The Sun.
London, England, 1841-06-26 00:00:00

Augmented permanent Tax, exclusive of Income

24,966,969

Add also other new temporary Taxes on Customs
and Excise, Income; Tax, &c.

Total Taxes in 1802

This amount of Taxes' was levied as follows, viz.:—
Total Nett Revenue derived from the Ces- £ s. d
toms and Excise the year 1802, at the
rated duties, as they existed in 1792 .15,425,859 13
Additional, or War Duties imposed as
temporary Duties by the Tory Go-
vernment, viz.:— ft

£ s. d.
1793

1794, including War
Tax on Sugar L141,186 19 6i
1795

1796 _ 1,376,892 9 7i

. . ...
1797, including War
Tax on Sugar 3,178,333 14 5i
1798 683,757 10 6i

1:799

1800

1801

~... L 730,753 19 10

1802 1,957,340 12 10i

12,647,396 9 4
Add Income Tax in 1801 5,822,741 19 4

Total increased Taxes 18,470,138 8 8

Total Taxes ... 33,896,028 1 9i
The total Expenditure was
The total gross Revenue derived from the
permanent Customs, Excise, and Assessed.
Taxes, including all kinds made perma-
nent during the year 1814, amounted to 51,824,981 7 94
The Revenue from War Taxes on Customs,
on Excise, and the Property Tax, exclu-
sive of Miscellaneous Incomes and Re-
venues 24,655,934 9 0

Total Revenue .. 76,780,895 16 91

Total Expenditure for the above year was 106,632,260 0 0
The difference (thirty millions) was as usual borrowed and
funded.

Notwithstanding the above enormous additional taxa- ,
tion, a loan of 40,000,0001. was paid into the Exchequer
as late as 1816, during peace with all the world.
The Property Tax was repealed in 1816, and ceased to ,
be in force after 1817 ; but the temporary or War Cus-
toms Duty imposed in 1809, and yielding 2,761,024/, was
made permanent in 1816, and the greater part of the
War-Excise Taxes were made permanent in the same
year, adding altogether about thirteen millions of the
temporary taxes imposed since 1802, to the permanent
annual taxes, to replace the more equitable Property-Tax.
In 1819. new taxes were imposed by the Tories equal
to 3,200,0001. per annum.
The Torieq have boasted that the reductions of taxa-
tion which they made were so complete as not to have
left the Whigs the possibility of reducing any one tax
whatever ; and they now proclaim that they transferred
the Exchequer to the Reform Government with a revenue
exceeding the expenditure. Unfortunately for the Tories,
assertions, and those stubborn facts called figures, arc
different things.
When William Pitt, in the freshness of youth and
honesty, and before he was pursuaded or forced into pro-
fligacy by his Tory colleagues, entered upon the govern-
ment of this great country, he did so as a Liberal and a
Reformer ; and as he had the ability and the will, he
did, immediately after the war, which ended in 1783,
that which the Tories did not do after the war into
which Pitt had plunged the empire in 1793, and which
ended in 1815. Mr. Pitt zealously and laboriously re-
formed the finances and reduced the expenditure of the
country, and Mr. Pitt's plans of reform went even further.
" My first connection with the Treasury," said Mr.
Harrison, the Treasury Adviser, before a Committee of
the Reformed House of Commons in 1832-3, "was in
consequence of Mr. Pitt intending to take up some very
serious measures for the abolishment of Tithes, and for a
complete revision of the Poor-laws."
We may here observe that the Whig Ministers have
not, it is true, done what Mr. Pitt intended, they have
not abolished Tithes. This Sir Robert Peel may be
presumed to do, as the disciple of Mr. Pitt.
From 1785 to 1792 the income was •so far adjusted
that, after paying the current public expenditure, and
the interest of the National Debt (9,525,866/.), Mr. Pitt
had a surplus of about one million to place to the credit
of that, for him, and for the Tories, happy delusion,—the
Sinking Fund: which served as an opiate to the nation,
while the Tories went on in their profligate borrowing
and raising by increased taxes, those enormous sums,
the oppression caused by. which has ever since been
weighing down the energies of the people.
The Public debt, including the Floating Debt, stood
as follows at the stated periods :
Principal. Interest.
In 1792...... 212,461,782/ 9,525,8661.
1801 579,931,447 21,778,018
1816 864,882,441 . . 41,225,257
Now let us examine the reduction of taxation and the
diminution of the debt, as proclaimed by the Tories :-
Ist. —The taxes repealed or reduced by Lord Liverpool
and the Duke of Wellington are stated by the Tories
to have amounted to 15,883,0001.
2d.—The items of these reductions are in several in-
stances exaggerated, and in others mis-stated.
ad.—ln the amount of taxes reduced on wine and spi-
rits in 1825, the real sums were 230,000/., and
750,0001., instead of 900,000/. and I,2so,oool.—exag-
geration-1,070,0001. There are also some other, but
not important exaggerations in this notable list of re-
ductions.
4th.—The ether reductions may be considered as to
have been originally in a great degree portions of the
temporary and War Taxes, and which ought, strictly
speaking, to have been reduced in 1816.
sth.—The first three taxes reduced on the Tory list, viz.,
Agricultural Horse Tax, 480,000/. ; Malt Tax,
1,400,000/. ; Hides, 300,000/. ; equal to 2,180,000/.,
were considered purely as taxes to relieve the land-
lord and farmer, and carried as such ;. although we
admit readily that the two last were eventually for the
general benefit of the consumer, as was also the re-
peal of the Beer and Salt Tax, and several others.
6th.—But we deny that the Tory Government deserves
credit for those very beneficial reductions or repeal of
taxes.—No, they were forced by the Whigs to make
those reductions. When Mr. Calcraft brought forward
his plan in 1821, for repealing the salt duties, he was
opposed and defeated by the Tories; and it was not im-
mediately after the war of 1815, that the Tories sub-
mitted to retrench profligate expenditure, and to re-
duce and repeal taxes; but after 1820, when they found
that the Whigs in the House of Commons, and the
people out of doors, would no longer suftbr such exces-
sive taxation.
The following taxes are set down as taken off by the
Tory Government in 1822 :
Malt
.....
Hides
Salt ............
Hearth money (Ireland) 200,000

3,195, 000
The facts are these :—Mr. Vansittart, the Tory Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer, brought forward a budgeroon-