The Sun.
London, England, 1836-04-11 00:00:00

THE WIN, LONDON, MONDAY, APRIL U, 18;i6.

NEWSPAPER STAMPS.

(From the Edinburgh Chronicle.)
Newspapers will require henceforth to be of a more lite-
rary and intellectual kind, blending the news of passing
events with more substantial matter ; matter founded on
sound principles, particularly of political economy, and of
its cognate branches. When the reduction of the stamp
and paper duty takes place, no newspaper, we venture to
predicate, will eminently succeed, if it contain merely trite,
superficial, and commonplace views ; if it is not able, in
short, to grapple with questions of sound philosophy, eco-
nomical science, and the science of general politics ; in a
word, if it i,s not worthy of the improved intelligence and
spirit of the age. Worthless prints may and will appear ;
indeed lye') under the present system they have already
appeared ; but their influence will be slight, their career
will be short. The quality of the public press must be
equal to the demand, or to the correct taste and expansive
views which daily more and more characterise the great
body of the reading population. The public press will, we
flatter ourselves, become the vehicle of intellectual instruc-
tion in morals, philosophy, science, and every useful branch
of knowledge.
If this view of the matter is sound, the reduction of the
Newspaper Stamp will bear peculiarly hard upon the Tory
press. Many of the Tory papers are admirably written—
indeed most of them are so—a circumstance which, though
we differ toto ccelo from them in principle, it is but fair to
mention. But as Toryism is rapidly disappearing, as not
one reader in a dozen reads a Tory journal, and as, there-
fore, they cannot proportionally extend the number of their
supporters, we think it probable that the new system will
essentially affect their interests, and perhaps extinguish not
a few of them altogether. We say this from no unkind feel-
ing ; it is our decided conviction, founded on the views we
have been endeavouring to illustrate.
Many other reflections press on our mind, suggested by
the contemplated reduction. But we have not room nor
time to say more, except that we cannot sufficiently praise
the admirable offer made to the people by the Chancellor of
the Exchequer. It is worthy of the Government—it is
worthy of these liberal and enlightened times. Nor, in justice
to the public interest, could the reduction have been lower.
The Id. of duty retained affords scarcely a suitable remunera-
tion for the carriage of papers. It is at least much more judi-
cious and statesman-like to charge this remuneration, slight
as it is, in the shape of a stamp-duty, than as a postage. As
stamp-duty, it is paid per advance, without any annoyance,
and without incurring almost any expense in its collection.
It could not, in truth, be levied in a cheaper or better way.
Had it, on the contrary, been charged as postage, this
would have been to adopt an operose and complicated, in-
stead of a simple and expeditious system. The postage
would have been both very expensive and difficult to co-
lect. Besides, had a postage, however trifling, been adopted,
instead of the stamp-duty of l d., the boon would have been
unequal in its operation : the inhabitants of a large town, as
London or Edinburgh, would have been freed from a charge
which had to be borne by the readers of newspapers in the
country. This inequality would soon have been found to
be irritating and unjust : it could not, indeed, long have
been tolerated.
The measure, in short, has been brought forward in a
noble spirit ; it will, we feel assured, be met in a similar
spirit ; and the result cannot fail to be most gratifying and
beneficial.