).
Senior's An Outline of the Science of Political Economy, which was based on lectures he delivered from 1827 to 1830, was published in 1836.From 1830 until the mid-1840s, Senior was actively at work on social and economic policy issues, including advising governments, chairing commissions and preparing reports. In 1840, he was appointed Examiner in Political Economy at the recently established University of London, and in 1847 was appointed as Examiner in Law at the same institution. The Political Economy post he held until 1857 and that in Law until 1860. In 1846, Senior became dissatisfied with his literary output which consisted of reports, pamphlets or other physically small contributions. ‘I want to put my name to a book', he wrote to the editor of the Edinburgh Review, Macvey Napier, on the 18 August, writing to him again on 27 January 1847 that:
I feel that in writing on so many subjects I have in some measure wasted my opportunities and that if I were now to die I should leave behind me only scattered fragments and no great book. I have resolved therefore to write my “great book” which must be on Political Economy, as quickly as possible (Senior quoted in Levy 1970: 154).
Sadly, the ‘great book' was not to be—for a number of reasons. First of all, Senior wrote ten articles for the Edinburgh Review between 1848 and 1852, including a long review of both Mill's Essays on Some Unsettled Questions of Political Economy and his Principles of Political Economy (Senior 1848a). Senior also wrote articles on foreign affairs for The Economist, which was established in 1843 (see Levy 1943: 279). He was responsible for the paper's news and views on foreign affairs under the first editor James Wilson (editor: 1843-1857) and for a time under the second editor Walter Bagehot (1859-1877).[28]
Second, the impact of Mill's Principles may have dampened Senior's spirit for his own venture. He summed up Mill's book at the end of his review: ‘It is not an attempt to advance human knowledge in one direction, to be superseded hereafter by more comprehensive treatises.
It is a magazine of truths and of precepts from which philosophers and statesmen will, for centuries to come, draw theory and practice' (Senior 1848a: 339).By his own account, Senior could hardly follow that.
Third, he was once again elected to the Drummond Professorship for the period 1847-1852. This meant that he was committed to thirty-six university lectures.[29] In this second period at Oxford, he had an opportunity to review his position on the scope and method of economics.
Finally, towards the end of his tenure, events conspired to distract him. He became increasingly concerned and involved in the happenings in France. The overthrow of King Louis Philippe's government by republicans on 24 February
1848 led to an article in the Edinburgh Review in April entitled “The French Republicans” (Senior 1848b). For two weeks in May 1848, Senior visited colleagues in France, including Tocqueville and Horace Emile Say, son of JeanBaptiste, and while he was there he began to take notes of things he both heard and saw. This was the beginning of a regular journal which continued through later travels until the end of his life. It is noteworthy that Senior made an extensive visit to France and Italy between October 1850 and the end of May 1851, and it was probably due to his anticipation of this period of absence that he resigned from the Political Economy Club in December
1849 (see Levy 1943: 311).
Meanwhile, events in France were developing further. Tocqueville wrote to Senior on 28 November 1851 saying that the present condition could only end by ‘some great catastrophe'. Louis-Napoleon Bonaparte carried out a self-coup on 2 December, and news was flashed via the recently installed electric telegraph that a number of persons had been arrested, including Tocqueville. Senior rushed to Paris on 20 December and spent three weeks there visiting the now released Tocqueville and his family before returning home to wind up his final course of lectures. Not surprisingly, therefore, given these distractions, the final lecture course to be delivered between 1851 and 1852 fell somewhat by the wayside with only elements of material prepared (see ibid.: 314). Notwithstanding all these delays and pressures, Levy argued that there was evidence that Senior never gave up on his plan to publish his masterpiece and that he was still working on it just before his death (see Levy 1970: 159).
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