The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1856-04-04 00:00:00

trace ; and, by adding to the national indebt-
edness, they increase the pressure of an
immoveable weight. How to avoid these
worst of political evils, is what must occupy the
thoughts of the community. The merchant ought
not to forget the effect such a state of things must
inevitably have on the commerce of the country.
The manufacturer must remember that taxation
can in no way be added to price, except by the
improvement of stretching machines for their piece
goods, and adulteration in the other leading

articles of consumption. The shopkeeper and the
farmer must bear in mind that the State has, very
properly, the first charge on their substance,
and that they cannot resort with equal safety to
those expedients which make taxes fall, with a
negative gravity, such as that of air, on others.
Let all those things be carefully weighed—let
the receipts of trade be fairly balanced against the
actual expenditure of the State, and the residue is
the income of trade. With such unerring data
we are to blame if we go astray, and leave our-
selves open lo the reproaches of those who have a.
supernatural love of gaining by the depreciation of
property which attends mercantile mistakes,
and commercial follies, There are few things
more easy, however, than to keep out of all such
scrapes. Let us treat the matter suppositiously.
Say our imports amount to 100,000,0001,
our exports to 100,000,0001., and all our
other products to 200,000,0001. yearly. Take 20
per cent. on 400,000,0001. as the net profit on our
transactions on this amount of produce, and we
have 80,000,0001. Deduct from this 65,704,4891.
taxation, trade discounts on 400,000,000/.
at, say six per cent. of 24,000,0001., and we
shall find the total against us 89,704,489/.
leaving a deficit of 9,704,4891. to be made
up under the hammer of the auctioneer. We
do not pretend to accuracy in these figures,
But taking them, all errors included, we should
feel much obliged to any one who will show us any
other way in which to account for the fact, that one in
twenty of the whole population are paupers, and
trade has become almost as dangerous a
pursuit as throwing dice or playing at roulette. Some
may say we are altogether wrong, and that the
profits derived from all our national resources are
double what we set them down at. There would
be no end of satisfaction in the proof of such an
allegation. We would spread it over the numbers
of our cash-paying population, and ask what it
would leave per head for their support? We
should not then be in a condition to pay consider-
ably more than 50 per cent. of the entire receipts
of the nation, in State taxation, to which is to
be added fully 25 per cent. for local rates. We
do not complain seriously of the latter, as the
assumption is that we receive 20s for every pound
we pay towards self government.

But when we come to war, or overgrown
military establishments, it is impossible to calcu.
late any thing beyond the actual sum expended,
the profits of which aro spread all over the
world. The total of our army and navy estimates,
with the exception of a small per tentage, must
necessarily be spent abroad, and, therefore, it is the
worst of all sources of fiscal exhaustion, and can.
not be too soon cut down, under existing circum-
stances. If France can keep an army of five or
six hundred thousand men, and if Russia and the
other military Powers of Europe cannot continue
war when they see a positive gain in prolonging the
contest, are we to outrage our common under-
standing, and attempt to do what we
believe no other country in the world
can accomplish without bringing on a national
bankruptcy in its literal sense ? We have
now arrived at the position we were in in 1824,
with these exceptions. that we have less money
in circulation, a larger population to feed, with
corn at a famine price as compared with that year ;
and to escape a second 1825-6, we have only one
year to carry out those retrenchments which took
fourteen years, or to reduce the expenditure until
it reaches the income, which was only 57,500,0001.
in 1838. There is no time to be lost in matters of
such a gigantic character. If we have gone back
to 1824, we may remain quite satisfied that
another 1825 is at hand, while additional
and unerring forces are urging forward
with increased rapidity the bitter fruits
of a second lamentable affiance of financial errors
and great social wrongs. There was a time when
every man ever so remotely: connected with
trade, looked to their neighbour's success for
profit. But in these days men wait for sweeping
revulsions in the whole of our national pursuits
for their harvest. They can calculate the exact
number of revolutions of the screw which will
suit their purpose, and it is against these sharks
that we would forewarn the merchant, shopkeeper
and artizan. They are the enemies to all stability
in trade, and as excessive taxation is their
prime agent, we need scarcely employ any
stronger argument in favour of an immediate and
most comprehensive retrenchment in the public
expenditure.