COPPER CASH AND THE MONETARY SYSTEM 871to circulate cash in 1656 because he thought that the economic burden imposed
on the Ever-Normal Bureau to provide the initial capital for financing the mint-
ing of cash was causing the bankruptcy of that agency. Since the government
would have recouped its initial expenditures by using the cash that it minted by
paying bills, the basic problem may have been the shortage of capital in gov-
ernment hands. Yi Sibang told Hyojong that the Ever-Normal Bureau had been
loaning out a stock of 20,000 sam of grain at 10 percent intereSllo collect 2,000
sam (per year) income, but it was not even enough to pay for the expenses for
one Ch'ing ambassador's stay in Korea. Despite the shortage in the bureau's funds,
it had also granted a thousand sam of grain to the merchants and people of the
city but had still not received repayment (in cash).
Hyojong replied that it was his cash policy that had led to a gradual loss of
state finances, and that unless he cO\lld think of some way to solve the problem,
the only alternative left was for him to order an end to the use of cash immedi-
ately. Yi Sibang told him that Kim Yuk himself really was not aware of how dif-
ficult it was to keep cash in circulation, particularly since last year's revision to
collect part of the [(ledong tax in Kyonggi Province had been suspended, and
there were no (cash?) funds to pay the tribute masters (kOlI/illlul elwin). Hyo-
jong remarked that it was already too late to remedy the situation and asked how
many years his cash policy had been in effect.
The chief royal secretary (Tosungji), Chong Ch'ihwa, replied that it had been
in operation for six years. Even though the original purpose of the law was to
increase state revenues and provide benefits to the people, most people were
opposed to it, and it was hard to maintain cash in circulation. Hyojong then con-
cluded that since the six years of his cash policy had been worthless and state
finances had been drained, presumably by honoring cash payments for taxes and
penalties, the time had come to abolish cash.
The Border Defense Command claimed that it had opposed the use of cash
ever since the policy was first adopted because it would be too hard to achieve
successfu I circulation, but for the first three years of the policy everyone's objec-
tions had been overridden by the defense of the "great minister" (t({csin), obvi-
ously Kim Yuk. After the third year, they were able to obtain Hyojong's promise
to limit the experiment to a decade, but they kept silent from that time on even
though they were convinced that the public was opposed to it. Now that Yi Sibang
had reported what was happening, they were convinced that the "great official
in charge" (chugwan-daesin) must have realized that cash was never going to
circulate. Hyojong now felt he had full support for his decision to abolish the
use of cash. Simultaneously he ordered that all rice that had been paid or loaned
out for cash recently be repaid in rice instead of cash."
Yi Man '(Ifl 's Evaluation oj' Kim Yuk's Cash PolicyYi Man'un chose to embellish his treatment of Hyojong's final decision to end
his experiment with copper currency in his account in the revised edition of the