The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-12-21 00:00:00

AGITATION AGAINST THE INCOME

TAX.

PO3ll.eS!!

A crowded public meeting was held at Guildhall,
London, on Friday, to consider the incidence of the
Income Tax. The Lord Mayer piieidd, and many of
the great provincial town., as well as the metropolis,
were numerously represented on the platform. A
letter was read from Earl Russell, in which his lordship
expressed bin opinion that the Income Tax ought to be
relied upon for extract' dinary contingencies, and not as
an ordinary implat in times of peace. But he was not
convinced that en large a res iurce could be at once sur-
rendered, and declined to como to a peremptory decision
on the question until the Government proposals were
known. Amongstthe speakers were Mr. Massey, MP.,
Sir J ohn Bent ett, Mr. Lewis, the new member f Del ry,
Mr. Samuel Morley, M.P., and Sir Dilke, M.P. The
resolutions condemned the Income Tax as intoWtorial
in its character, unjust in its working, and demoralising
in its national character; and declared that its con-
tinued imposition was contrary to the pledges of
Governments of both parties, besides being a direct
breach of faith with the texpayir, and having always
been relied on as a war-tax, or a tax for extraordinary
emergencies, oneht now to be repealed. It was also
decided to form a Nat'onal Anti -Income Tax League,
and a provisional Committee for this purpose was
named.

In connection with the meeting in Lord 41 and also I
reviewing the hut-dent Ma whole, the Pa v Ncti aof
Saturday has the following leader
The meeting held in the Guildhall )esterday aftcrnoou,
undo, the presidency of the Lord Mayor, Is one sign among
many that the Chancellor of the Etchequ,r. who about this
time of the year begins to accumulate the materials of All
Budget, ought not too confidently to set the Income-tax
down among them. II anything Mare is certain, it Is

that the policy of maintaining the Income-tax as one of
the ordinary sources of revenue will henceforth be
strictly and persistently contested. Many thing. show
that the hostility of the country to the tax Is becom-
ing deeper every year, and that the feeling has only
to be concentrated and directed, In order to become
a force which no Government can withstand. The public
has b grne the impost for nearly a generation with more or
less resignation, but its patient endurance Is nearly ex-
hausted. custom, which reconciles us to so much tick is
disagreeable, misses Its effect bore. The tax is more in-
telligently If not more heartily disliked now than when it
was re established by Sir Robert Peel. There are no doubt
special reasons for the outcry that bus lately been raised
against the Income Tax by classes or our countrymen not
usually given to complaining in public. The burden of a
heavy tax may be made tolerab e by due adjustment; and,
on the other hand, the Ii rhtest tax may be levied in such •
manner as to cause needless annoyance and provoke just re-
sentment.

It is to he feared that in the mode of levying the Income
Tax the convenience of the tax payer has not yet received
fair anti due consideration. The collection of the tax in one
sum at the beginning of the year was a rude and sudden
change—the measure of a Chencellor not accustomed to con-
sider human feeling in his eagenicse to attain financial ends.
Since that change, by the gmiersl teetinunty of the trading
Red mereantile classes, a rigour previously unknown has
been introduced into the assessmesit of bnconnes, The eon, try
is full of complaints of the arbitrariness anti ittjustice with
which the income Tax payer la treated Lest a few unscru-
pulous persons should pay less than their due, it is thought ex-
pedient to trost honest people as knaves, and so charges are
made upon some incomes that have ceased to exist, and others
that never existed but in supposition The fact that evasion
and falsehood were largely practised In the preparation f
Income Tar returns was not unknown in Downing-street
Injure the Ilene.on of the present Chancellor of the El.
chequer, and the fact was a source of difficulty. But it was
rein n ushered by Sir Lowe's experienced predecessors that
the income Tax is in itself far from equitable, and the endea-
vour to check fraud was guarded by a desire to avoid
wanton injustice. After the experience of thirty years the
machinery of the Income Tax remains 11l adapted to its end,
and the attempt to apply more power to its propulsion
only produces some result more barbarous than before.
A sense of injury has been widely diffused throughout
the land, ft. this 1 eellng has greatly contributed
to the agitation which we witness, and which is in-
cressing. Naturally, the loudest complaints come from those
who are liable under beliedUle is, that under which the profits
of trades and professions are included, for here most in.
limit, Is done. The (midfielder, whole Ineonle Tax is de-
ducted from his diVintends sat tile Bunk of England ; the inili-
tary or naval oflleer stet the Iloverunient clerk, who receive
their pay or salary minus the tax ; the farmer, whose Income
is taken to be s gale:tient to one-11111r of his rend, get Into no
disputes with Cmnmissioners end Assess be. But the Income
of the menuf .cturer or retail tend Stnaa enti only be approxi-
mately estimated eenno by himself, and it is income of this
origin that becomes the subject of contention.
• - •

But the objections to the Income Tax are deeper and
broader than any grievances founded on special and peculiar
experience. llama administration may lead point to com-
plaint and intensity to opposition, but the injustice of the
Income Tax is original, inherent, and universal It has some-
times been found convenient, in the interest of particular
theories, to palliate the character of the impost ; but the
most eminent statesman who have resorted to this means
of raising revenue were accustomed to acknowledge its
defects. Sir Robert Peel and Mr. Gladstone asked leave to levy
the tax, and they obtained it the more readily that they never
committed themselves to Its theoretic defence. For them it
was the least of alternative evils. Neither of them ever pre.
tended that it could be made a just tax. The problem low
to snake the Income Tax just has been discussed by political
economists and actuaries, and considered by P.rliamentary
Committees, but with one invariant° result : the many
schemes proposed for accemplishing that end have been re-
jected as either Impossible of execution, or as tending to
aggravate the existing wrong. The most that has been at-
tempted by Government is to buy off opposition to the tax
by concessions which, very proper lu themselves, have no
pretensions to he considered a fair adjustment of public
burdens. So far from wondering, then, that the public are
moving at last against a tax that no human ingenuity has
been able to reduce to justice, we may rather wonder that
the movement has been so long delayed One explana-
tion of the public patience may be f samd in the fact,
on which Mr. blu,soy dwelt on Friday in the
Guildhall, that at no time was the country asked to
submit to the income tax as a permanent burden. So far
from this, whenever Parliament has been asked to renew
the tax, our statesmen have explicitly effirmed that
they only resorted to it as is temporary expedient. The tax
is renewed )ear by year by a special Act of Parliainent
There is no other tax so unstable, sin other as to which
Chancellors of the Exchequer are constantly affirming that
they are looking forward to its reduction or abolition Some
of them have even fixed a date for its complete disappear.
lance, Mr. Gladstone having states], when Chancellor of the
Exchequer in Lord Aberdeen's Administration, In 1554,
that the Incense Tax would he gradually reductd, and
would be entirely abolished in 1880. By this answer Govern-
ments have disposed of one complaint which probably
could have been got rid of In no other way. The injustice el
taxiing the possessor of a precarious Income for earning
which continual lalseur of supervision is necessary, and the
possessor vie, permanent Income who gives no lalsour to the
production of his revenue, at one and the sans, rate, is
flagrant; but no redress has ever been offered. sinveruments
have preferred to say, "We know that this tax prowess hard
on tine professional man and trader, who must make a
provision for the future and convert into capital income
which we tax. We do not see our way to remedy the in-
equality •, but have patience ; it will not last lung, and as
soon as this or that object is secured you will see the tax
abolished." This is how and why the tax has been borne no
meekly and so long
Ity the confession of all our statesmen, the Income Tax iis
a tax for emergencies, for great reconstructions, or great
wars. Peel revived and re-eat Milsheil it in order to en-
franchise trade ; his successors made the war with Russia a
reason for continuing its operetion, and Increasing its tate.
Perhaps we had better not fellow ha hlitory any further, or
we might have to consider whether an extraordinary tax
has not a tendency to produce the emergencies which
are reunited for its formal justification. We are under
no such pressure now ; should we ever be compelled
to wage war to defence of our country or its in-
terests, we should all he ready to support the in-
convenience of an impost worse than the Income Tax, if
such a sacrifice were necessary. Brit we are at peace. We
are at peace, with naval and military expenditure exceeding
my one halt the expenditure of twenty years ago. The
revenue from aources other than Income Tax steudily rises,
fuel at such a rate that sinless the Income Tax is speedily
abolished, It will exiat less as a means of safety than ass
snare to statesmen. It can do little or no good for us in
our present eireemstances, whereas it may become the
occasion of mlich harm. Formerly it was said that an
Income Tax was an advantageous moans of raising
revenue, inasmuch as It called the attention of the com-
munity to the expenses of Government, and so seggested
care la the mausegernent of the public ml nay ; last In the
face of the experience of the last few years this argu-
ment ems no linneer be maintailied. The ends ter which the
tat was called fits existence have been ansaereil. We have
a Customs and Excise system in which the maximum of pro-
ductiveness to the Government and the minimum of loss to
the consumer have been approached, if not realised. By our
system of imnded warehouses our country has been made the
free port of the world. It Is time then to think of getting
rid of a tax which is vexatious in its incidence and unjust in
Its character, which has been long enough endured as neces-
sary, but which from the moment that it is supeilluous will
become a danger.