William Cobbett, English farmer and journalist (b. 1763)
William Cobbett (9 March 1763 – 18 June 1835) was an English pamphleteer, journalist, politician and farmer born in Farnham, Surrey, one of a popular agrarian faction seeking to reform Parliament, abolish "rotten boroughs", restrain foreign activity and raise wages, to bring peace and ease poverty among farm labourers and smallholders. He backed lower taxes, saving, reversing commons enclosures and resisting the 1821 gold standard. He sought an end to borough-mongers, sinecurists and bureaucratic "tax-eaters" and stockbrokers, and to Jews in Britain, whom he typecast in a similar way. Early in life he was a soldier and devotee of king and country, but his later radicalism furthered the Reform Act 1832 and gained him one of two newly-created seats in Parliament for the borough of Oldham. He urged Catholic emancipation. He saw British agriculture and other economic output geographically. His polemics range from political reform to religion. His best known book is Rural Rides (1830, in print). He argued against Malthusianism, saying economic betterment could support global population growth.