The Sun.
London, England, 1851-02-18 00:00:00

J]NING, FEBRUARY 18, 1851.

the Chancellor of the Exchequer ought not, upon this prin-
ciple, to be divided between the counties and the Consolidated
Fund?

Enough for to-day. Let us repeat as our parting word,
that on Friday night the House of Commons must determine
whether the income-tax, with all that inquisitorial machi-
nery so well described by our correspondent from Manches-
ter, is to be established as a permanent portion of the finan-
cial arrangements of this country.
(From the Morning Post.)
The country has now before it the Finance Minister's esti-
mate of the expenditure and resources of the nation for the
ensuing year. Sir Charles Wood has informed us in what
mode he proposes to deal with his again recurring difficulty
of a surplus, of whose survival of its birth, however, he is
not yet quite certain ; and we may infer, from what he said
in explaining his proposition, the principles on which he pro-
poses in future to create revenue.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer asks the House to grant
him a renewal of the existing income-tax—pure and simple,
without any modification of principle, or graduation in scale
—for a further period of three years.
We do not propose at this moment to enter into any de-
tailsil examination of the propositions of the Chancellor of
the Exchequer. We propose simply to offer a few general
observations on the tendency of our financial legislation, in
order to explain to our readers why the decision of the House
of Commons on the present Budget appears to us more than
usually pregnant with probable important consequences.
We mast ask them to go back with us to the 11th of
March, 1802, the period when the imposition of the pre-
sent income-tax was first proposed to Parliament by the late
Sir Robert Peel, Now, what were the circumstances of the
country at that time? Why, on Sir Robert Peel's acces-
sion to power, the country, as far as its financial condition
was concerned, was in a state of absolute collapse. The
springs which had hitherto supplied the tide of revenue
yielded a continuously decreasing stream, while the amount
of expenditure was concurrently advancing ; the condition
of inland revenue gave unequivocal symptoms that indirect
internal taxation had been strained to the utmost limits of
productiveness—the Excise had not answered to the whip;
Customs were drooping; the financial condition and pros-
pects of India were most gloomy and discouraging; and, in
short, increasing and apparently annually recurrent deti-
ciences stared us in the face. In this eminent difficulty Sir
Robert Peel saw no resource, but, in his own words, " to
make an earnest appeal to the possessors of property to make
a great present sacrifice for the purpose of repairing that
mighty evil."
hat appeal was cheerfully and nobly responded to, and
the gap created by ten years of erring legislation was filled
up. Sir Robert Peel, however, entertained views beyond the
mere and immediate equalization of income and expenditure.
He believed that by an extensive reform of our commercial
tariff he could not only ensure a reduction in the price of
articles of consumption in the cost of living nearly coalmen-
surate with the amount of new taxation imposed, but that
his system would, in process of operation, create such an ad-
ditional revenue, that ultimately he should be in a position
to remit the income-tax altogether. We know now but too
well that he dreamed dreams which never came to pass.
While seduced, probably, by the momentary popularity
which such a policy confers, both Sir Robert Peel and the
Ministers, who have succeeded to and adopted his principles,
have indulged in such continual and progressive remissions
of indirect taxes, operating upon consumers, that we now
depend upon direct taxation to such a degree that it would
be exceedingly difficult to get rid of it without an entire re-
vision and re-adjustment of a great portion of our commer-
cial and fiscal system.
Well I we have now come to a point at which we may
stop and coesicier whether we shall do this, whether wesehall
turn aside, or whether we shall continue in the path chalked
out by the propounder of the commercial policy of 1842 and
1846? Sir Charles Wood is for the latter course, and he
certainly enunciated in support of his views some of the most
extraordinary dogmas in political economy imaginable. Ile
believed, among other things, that no part of any duty on
imported articles, the produce of foreign countries, is paid by
the foreign grower or the foreign merchant; and that no
portion of the Excise Duties on domestic production, such as
the malt tax or the hop duty, are borne by the British
owner or occupier of the soil, but that in all and every case
the contributions to the revenue come exclusively out of the
pocket of the consumer. We will not, however, stop to re-
mark upon this patent fallacy at this moment. We only
allude to it because it is in obedience to this code of com-
mercial faith that Sir Charles Wood is ever pulling a brick
out of our system of import duties and indirect taxation
through the medium of Excise imposts.
Now, the fact to which we wish at this juncture especially
to direct the attention of the public is, that every one of these
annual petty remissions, which fritters away accruing re-
serves, rivets the mill-stone of the income-tax more firmly
round our necks. By degrees, direct taxation will become
the only resource to which the Finance Minister can have
recourse to fill his purse when it suffers a collapse. The
Customs and Excise at this moment present a flourishing ap-
pearance. Yet, without being alarmists, we may venture to
suggest that their condition is possibly, as the agricultural
depression is said to be, exceptional. At all events, every
narrowing of the area of taxation diminishes the security of
the revenue. Suppose that the comparatively small number
of articles in future contemplated to be made liable to taxa-
tion fail to produce the calculated amounts, and not only do
not give the Finance Minister the anticipated 612,0001.
surplus income, but actually leave him in a deficiency,
where will he go for income? The consumer won't allow
him to return to import duties, for he has impressed him with
the belief that though apparently paid by the foreigner they
really come exclusively out of the native pocket. Excise,
perhaps, won't produce revenue, even if he is bold enough to
make the experiment of attempting the resumption of aban-
doned taxes. What will remain ? to what can we resort?
Additional direct taxation? After the fashion of the igno-
rant and impatient savage, we can cut down the tree to get
at the fruit, and when that easily attained but peremptory
supply is gone, why, we shall lire nothing to feed upon, and
starvation will stare us in the face. This, depend upon it, is
the tendency of our present financial legislation ; and we
earnestly urge upon the public and the Parliament to reflect
seriously, and weigh carefully, the history of the last ten or
fifteen years, before they pronounce a judgment on the pro-
position of Sir Charles 'Wood.
(From the Morning Advertiser.)
Long-looked-for has come at last. The Budget is before
the country. Sir Charles Wood delivered himself last night
of the mighty matter. The period of his travail is over. He
has got rid of a burden too heavy to be borne. Ile is relieved
from a load of anxiety. This morning he must feel as in a
new world. He is doubtless, to-day one of the happiest men
in her -Majesty's dominions.
But though the subject of happiness himself, the Chancel•
for of the Exchequer is the author of an incalculable amount
of misery to others. His Budget has already been produc-
tive of great grief in many quarters, and will yet, as it reaches
the remotest parts of the country, occasion deep disappoint-
ment in many more. Little does the Right Hon. Gentle-
man imagine the amount of misery, in all parts of the land,
of which his last night's developments will prove the source.
The hopes which his Budget disappointed will prove the pre-
lude to broken hearts. All classes expected something,
and, with one exception, are all doomed to disappoint-
ment. The window-tax is to be in name remitted, and
there are to be reductions in the imposts on coffee, and on a
certain description of timber. All other interests have been
slighted. Sir Charles Wood has set their claims at nought.
The advocates for a repeal of the paper and advertisement
duties—the friends of a reduction of the duty on tea—the
applicants fur the remission of taxes on soap—the claimants
for a modification of the duties on carriages, all, all are
doomed to disappointment. Their successive deputations
have gone for nothing. Their elaborate statements, their
forcible representations, their earnest pleadings, have failed
to produce any impression on the mind of the Right lion.
Gentleman. One deputation after another quitted the pre-
sence chamber of Sir Charles, when detailing the grievances
under which their respective " interests " groaned, under
the conviction that he was about to do something for theta.
Deputations are remarkably expert in deducing inferences.
And each deputation that lately waited on the Right
Honourable Gentleman imagined they saw with unerring
certainty indications of his intention to diminish, if not en-
tirely remove, the burthens under which they severally
laboured.
The fond delusion is now dispelled. They have awoke
out of sleep. They dream no lonizer. Their eyes are opened.
The terrible reality of their situation now appears to them
in its true colours. The Budget brings no relief to them.
They are booked for certain, with the perpetuation of their
burthens for at least another year. To those who are al-
ready weighed down by what Falstaff would call an "in-
tolerable quantity" of taxation, the circumstance of seeing
no chance of relief for another long year must be disheart-
ening indeed. Little does the Chancellor of the Exchequer
think what long faces and heavy hearts his Budget of last
night has already caused in all parts of the country.
It may seem paradoxical to assert, yet such is the fact,
that, with the exception of not having to receive any appli-
cations at all fur a remission or reduction of taxes, nothing
could have been more pleasing to him than the number of
" interests " that sought relief. When deputation after de-
putation was announced to him, he, no doubt, said within
himself—" The more the merrier." Had he been
applied to by only one or two interests, for
the removal or the reduction of the burthens
which pressed upon them, he would have had considerable
difficulty in resisting their demands. But when his door was
besieged by scores of deputations, representing every concei-
vable "interest" under the sun, and each more clamorous
than the rest, his difficulties vanished. His answer to each
was, that as he could not comply with the wishes, or accede
to the applications of all, he would not meet the wishes of
any. As he could not do everything, he determined on doing
nothing, always excepting the measures of relief, if such they
may be called, which the Budget announces.
The window-tax part of the Right Hon. Gentleman's plan
will be received with derision. It is a miserable measure,—
in every way worthy of the Papal aggression measure of the
Premier. It is melancholy to see the man to whom is con-
fided the administration of the financial affairs of
this great country bringing forward so poor and paltry
a measure. Sir Charles Wood is a mere financial
*ler. His mind is incapable of forming any
great and comprehensive plan. His window-tax proposal is
a mockery. It is a downright delusion. It has the impress
of dishonesty on its forehead. It professes to be that which
it is not. It ostensibly abolishes the window. duties; whereas
it does no such thing. Two-thirds of the tax are to be re-
tained under another name. What's in a name? If the
rose by any other name would smell as sweet, the window-
tax will lose none of its unpleasant odour, because it is
henceforth to be paid under the name of a tax on house-rent.
A more bungling Budget than that which Sir Charles
Wood last night unfolded to the House of Commons, was
never framed by a Chancellor of the Exchequer. It is a
burlesque on the office which the Right Hon. Gentleman
fills. It has this peculiarity about it—that all the interests
which sought relief from the pressure of taxation have been
refused, while those classes whose clamours were not heard
by Sir Charles, and whose persons did not darken the
doors of Downing-street, are the happy men who
have received the financial favours of the Right
Honourable Gentleman. Swift represents those per-
sons as happy who expect nothing, because
they will not be disappointed. But much happier still must
be those who, though they expected nothing, have received
benefits at the banes of Sir Charles Wood. Those persons
connected with the coffee and timber "interests" must feel
themselves the happiest of her Majesty's subjects.
But though Sir Charles Wood's Budget has created, and
will create, so great an amount of disappointment in all parts
of the country, we wish to guard those classes of the com-
munity who are especial sufferers from the pressure of taxa-
tion not to fell into the mistake of assuming that the finan-
cial plans of the Right lion. Gentleman are unalterably fixed
for a period of twelve months. He may yet be compelled to
change his mind. lie was constrained to change it several
times last year, with reference to the stamp duties. And
what he was compelled to do before he may be made to clic:
again. The. pressure from without which necessitated an
alteration of part of Sir Charles Wood's financial schemes
_e
if applied with equal energy
equally successful now. and perseverance, h
There is one part of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's
Budget which is so flagrantly
so glaringly
be per
glaringly unjust,
-
that if the public be but true to itself t cannot
vered in. The financial scheme which the Right Hon.
Gentleman developed last night has many_
obnoxionsthhttilegs
in it ; but the crowning one is the proposal to perpetuate
income tax for threeyears more. Sir Charles does not affect
to ptetenci that the income-tax, As the mesattre 1197 r ettuds,