The Sun.
London, England, 1865-02-09 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF TEE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TlMES.—Yesterday the farmers of England rallied
around the standard raised by Sir Fitzroy Kelly,
and to-day a chosen band will march. upon Down-
ing-street, and summon the Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer to surrender at discretion. Those whose
business or pleasure may lead them to the neigh-
bourhood of the Treasury buildings a little after
noon may see the distressed agriculturists on their
way, every one of them suffering under the Malt
Tax, and bent on obtaining relief from their burdens
at the hand of the chief of tax gatherers. We hope
the prospect does not alarm the Chancellor of the
Exchequer. Two years ago he protested against being
intimidated in his own house when a crowd of
clergymen and hospital treasurers ventured on a re-
monstrance, but to-day he will have to face a more
stalwart company. Instead of the mild dispensers
of Charities there will be men known in many a
field of action ; squires and yeoman from Kent and
Sussex, from the Eastern counties and the shires,
from the extreme North, the South, and the West,
will be assembled together, all powerful and all re-
solute. If the deputation which will wait on Mr. ,
Gladstone to-day truly represent yesterday's meet-
ing, they will be a company powerful in everything
except Parliamentary influence. Their natural
leaders do not believe in tha possibility of their suc-
cess. With the exception of Sir Fitzroy Kelly, no
member of the late Conservative Govefnment ven-
tured to countenance by his presence the meeting
in the Freemason's-hall. These leaders of the country
party know that before abolishing a source of re-
venue there must be a sufficient surplus in hand.
The Malt Tax brings in six millions a year, and six
millions are not to be picked up in every corner.
The speakers yesterday disdained for the most part
to refer to this difficulty, and one of the few who
did touch upon it was content to declare that it
was no business of his to provide an income to
meet the national expenditure. Yet former experi-
ence might have warned them of the futility of
clamouring for a repeal of the Malt Tax without
having a surplus or providing a substitute to make
up the deficiency. Thirty years back the far-
mers' friends got a majority of the House of
Commons to vote for the repeal of the tax, but the
leaders of both the great parties protested that the
Government could not be carried on without the
money raised by it, and the decision was reversed.
And what was declared by Whigs and Tories to be
impossible in 1834, when the national expenditure
was under forty millions, is not to be done at a
stroke now when the expenditure is nearly seventy
millions. The fact that we have not got the money
to make any appreciable reduction of the Malt Tax
might be thought a sufficient answer to those who
are agitating for it, but it is not hard to show that
if we were so fortunate a tax on malt liquors must
in some form or other be maintained. When the
Chancellor of the Exchequer has a surplus he is
bound to apply it in relief of all classes of taxpayers,
and to remove those taxes which press most hardly
upon them. As far as the Malt Tax is a tax on
beer it satisfies neither of these conditions. Mr.
Cobbett, indeed, advances a reason of a different
kind against the Malt Tax. Unlike the needy
knife-grinder, he always has a pitiful story, and yes-
terday he melted his hearers by telling them of a
farm labourer who, after a long life of faithful ser-
vice, was so far demoralized by tea-drinking that he
stole two-pennyworth of sticks to light his fire.
Printed in the form of a little tract this tale might,
perhaps, be distributed with success in the rural
districts, but there are few who will agree in the
deduction that beer-drinking is more conducive than
tea-drinking to morality. The moral argument,
such as it is, is wholly against a reduction of the tax
on beer, but it may be set aside. It is enough to
discuss the question on the simple grounds of finan-
cial justice and financial policy. On the first head
it is sufficient to recall Mr. Gladstone's unanswer-
able argument of last session, that the remission of
a duty affecting the price of beer would be a relief to
England at the expense of Scotland and Ireland. We,
consume beer, which our neighbours do not, and to re-
lieve our own pockets alone would be to give an excuse
for the cries of Scottish rights and Ireland's wrongs.
Nor does the burden of the Malt Tax, as a tax on
beer, furnish any reason for its abolition. The
speakers yesterday indulged, as in the fashion of
amateur financiers, in some very random statements
on thg percentage of the cost of beer and other com-
modities due to taxation. One gentleman said he
had in his pocket calculations which proved that the
tea duty amounted to no more than three per cent.,
and as he seemed to know that the tea duty was a
shilling a pound it is a matter of curious speculation
what he thought was the price of tea. But of the
speakers who treated this part of the subject Mr.
Fielden was the most elaborate. He criticised with
severity the statements of Mr. Milner Gibson in the
House of Commons and before the electors of Ash-
ton, and no doubt convicted the President of the
Board of Trade of some hasty errors. But the ques-
tion of the malt tax is not bound up with Mr. Mil-
ner Gibson's infallibility. We are content to accept
Mr. Fielden's own confession that out of the four-
pence which is the price of a pot of porter one half-
penny is the part due to the malt tax. The liquor
is here not above the average quality, and the tax is
121 per cent. There is no other taxed liquor which
is so lightly taxed. The best black tea is four shil-
lings a pound, and the tax of a shilling is therefore
25 per cent. The best coffee is eighteenpence a
pound, and the tax of threepence is, therefore, 161
per cent. If average qualities are taken, the per-
centage of taxation is, of course, higher. The aver-
age duty on wine is about 17 per cent. on the sell-
ing price. If the duties on sugar and tobacco are
taken into account the comparison is equally un-
favourable to the claims of the beer-drinker. The
duty on spirits is, of course, many times higher, but
this is regulated on different principles, and may be
set aside. On a fair comparison of beer with arti-
cles of consumption of a similar description it ap-
pears that beer is more lightly taxed than any of
them. It may be confessed that a demonstration
that beer is lightly taxed, compared with other
potables, is not a conclusive answer to remonstrances
against the malt duty. There is such a thing as a
duty on malt apart from its effect on the price of
beer. As far as malt is an element in beer the duty
upon it affects the article which reaches the consumer
to a comparatively slight extent ; but if malt be
capable of immediateprofitable use, the increase in its
cost arising from the duty is very large. The meet-
ing was yesterday told of a Staffordshire farmer who
congratulated himself on having overcome last year's
drought by the device of feeding his cattle on barley
which he had malted, when a friend warned him
that he was infringing the law. How he could have
been ignorant of the law, considering the notoriety.
of " Gladstone's mixture," is a wonder, but he ap-
plied to the Inland Revenue for information. The
board, faithful to themselves, told him he might cer-
tainly wet his barley, but if he let it grow he would
incur penalties. It is an incidental hardship that a
tax which is designed as an impost on beer should
interfere with the feeding of cattle and the cheapen-
ing of beef. Could we retrace our steps, we should
probably be of opinion that the Malt Duty ought to
have been abolished before the Beer Duty ; but it is
easier to bear the chains to which we are accustomed
than to submit to new, and a proposal to reimpose
the Beer Duty for the purpose of removing the Malt
Tax would meet with very slight support. The far-
mers who gathered together in Freemason's-hall did
wisely in appealing to their " town friends" for sup-
port. Urban friends have an interest in the matter
equally with the rural population. Men like good
beer, and cheap, and good beef, told cheap, in London
as they do in the country; and in the long run the
consumer gets his share in the remission of a tax as
well as the producer. If there were no such thing
as a national expenditure no one would hold up his
hand for a tax. Unfortunately for this view, there
are many objects which Englishmen value more than
money, and as long as we have good government we
must pay for it. Between a large variety of taxes
there only remains the possibility of choosing that
which is least objectionable. These are truisms, but
as Mr. Morritt confesses that his financial education
began after he was elected for the North Riding they
maybe of service to him, and lead him, on reflection,
to see difficulties which he does not now appreciate.
In the meantime, to talk in the dark of throwing
overboard six millions of money is more likely to tell
in Freemason's-hall than in Downing-street. First
get your surplus, and then show that of all taxes the
Malt Tax has the best claim to be abolished.

HERALD.—Lord Palmerston and his colleagues
have undoubtedly treated the Reform question in a
very dishonourable and dishonest fashion. They
drove Lord Derby from office on the ground that
the noble lord was not reformer enough : they under-
took to endow the country with a six-pound fran-
chise and to effect an important redistribution of
seats. It was in their power to have carried such a
measure through the House of Commons if they had
pressed it with the slightest earnestness. The majo-
rity which had placed them in office was pledged to
the support of such a bill, and the Conservative re-
action had not then effected any considerable change
in the strength of parties. They introduced a bill,
but it was evident from the first that they had not
the slightest desire to carry it. They used none of
the means which are at the disposal of a Ministry to
press on its consideration. They showed in their
speeches that they would be glad to see it fall to the
ground, if only the fall did not take the character
of a party defeat and their most faithful supporters