The Press. — London, England, 1854-05-27 00:00:00

MAY 27, 1854. (Laughter,) The right hon. gentleman came forward as though he were to be the victim of the Government; he has asserted that he will not allow his colleagues to take a share in the faults he has committed, which are to his mind of so patriotic a kind ; and he takes refuge in quota tion more classical than novel, and from so accomplished a scholar as the right hon. gentleman we might have expected a more felicitous line. The house will recollect the circumstances which attended on the events that called for that exclamation, and I think the right hon, gentleman must, in making it, have ventured on our forgetfulness of the author. The house will remember when the young gentleman alluded to was, with his companions, detected i n having plundered the Rutulian Republic, he exclaimed— ' Me, me, 101111"1 qui fret, in cie eauvertito ferrnm!' I em surprised that tie tight hon. gentleman could resist, with his knowledge of the original, the infinite humour of the succeeding line, and not have quoted it. It is— ' 0 Ratali. mea fraus omnia.' (Great laughter.) I think that would be a good motto for the new Exchequer Bonus. k Renewed laughter.)" Mr. Disraeli called on the committee to repudiate the scheme for issuing the new bonds, which had not been sanctioned by precedent, and presented man y symptoms ofoss and hazard to the public. He con cluded by dending Mr. Pitt from the invidious cri ticism and yet more invidious comparisons of the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his partisans. Mr. GLADSTONE intended to offer but a brief vin _ _ . . dication of his bygone policy. Reviewing the cata logue of his alleged errors, he declared that the reduction in the Exchequer Bill interest had turned out profitably to the country, and challenged a direct vote on the subject. The failure of his attempts at conversion had already been candidly confessed. The charge of having tampered with the funds of the savings banks he utterly repudiated, and, after explaining the nature of the transaction in which those funds had been involved, pointed out that the money of the investors was in no degree lessened or endangered. To the allegation that he had brought out a peace budget when war was probable, he re plied by denying the doctrine that no tax should be removed so long as any interruption of peace seemed possible ; remarking, besides, that the Opposition members themselves had incessantly endeavoured to accomplish further reductions of taxation, obliging him to engage in constant conflicts for the rescue of various items of the public income. Declaring that he stood by that budget, Mr. Gladstone acknowledged the loyal spirit in which the country responded to the calls now made on it for increased resources, and at tributed the ability to answer those calls in great measure to the ease and prosperity derived from ju dicious legislation in former years. The Chancellor of the Exchequer then detailed the character and the motives of the plan now proposed for obtaining money. Of the seven millions of new taxes lately voted the greater proportion could not he realised for many months. The malt tax would produce little or nothing until the winter, and the return from the doubled income tax would not come in until a yet later period. While the incomings were so remote, the outgoings were rapid in their incidence and necessarily uncertain in their amount. To provide for this interval, and supply a prudent margin for that uncertainty, he had asked for leave to issue the Exchequer Bonds, and still insisted, in spite of all criticism, that the process could not be called a loan, seeing that it would create no addition to the per manent debt. With regard to the expediency of the par ticular description of stock, he admitted that it was novel in form, and on account of its novelty might encounter some difficulties in the City. But he contended that the new bonds were likely to be very useful and convenient to all parties, and believed that they were appreciated among the capitalist classes. Touching the amendment proposed by Mr. Baring, Mr. Gladstone scrutinised its import, and (as its sup porters had declared that it was not considered a vote of " want of confidence") could trace in it no other effect than the suggestion of a loan. He noticed that the Opposition had lately evinced a marked proclivity to the borrowing system, and retorted upon them the charge adduced against himself, of advo cating a " loan in masquerade." He then adverted to the tenet that he had proposed the income tax out of spleen against the landowners, and argued that in resisting a loan he was really acting as the best friend of the land, which must always remain subject to im . positions from which moveable classes of property could escape. The right hon. gentleman disavowed any idea of disparaging the talent of Mr. Pitt, whose name be said had been arrayed against the policy of the Government, but his example was quoted only with reference to errors which he had himself con- fessed and retrieved a few years later ; while the Mi nistry had followed in his footsteps in the better advised course which he subsequently adopted. Mr. Gladstone concluded by challenging discussion, in intelligible form, of any of the matters that had been raised, adding that the Government came to the house to ask for the means of carrying on the war, and were convinced that the decision would be give.n with regard to the advantage of the country. Mr. Rutitto briefly replied. He declared that he believed the amount asked for was not necessary, but that if it were so the market could supply the money by Exchequer Bills, bearing only three per cent. in terest, and on so many accounts preferable to the pro. THE PRESS. posed bonds. He added that what he intended to do had been done openly, without any other inten tion than that expressed in his amendment. The committee then divided (at half-past one), the numbers being—For the resolution, 200 ; against,lBo. Government majority, 104. CHURCH RATES. Leave to bring in a bill enacting the total abolition of church rates was asked on Tuesday by Sir W. CLAY. Past discussion, he insisted, had sufficiently ventilated the question, and had resulted in establish ing the principle that the church rate system us it existed was unjust and intolerable : " The House of Lords, by their anal judgment on the well-known Braintree case, recently decided after sixteen years' litigation, had settled the legal doubt that a church rate was not an indefeasible charge upon property, but simply a tax levied by a majority of ratepayers, or, as had happened in many places, of which Liverpool was the last and most memorable instance, refused by such a majority. Looking at the result from a national point of view, he cited a variety of statistical calculations from the lut census tables, showing that out of the whole number of places of worship in England very nearly a moiety were constructed and filled by members of the Nonconformist body. Under these circumstances the continuance of a tax levied upon the whole community for the purpose of maintaining the churches of a section was utterly impossible. The rate must be abolished, and there remained only to provide a substitute. Sir W. Clay then described and criticised the various schemes which had been proposed for that object, suggesting finally that ample funds could he furnished from the surplus revenues of the Church, aided as to certain places and purposes by a moderate pew rent. This provision of a substitute was, however, he declared, a matter which con cerned Churchmen only. The Nonconformists and the Legislature which represented the nation in its entirety had nothing to do with it ; nor was there any just reason why his bill, simply declaring the church rate abolished, should not become law. There could be no fear that churches should fall into decay, even though the compulsory sources of income for their sustentation were stopped up, seeing that within the last fifty years there had been 22,400,(X)0/. raised by voluntary contributions for the building of sacred edifices." The hon. baronet concluded by remarking upon the disputes and discordance which the church rate con troversies were perpetually exciting in different localities, and earnestly recommended the house to close that perennial spring of strife and bitterness. Mr. Prro, a s a Dissenter, rejoiced that the bill had been brought in by a Churchman, and contended that the abolition of the rate would prove of essential benefit to the Church. He then detailed to the house a variety of facts elucidating the statistics of dissent. Mr. WIORAM opposed the bill, urging, among other practical objections, that there were many places so poor that the churches in them could never be kept In repair except by a compulsory impost. On the legal question he argued that the church rate was a common-law obligation on property, with which the house ought not to interfere except upon much stronger grounds than had been shown by the opponents of the tax. The churches were built for the benefit of all, and opened to their attendance. They apper tained to the national Establishment, and should be supported by the nation. Mr. CiminNEn believed that the Churchmen them selves would be most eager to abolish the rate if they had the interest of the Establishment really at heart. Mr. PACKE confessed that legislation was most desirable on the subject, but could not approve of the present measure. The Established Church was emphatically the church of the poor, and it was the duty of the nation to preserve its fabrics for their benefit. Mr. BIGGS related several anecdotes showing the circumstances under which the church rate was sometimes enforced, and supported the bill. Captain SCOBELL wished to abolish the church rate as such, but would not leave the churches un provided with special funds for their maintenance. He enforced the expediency of redistributing the property of the ecclesiastical establishment. Believ ing that the impost now levied as a church rate had become fairly engrafted upon the land, he threw out the suggestion that the tax should still be raised, but transformed into a school rate. Lord STANLEY was convinced that if the question were left untouched for a few years the country would practically decide it. The Nonconformists would not long have cause to complain of injustice, even if the Legislature declined to interfere. He pointed out, however, another reason why such inter ference was most desirable, and another party who suffered under the present law:— " There was always great public disadvantage in retain ing noon the statute hook a law which the state of public feeling rendered inoperative, and therefore there wes a great hardship on those who were bound officially to sup poet the Church by the levying of such a rate. (Hear, hear.) In many of the most Conservative boroughs of this country in which the feeling of attachment to the Church of England was very strong he knew that they refused to lay a rate. Though he believed, therefore, that the question would be ultimately settled in the wane of a few years by the general refusal to pay *Orate, at least in every borough of the wintry, still tbat %ash would be ob tamed only after a great deal of disputing, ill-will, and discontent. (Hear.) It could not be denied by any one who had considered this subject that it involved a great anomaly ever since the existence of dissent was recognised by the civil power. (Hear.)" The question, as Lord Stanley afterwards reminded the house, was never raised as one of money:— " If I take the total amount that is raised from the Non conformists, I believe that, at the very highest computa tion, it has never exceeded 200,0tX11. rile amount, there fore, becomes a totally insignificant one when the question of feeling is taken into account. (Ilear, hear.) The question throughout, it cannot be concealed, has not been one of money, but one of principle. (Hear, hear.) And that being so, I believe that if we continue to uphold oar old law—if we are still to resort to the old machinery of imposing a rate—although we may diminish its amount — although in other ways w•e may alleviate the amount of the pecuniary hunlen—that the daily objection on the ground of principle will not be removed, and that all that will have been done will be to render our rate less productive in amount, though no way less objection able on the ground of feeling. (Hear, hear.)" The noble lord admitted that, so far as his own opinions were concerned, he thought a fair com promise possible, yet be apprehended that it was impossible to persuade the public to accept of any. He described the attempts made by the bill which Mr. Macke had just proposed, and by a former mea sure brought forward by Dr. Phillimore, and ex plained the causes which led him to believe that neither of them afforded a solution of the difficulty. On the whole, therefore, he preferred the simple proposition of Sir W. Clay, by which the church rate was abolished and the question of a substitute left in abeyance. Mr. CROSSLEY spoke in favour of the bill, and Mr. PHILIPPS, as r. presenting a poor Welsh distiiet, on behalf of maintaining the church rate. Dr. R. 1 3 FirrximoRE thought that fair adjustment very possible upon the principle which he had him self embodied in a bill last year. This was con trived by exempting all dissenters from the compul sory payment of the rate, upon their making a formal declaration that they did not attend the church ser vices. Mr. DkrmatoND considered that the abolition of church rates was equivalent to robbing the Church. He looked on the proposal as opening the whole con troversy between the voluntary system and the es tablishment, and, after contending for the necessity of maintaining an established church, declared that if rates and tithes were abstracted from the Church they should justly belong to the State. Lord J. RUSSELL referred to the opposition which previous attempts at legislation had encountered alternately from the supporters of the Church and of Dissent. He feared that the obstacles in the way of a compromise were still insurmountable. Nor had he any hope that, even if the church rate were surrendered, contention would finally cease. On the contrary, he believed that this was one of a series of attacks that would be rapidly followed up against the Church if a precedent of concession were once set:— " I cannot be content with an assurance that if church rates are abolished all will be well, that dissenters will re gard all the other privileges and prerogatives of the Church with perfect contentment, and that the Church way look forward to nothing but a happy and prosperous state of tranquillity. I have no such expectations. The Church has, independently of this question of revenue, various ex clusive privileges: she occupies a high position in the country, is favoured by Parliament, is herself connected with Parliament, and her prelates alone have seats in one of the Houses of Legislature, and occasions will be found when those who differ from the Church will complain of those exclusive privileges. I do not say that those privi leges should be maintained, and I am nut arguing that they are unreasonable, but all that I am arguing, and all my experience supports me in that opinion, that if you remove this cause of discontent you will not have all t hat tranquillity which my hon. friend promises." Lord John Russell went on to explain the diffi culties of the case, and to lament the failure of all his own attempts to compromise this and other ques tions between the Church Establishment and the Nonconformists. He confessed that the state of the law of church rates was most unsatisfactory, and that the system was attended with many scandalous practices. Yet he could not consent to waive all the rights of the Church, and felt assured that the dis• puce could never he properly settled except upon a basis of fairness to both sides. Thence he proceeded to show the impracticability of finding such a fair basis ' or of inducing both sides to accept it if found ; and finally could offer the house no better advice than to leave the difficulty where they found it, and not at all events to attempt its solution this session. The Government had a measure of their own under consideration, but could not tell what it would be, whether it would snit, or when it could be brought forward. Certainly not just yet. And when brought forward he had strong doubts whether it could ever be passed. For the present he was anxious to get the bill now before them thrown over, chiefly because he feared that if the house entertained such a propo sition it would Muse nn impression throughout the "I P 7