The Sun.
London, England, 1860-03-13 00:00:00

nor was it imagined, that the purchasers would get them
cheaper, and the only parties possibly who would benefit by
the abolition of the duty would be the rag dealers, the paper
makers, and the publishers. (Hear, hear.) Mr. Bohn, the
publisher, had given some particulars with re ect to the
effect of the duty upon a few standard works. and it ap-
peared from those that the tax upon the " Annual Register,"
which cost 18s., amounted to 3d. ; upon o volumes of
Lord Macaulay's " History of England," which cost 365.,
to 6d. ; upon Colenso's " Arithmetic," costing 4s. 6d., to a
halfpenny; and upon the " Cornhill Magazine," price ls.,
to a halfpenny. Now he asked whether the consumers of
knowledge would be one fraction benefited by the total abo
lition of the tax ? (Hear, hear.) There might be some trades
which would be benefited, bat in respect to literature he did
not see how, in the face of those facts, it could be contended
that any benefit could accrue. Take the common schools
in the country, which he was proud to say were increasing,
how were they supplied with books ? Why, they gene-
rally obtained them from the British and Foreign School
Society and other institutions at less than the cost price,
and where only a halfpenny would be saved on a book
like Colenso's " Arithmetic," he wanted to know how
the middling schools would be benefited by the abolition.
(Hear, hear.) Our manufacture of pliper had largely in-
creased, and our exports of paper had increased in a most

extram dinary ratio during the last few years. Some went
to Hamburg, but nearly all the rest of our exports were for
America and the British colonies. In 1857, 191,721,6201b5.

of paper came to charge, of which was exported
16,031,0531b5. ; in 1858, 192,347,3251b5., of which
20,068,7091b5. were exported. Without comparing last year
with the preceding the manufacture had increased to the
extent of 24,379,3721b5., while the exports had increased by
3,518,9211b5. (Hear.) But it was said that whenever there
was a village with good water, pure and healthy air, paper
manufacture would rear its head. Ho lived in a county
where such villages existed, and he now saw in ruins there
many paper mills and cloth manufactories which were for-
merly in operation. What was the cause ? Except in one
or two districts in Somersetshire, those trades had left and
gone to the north, and all because they were generally in-
stituted by men who had not sufficient capital. The larger
manufacturers in the north had capital, and were enabled to
purchase that expensive machinery which was now used in
making paper. The President of the Board of Trade said
that 20 years ago there were 625 paper mills in the country,
while the number at present did not exceed 393. It was
lamentable indeed that so many had fallen to the ground,
but if he had gone back to 1813 he would have found that
at ihat time there were no less than 700 paper mills in Eng-
land and between 70 and 80 in Scotland, and for Ireland
there was no return in that year. As for giving more em-
ployment to the labourers he had some difficulty now in
getting sufficient labourers on his estate, and were it not
for the machinery now used half his harvest would be
spoiled, so that he did not thank the right hon. gentleman
for that. (Hear, hear.) That morning he had conversed
with Mr. Potter, of Lancashire, and his working partner,
who had informed him that the expense of erecting a paper
mill, with all the appliances of the newest machinery,
would be £4,000 or £5,000 for a water mill, and £lO,OOO or
£ll,OOO if a steam engine were used, and the looking after
the machinery and keeping it in repair would
cost £1,200 a year. There was no chance then
of t7small establishments being able to exist. But
if the right hon. gentleman was determined to repeal the
paper duty, how did heintend to meet the deficit of £1,200,000
caused by that repeal ? He intended to propose another
penny of income tax. Now the income tax was formerly
used only in time of great necessity. Until 1842 it was
always affirmed to be a war tax. In that year, when it was
put on, the emergency was great. There was a great de-
ficit, accruing from the four or five preceding years ; the
deficiency for that year (1842) was £2,334,000, and the esti-

mated deficiency for 1843 was put down, if the income tax
had not been put on, at £10,772,000. That was the prime
reason for the income tax being put on, and the improve-
ment of our commercial code was only a subsidiary reason,
and it was at first imposed for three years only. In 1853
the right hon. gentleman held out an illusory promise ;that
this year it would be done away with. It bore hard espe-
cially on those whose incomes were less than £l5O a year.
In the assessment under schedule D last year these incomes
, amounted to one-fourth of the whole amount of the assess-
ment, and, taking the number of persons, they formed a
much larger proportion of the whole. In 1858 there were
288,202 persons assessed under schedule D, and 155,116
were those with incoMes under £l5O. There were 91,731
persons assessed under schedule E, out of which 57,605 had
incomes under £l5O. (Hear, hear.) He would intercede
with his right hon. friend on behalf of that class of persons.
Was this a time to sweep away the paper duty, and place it
on their income tax ? (Hear.) The 7d. income tax on £lOO
a year would amount to £2 16s. 4d. of direct taxation taken
out of the small income of such a poor persen,who had hard
work enough; God knew, to support his wife and family,
and to live respectably, as he was obliged to do, if hebelonged
to the useful class of clerks or commercial travellers ; and how
would the importation of French wines and silks benefit him?
The odiousness and hardship of this tax was shown by the
report from the Commissioners of Inland Revenue, as to the
diZSGultica of its collection, and the panizul appeals maae TO
their compassion and forbearance. He (Sir W. Miles) would
now ask permission of the house to move the following
amendment instead of the one ,of which he had given
notice :—" That as it appears that the repeal of the dFty on
paper will necessitate the addition of a penny in the pound
to the property and income tax, it is tke opinion of this
house that such repeal is, under the circumstances, at the
present moment inexpedient."
Mr. B. STANHOPE seconded the amendment. Re-
ferring to the financial situation of the country, as described
by the Chancellor of the Exchequer the other day, he ob-
served that without any additional income tax ho would
have been able to make all the customs alterations. The
additional palmy of income tax was therefore the immediate
consequence of the repeal of the paper duty. The objections
that had been taken to the paper duty, and the arguments
for discontinuing it, were not particularly applicable now.
If the House of Commons passed a resolution against it in
1858, and thought it so odious and bad a tax, why was it
not repealed at that time ? In 1858 they declared that the
paper duty was not to remain a permanent source of re-
venue, but that year not only did they not increase the in-
come tax, but they considerably decreased it. There was
one objection which had been used for a great many years
to the paper duty, and that was that it was a tax ou know-
ledge. Did they mean to say that the whole amount of the
paper duty (£1,200,000) was a tax on knowledge ? If so,
that was an erroneous opinion. He had inquired of a large
manufacturer, and though only an approximate estimate
could be formed, he believed that of all the paper manufac-
tured two-fifths only were used for printing purposes, one-

fifth was used for writing purposes, and two-fifths for the

purposes of trade. Mr. M'Culloch, who was often quoted
on.thp other side of the house, said, " The abolition of the
duty on paper would not make any difference in the price of
books, newspapers, and other periodicals. The duty on a copy
of a double sheet of the Times is about id. On a number of
the _Edinburgh or Quarterly Review, which sold at 65., it
was 2d. ; and on "Macaulay'g History of England," which
sold at 325., it was only 6d. It is idle, then, to pretend that
the existing duty on, paper is any obstacle to the circulation
' of literature, or that books would be cheaper if the duty were
abolished. The question really before the house was not
whether they would repeal the paper duties, but whether
they would increase the obnoxious income tax? That was
the question which they had really to answer; and on whish
they would have to explain theli answer to their consti-
tuents, to whom they had now.a-days to pay almost an an-
nual visit. (A laugh.) If the house really represented the
views of the community, they would indorse without hesi-
tation the opinion that it was impolitic by taking off a tax
that was burdensome at most to but a small portion of the
public, to render it inevitably necessary to increase one of
the most odious imposts that was ever levied upon the
country. (Cheers.)
the descriptionsM r.
N
ORRIS would venture to assert that neither of
gsuivbejnoottsoutthtehhatoumseomasentthewastsastteriooftlypuoohlirf
opinion on these
rect, He believed tha
t the public generally were not much
with either
in love
duty. The truth was, they found them-
selves in the position of being compelledand
he t ow
aaccept
inclinedone ot
or
other of the two evils before
Chancellorthink th at uponof
th
ea
Exchequerbalanee
of
them,
testimony
would be thetho
uproposal
eorfatbhl
oe
to the supplemental budget of hon. gentlemen opposite. He
(Mr. Norris) understood that the Chancellor of the Exche-
quer asked the house to assent to the income tax foron
year, and for one year only. (A laugh.) That motione
would only touch one-seventieth portion of the budget, and
he did not think that would give weight or authority to the
proposed alteration. The income tax was objected to upon
the ground that it was a war tax. But what was the paper
duty ? Why, it was a tax 'imposed in the year 1711, in the
reign of Queen Anne ; and the preamble of the act expressed
that it was imposed for the purpose of carrying on the war
then raging until her Majesty had made a good and lasting
peace. If that were true, then all the arguments of the hon.
gentleman against the income tax, upon the ground that it
was a wartax, were equally applicable against the paperduties.
(Hear, hear.) It was a mistake to suppose that the paper
duties did not enter into the cheaper class of semool books.
The fact was that the tax augmented the price of them from
6 to 20 percent. ; mad, if it was true that the purchasers of
such works as Lord Macaulay's "History of England" paid
so little to the State in the shape of paper duty, while the
poor paid so largely, then the incidents of that tax were most
unjust, and it pressed heavily on the poor, while the rich
escaped almost altogether. Seeing the difficulties by which
the question was surrounded, he thought the tax ought not
to be continued.

Mr. Al ILLS reminded the house that they were not then
considering the nature of the tax, for all taxes were objec-
tionable, but whether at the present time, with an exhausted
Exchequer, they were to repeal the Excise duty on paper,
and add to the amount of income tax. The house had al-
ready decided that the paper duty should be repealed when
the proper time arrived, but the question was, had that
period arrived? He thought the opinions put forward by
the noble lord the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in
June, in 1858, when the right hon. gentleman now the Pre-
sident of the Board of Trade brought forward his motion
for the repeal of the paper duty, should have prevented him
from supporting the repeal of the tax. He stated distinctly
that good faith required that the taxes on tea and sugar and
other articles of consumption should be first abolished, and