The Press.
London, England, 1853-05-14 00:00:00

THE PRESS.

" It now appeared that those accredited agents, who of
course were very well known before they were more di-
rectly mentionea, or at all events that one of them, the
right hon. member for Wells (Mr. Havter), was not a
party to any compact whatever, but that the whole affair,
from beginning to end, was one of those numerous con-
ferences to which the right Iwo. gentleman was a party—
and 1 suppose no one is a party to a greater number of
conferences than my Hieit hon. friend—( laughter)—it was
ono of those loose conversations in the lobby—(peat
laughter )—in which I suppose every member of the
house, from time to time, takes a part. I admit I do.
( l.'heeru and laughter.) Although politically opposed to
the right hon. gentleman, I have known him for 20 years ;
he is a member of the same profession as mysvlf, and I
must say it laws).* affords me pleasure to converse
with him. But when an hon. member, on the strength of

one of those loose converslitions'—(iaughter)—getS up
u statement like this, and brings a chargo against the
overnment of this country, a charge involving a degree
of perfidy entirely unworthy of the tiovertnnent of this
great nation, that hon. gentleman, accenting to my views
of right and wrong in these mutters, owes an apology to
the house for having mad., such an erroneous statement."
Capt. 11AOAN denied that his statements were erro-
neous. " Accredited" in his former speeches meant
"so considered." To the insinuations in the speech
just delivered he then applied epithets which, under
a rebuko, from the Speaker, he retracted.
A number of Irtmch members afterwards spoke,
detailing their various impressions, coniectures, and
reminiseenses. At last, upon an appeal from Sir R.
H. Inglis, the matter was allowed to drop.

THE INCOME TAX.
THE Commons being on Monday once more invited
to pass the income-tax resolutions of the budget,
31r. R. PALMER proposed an amendment, by which
the 7d. in the pound assessed on incomes from land
should be charged only upon the net rental remain-
ing after repairs, insurances, and expenses of manage-
ment had been duly deducted. Accepting the income
tax as perpetual, and referring to Mr. Gladstone's
admission that the nominal 7d. on land was an actual
9d., he insisted on the justice of allowing the land-
lords the same remission which tradesmen obtained
ou the score of dilapidation, expenses, insurance, and
other drawbacks from their ostensible receipts.
Mr. !wax): declined to disturb the general ap-
proval he had already given to the budget. Never-
theless he recognised the possibility of improving it
in some details. He especially wished to have the
tax extended to all classes, even so as to include the
labourer who earned twelve shillings a week. Every-
body would then contribute to an impost which now
fell upon only about one person in sixty-five, and the
exchequer would receive thirteen millions a year
instead of five or six, and thus be able to spare other
duties, such as those upon malt and hops.
Mr. W. 3111. es contended that the concession now
asked for was perfectly fair, and one to which the
landlords had a right.
Capt. Scumme characterised the budget as one of
equivalents. in which disadvantages on one side were
made up by disadvantages on the other. On first
hearing the Chancellor of the Exchequers long
speech, his scheme had looked like a Chinese puzzle,
but the more he studied it or heard it discussed the
better he learned to appreciate its harmony.
Mr. Pitmen's feared that any alteration in the
budget would be tantamount to overthrowing it alto-
gether, and could not take the responsibility of such a
eabe,tcopl
Mr. 1.. Ilrywou'rn liked the income tax so much
that he hoped to see it raised to ten per cent.
Mr. Iti.eK and Mr. Ael,tosinv enumerated some of
the special burdens which fell on the land, and
sought ti►r a partial r. imbursement, especially for the
small proprietors.
Col. HARCOURT believed that his vote in favour of
Mr. Disraeli's finance scheme on December lath had
pledgeA hint against adopting a feature which was
not included in it.
Mr. Seooxen did not view his vote of December
16th in any such light. He thought the income tax
altogether unjustifiable in time of peace, and would
adopt every proposal that tended to diminish and
restrict its operation.
Mr. HT reiterated his constant declaration that
the owners of land had nothing or less to complain
of. He entered into a variety of hypothetical details
showing the possibility of mannfaeturers sintering
losses and depreciations for which theylleould obtain no
corresponding reduction's in their income-tax assess-
ments.
Sir T. 1). ACL.%ND and Sir W. JourrE having
briefly spoken in favour of the amendment,
The CHANCELLOR of the Event:oven, while ac-
knowledging the plausibility and even the equity of
the amendment, as a naked proposition, found him-
self compelled to oppose it with all his personal and
official power, when taken in conjunetion with the
oilier provisions of the tax of which it formed a part,
with the group of circum4ances which at present
bore on the renewal of the tax, and with the pledges
given on former and on recent occasions. Respecting
these pledges, he conten.►od, first, that the approvers
of Mr. Disraeli's budget could not consistently vote
for the present amendment, because that budget

SATURDAY,

bore even more heavily against the land than his

own:—
`' Here was the combination of events in December last.
You had an unmitigated schedule A—you had the princi-
ple of ditlerentialism established against you in schedule
D—you had nu prospect of the abolition of the tax—and
you 'had the promise of a legacy duty. (Hear, hear.) Well,
now, it is supposed that party and factious motives alone
could have determined me to resist the scheme of Decem-
ber last. It was not so. I opposed the scheme of December
last because, in the first place, I thought its mode of deal-
ing with the income tax unjust. That was my conviction
at the time. 1 thought that the mode of dealing with the
income tax which was then proposed would lead to confu-
sion, and that impression has been strengthened since I
heard the right honourable gentleman the member for
Buckinghamshire say the other night that his proposal of
last December was not a financial measure, but the acknow-
ledgment of a principle. I still remain of opinion that the
mode then proposed of dealing with the tax would have led
to financial confusion, would have opened up difficult and
impracticable questions, and would have produced a war of
classes."

Secondly, he contended that the Opposition on the
previous Monday had voted to redress an alleged
injustice totally opposite to, and irreconcilable with,
the injustice ou the land, of which they now corn-

plained :

" What was the meaning of that vote ? To what int..
qualities did it refer? You know the meaning they bore,
and still bear, in the public mind. Do you attach the same
meaning to them or do you not ? There are two quite
different kinds of inequalities in the income tax. First,
there are those of which we have heard so much to-night.
We have been told that the property assessed in schedule
A is taxed at a somewhat higher rate than the property
comprised in the rest of the schedules. Was that the ine-
quality which was meant to be pointed out for correction
by the motion of the honourable baronet the member for
Hertfordshire ? If that was your idea, I can only say that
you were most unfortunate in having adopted words which
conveyed to the understandings of the community at large
a meaning totally opposite and contradictory, and in having
chosen for your organ and exponent upon the occasion an
honourable gentleman of great ability, but one who, in the
speech with which he introduced his motion to the house,
exhausted all the stores of his rhetoric in setting forth the
hardships—what hardships ?—the hardships of the landed
interests *.—no—but the hardships of those whose enter-
prise, whose intelligence, and whose skill constitute, us the
honourable baronet had said, their only property, and whose
continued good health is their only guarantee. (Hear").
Looking at the practical results of the amendment,
if it were carried, Mr. Gladstone computed the loss
it would inflict at 450,000/. per annum on schedule A,
and, declaring that equal justice must be done by
allowing some corresponding; remissions in other
schedules, estimated the total sacrifice of revenue
at a million. This he argued would totally annul the
whole financial arrangements he had proposed :
" If you make these deductions, what becomes of the
financial measure.? What becomes of the remissions of
duty ? (Hear, hear.) I am afraid you will be obliged to
commence a counter process, and having begun by reducing
land front ltd. to 741., and effecting an equivalent deduction
upon the other schedules, you will require to retrace your
steps and raise the land from 7d. to Std., and so on with
the rest of the schedules. I am not repared to enter
upon that course. lam convinced you never could carry
through such u process, and that the adoption of this motion
would introduce utter and hopeless confusion into the as-
sessment and collection of the tax. The motion, if adopted,
breaks up the whole income tax : and. breaking up the
whole tax, it necessarily breaks up that which rests upon the
tax. It breaks up the whole financial measures and proposals
of the Government. It is impossible for us to undertake the
reconstruction of the tax. If we meddle with it we peril
that very extensive remission of taxation which we have
laid before Parliament, and which I think I may say with-
ont presumption has received and is receiving the approba-
tion of the country. (Cheers.) We will not take the first
step in such a course."
The amendment, he finally urged, invited them to
tamper" with the income tax, a thing they could not
do without destroying its efficiency. ‘• We must keep
faith with those that have supported us."
Mr. 1 nsitAt:tt recalled the right hon. gentleman's
memory as to one feature of the Disraeli budget
which he had forgotten—the proposal, namely, to
relieve the land of two and a quarter millions in the
shape of malt tax. Not only was this remission now
refused, but Mr. Gladstone, after confessing that the
income tax amounted to 9d. in the pound on land,
had proceeded to lay further burdens on real pro-
perty by a legacy duty, which, with the income tax,
he intended to make perpetual :
" Then there was very great inconsistency iu the course
taken by the right honourable gentleman. It was incon-
sistent to show to the house that real property was assessed
to more than it was equitable that it should bear, were it
not for grow considerations of state, and then immediately
to propose a new tax, which would add to its burdens.
(Loud cheerx.) But is that all ? Is that strange incon-
sistency the only or the greatest inconsistency in the argu-
ment or in the policy of the tight hon. gentleman ? He
says, One of your nalneements for accepting my pmposal
of the income tax is, that you have got my personal pro-
mise, and every fair public prospect. that the tax will
end at the termination of seven years from the present
time.' Unquestionably there was some difference cf
opinion about that point; but the, basis of all the urge!

MAT 14, 1853.

vents of the right hon. gentletuan has been. and the posi-
tion of the Ministry has been, that we are to consider
that the ineome tax is to terminate at the end of seven
years. What. then, does the right honourable gentlennut
do? Having gloom that real property is assessed
more than is equitable under his income tax, he says,
with another ineousistency. •As you have at weakness
in favour of vivacious incomes, aithonch I have proved to
von that real property pays more thaa incomes derived
front any other sources, yet I will propose a tax that shall
compensate Otos:, who pay the fax upon preverbl,: in-
manes, in the manner you desire. (Hear, hear.) 1 will
propose a tax upon soccessions, which will make the
owners of real property contribute to the state, inde
pendent and irrespective of those who enjoy vivacious in-
comes—it shall be a tax by wav of comp:nu:anon.' But,
it' so, it ought only to be a tax tor riven yews. (('heeni.)
If the tax is to be a tax by way of compensation, it will be
unjust unless yon vim ode that it shall end at the tenui-
nation of sewn veers. The ground upon which the right
hononntble gentleman is couvineed that he ought to impose
* tax upon successions, namely, that a compensation is
needed for those who pay the tax upon precarious inemnes,
ought to induce him, denuding to his own argument, to
propose that this tax upon SUCCVNAiIIng shall be equally
liimited iu its dunttion with the income tax it-elf. (Cheers.)"
Defending the consistent; of those who, after
voting with Sir B. Lytton last week, should tote with
Mr. Palmer this, and citing a last year's speech of
Sir J. Graham's as proof that the present head of the
Admiralty had advocated all that was now asked, and
no more, Mr. Disraeli concluded :
" The country which is interested in this question will
ask itself, Can any one bring forward a valid reason why
we should be assessed tutjustly ?' We, when in office,
acknowledg.sl we could not attempt a perfectly just assess-
ment ; we offered a plan for an income tax in which we
matte a certain difference and gradation ; we placed before
the country the motives of our policy, and we endeavoured
to support that policy. No taunt shall for the future pre-
vent us front doing justice to the fanners and proprietors
of the soil, and while pursuing this comae we shall found
our justification upon the arguments; of the Chancellor of
the Exchequer, and upon the recommendations of the First
Lora of the Admiralty. (Cheers.)"
Lord J. Russm.t. repeated the allegation that the
last amendment, stating the injustice of relieving
the burdens indicted on trades and professions, was
irreconcilable with the present amendment, foitndea
upon the assumed injustice inflicted upon the land.
He asked what where the real opinions of the
members who supportsd both propositions—under
which thimble was the pea?
Lord J. MAssErt remarke:l that the noble
lord was so enamoured of financial injustice that he
could not even comprehend how honourable gentle-
men should be anxious to render the income tax
more consonant with justice on one side on one
Monday and on another side on another Monday.
It was upon the admissions of the Chancellor of
the Exchequer himself that the present amendment
had been framed.
On a division there appeared—
For the amendment... 2Ol
Against it. 270
Majority for Government— . —75
THE FARMERS' INCOME TAX.
The last amendment to the proposed income-tax
resolution was moved on Thursday by
Mr. VANSITTART, who demanded, in justice to the
farmers, that their assessment to the tax should be
based upon a third instead of one moiety of their rent.
Such was the case with Scotch and Irish farmers,
and the English agriculturist was no better oil than
they. Fanning profits had diminished very seriously
of late years, and were unfairly estimated at half the

rental.
The CHANCE:U.OR of the EXCHEQUER (math' not
admit that the profits of the farmer were very differ( nt
now from what they had been heretofore. Taking
everything into consideration, and balancing the low
prices of his chief product on one side with the in-
crease of quantity, the improvement of quality, the
cheapness of production, the application of machinery,
the extension of drainage, the greater economy of
farming processes, there was no plea for any change
in their assessment. As matters stood, the farmers
were not left without remedy in case of overcharge.
They might appeal, and, showing their net profits,
demand to he taxed accordingly. Here lie found one
fact which was alone fully
" demonstrative that the profits of the farmer were not
so small as was stated, and this was, that in the past year
the whole amount of relief from assessment elainted by the
tenant-fiumers of England and Seothind—upon a totl
sessment of 330,100/.—WaS between 3,(101/. and 0,000/.
onlv ; the whole amount of relief actually granted being
3.4 i9l. Hoar. hrur. ) This filet, he would repent, demon.
stratively proved that the farmers. as a body, had no case
to show that their profits, inclnding, of course. the cost of
the maintenance of their families, did not represent fully
one-half of their rent."
Sir F. Kr.t.t.v, objecting to all the schedules, each
on aceonnt of special inequalities. followed Mr. Glad-
stone's various arguments to the logical conclusion
that rive wrongs made a right, and that injustice to
each was justice to all. Adverting then to the sche-
dule immediately before theta. he reminded the com-
mittee that free trade, while doing, much for other
classes, had inflicted an irreparable injury on the