The Sun.
London, England, 1841-07-29 00:00:00

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LONDON:
THURSDAY, JULY 29, 1841.

BURDENS BORNE BY THE LAND.
Some of our Contemporaries are engaging in
an elaborate discussion concerning the peculiar
burdens borne by the land, and as they make
them out to be ls. per quarter on, wheat or 6s.
per quarter, they conclude that the protecting
duty on corn imported ought to be is. or Os. per
quarter. We will not engage in such a discus-
sion, because there is an immense confusion of
terms, great digculty in ascertaining the truth,
and, supposing it ascertained, no reason whatever
why land should not be relieved from any sup-
posed peculiar burdens inflicted on it. We must,
however, endeavour to justify our views, and, if
we can, clear away some of the confusion in
which the subject has been involved.
What is meant by land bearing burdens ? It
bears, and a noble foundation it is, our houses
and our bridges and our railroads; it bears,
when we cultivate it, fruits and flowers both nou-
rishing and gladdening to man's life; but it is a
mystification to say the land bears fiscal burdens.
They fall on the people ; they all fall on indus-
try ; they are all abstractions from the produce
of industry; they are all paid by labour, the one
source at all time of every shilling of the national
revenue; and it is a piece of sheer mystification
on both sides to write and talk about land bear-
ing fiscal burdens.
The real question is, whether the industry
engaged in agriculture bears more of the State
burdens than the industry engaged in manufac-
tures. At once, the answer is plain and positive
—it does not. It is subjected to no peculiar
burdens by the State. The, industry of the
agriculturist, and all the instruments he em-
ploys, even to horses', as far as the State is con-
cerned, are as free as air. He can send his
produce to any and every market. It is not sub-
ject, except in the case of hops, to any Excise
or restrictive laws. He needs no permit to move
it about. No prying exciseman visits his pre-
mises to see what he is doing. He can break up
his land, or neglect it, or use it, so far as the
State interferes, just as he pleases. It is only
when agricultural produce goes into the hands,
of the manufacturer that it is subject to restric-
tions. The maltster, the brewer, the distiller,
the tallow-welter, cannot work without the
presence of the exciseman, or in subjection, to
Excise regulations; and the farmer must become
a manufacturer, a maker of cyder or malt, a
brewer, or a tallow-melter, before lie is subject
to any of the restrictions which the State imposes
on industry. It is, therefore, a fact—an unde-
niable fact—that the industry of the agriculturist
is subjected by the State to no peculiar burdens.
The only burdens or restrictions that it is sub-
jected to are laid on by the landowners, or by
the customs of some districts, not by the State ;
but with them, as they are matters generally of
private bargain and contract, the public have
nothing to do. Land, the great instrument will
which the agriculturist labours, is let sub-
ject to a great variety of restrictions, which the
landowners suppose are for their benefit. They
lay duwn rules for its cultivation and cropping,
and fbr manuring it, and disposing of the hay and
straw, for breaking up meadows, and retaining
a certain proportion of land in
,grass and under
the plough. These are onerous, and, in our
judgment—though we are not intimately ac-
quainted with the art of agriculture—most ii -
jurious restrictions on the industry of the agri-
culturists—restrictions, too, imposed for selfish
purposes, by the it 4, and ignorant landowner
on the industrious and skilful men who cultivate
the earth. It is not our business to inquire into