Étienne de Silhouette, sometimes said to be…
November 1759 CE
De Silhouette had studied finance and economics assiduously and spent a year in London learning about the economy of Britain.
He translated into French several works by Alexander Pope, Henry Bolingbroke, William Warburton's The Alliance between Church and State, (1736) as Dissertations sur l'Union de la Religion, de la Morale, et de la Politique (1742) and Baltasar Gracián's El político.
The Prince of Condé's party later uses his translations from English to criticize him, but Madame Pompadour's support and vision see him awarded with the position of Controller-General on March 4, 1759; this is one of the most extensive administrative positions in the Ancien Régime, albeit a very unstable one.
His task is to curb France's spiraling deficit and strengthen the finances for the Seven Years' War against Britain (1754–1763).
Public opinion prefers his seventy-two-million-livres public loan to the ferme générale, an outsourced tax collection system.
He manages to curtail Royal household expenditure and revise state pensions; to encourage free trade, he reduces some ancient taxes while establishing new ones in accordance with the vision of a unified French market.
De Silhouette forecasts a bleak budget for 1760: income of 286 million livres compared to expenses of 503 million livres, including at least 94 million in debt service.
In an attempt to restore the kingdom's finances by the English method of taxing the rich and privileged (nobility and church are exempt from taxes in the Ancien Régime), de Silhouette devises the "general subvention," i.e., taxes on external signs of wealth (doors and windows, farms, luxury goods, servants, profits).
On October 26, he takes the war measure of ordering the melting down of goldware and silverware.
He is criticized by the nobility including Voltaire, who think his measures, though theoretically beneficial, are not suitable for wartime and the French political situation.
On November 20, 1759, after eight months in the position, he leaves the court and retires to Bry-sur-Marne, where he sets about improving the budget.
After his death in 1767, his nephew and heir Clément de Laage will complete his work.