The Sun.
London, England, 1850-04-16 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON,

more favourable circumstances, were still involved in
the deepest gloom and obscurity.
The " Brick-dust Budget" of the 15th of March,
however, completely dispersed any fond illusions that
might have been indulged in. The Right
Honourable Baronet then proved that, how-
ever incompetent to the discharge of the
important and arduous duties of his office in seasons
of adversity, his deficiencies were still more glaring
in periods of greater prosperity. New loans were
effected while profound peace and tranquillity pre-
vailed on every side—that was indeed bad; but the
public lost all patience when they discovered that by
far the larger portion of the "heaven-sent" surplus
was to be:applied to—what !—something would surely
be done with that to reflect credit on the Minister of
Finance, and retrieve the waning popularity of his
official coadjutors; alas, no !—the abolition of the
duty on bricks, and the liquidation of the National
Debt !!! This was indeed too bad ; it was the " last
straw that broke the back of the camel," that sealed
the doom of the Whigs. The result is sufficiently
perceptible from the proceedings of the past week.
Day by day it has been our painful duty, as public
journalists, to chronicle a series of disgraceful de-
feats, each more decisive than the preceding one. On
Monday the Ministers were most properly left in a
minority on the question of the assistant-surgeons of
the Royal Navy. On Tuesday they obtained a paltry
and insignificant majority of three (!!!) on the win-
dow- tax. On Wednesday, on the second reading of the
County Courts Extension Act, they were completely
and decisively routed by an overwhelming majority
of 77-144 independent Members having voted in ac-
cordance with the desires of the people, while only
67, of whom 32 were placemen, officially connected
with the Government, could be induced to divide with
the first law officer of the Crown, aided and assisted
by her MAJESTY'S principal Secretary of State for the
Home Department, and by all the strength of the Ca-
binet. On Thursday the First Lord of the Trea-
sury postponed, to a future session, the consideration
of the admirable suggestion of the Honour-
able Member for the county of Limerick, for increas-
ing the smaller borough constituencies ; in Ireland.
On Friday, in like manner, the question of economy
and retrenchment was placed upon the shelf, and the
duty that should have been performed by Ministers
themselves was cast upon a " Select Committee."
Saturday was happily a diet non, so that some little
breathing time was afforded. But another defeat
was impending, which last night completed their
discomfiture, and the astonished and confounded
Chancellor of the Exchequer was compelled to with-
draw, for 'the time being, " in order to determine what
course he. should pursue," the further consideration
of the Stamp Duties Bill, introduced with so loud a
flourish of trumpets as the offspring of the anxious
care and labour of fifteen years !
This i&indeed a humiliating and a painful alterna-
tive. The more equitable apportionment of the stamp
duties had long been demanded. The assessment
was, as Sir CHARLES WOOD himself acknowledged on
the 15th of March, " exceedingly unfair and un-
equal." Its equalization, and the substitution of ad
valorem duties for the present scale, was anxiously
looked for on every side. If judiciously and fairly
carried out, the change would have been considered a
real boon, but unfortunately Sir CHARLES WooD
could not be induced to bring forward a plain and
simple measure remedying the acknowledged grieve
ance. He endeavoured to incorporate therewith a
number of stringent provisions which would render
those imposts, already sufficiently oppressive, still more
onerous and intolerable. New regulations were in•
troduced that would subject matters now practically
exempted from the tax to very heavy charges, and the
facilities now existing for stamping or placing addi-i
tional stamps on documents would be materially
abridged. Besides, the Right Honourable Gentleman
began at too high a rate of duty, and made the turn-
ing point in the scale (1,0001.) too low. In place,
therefore, of remitting taxation to the extent
of 300,0001, as declared in his speech on the
Budget, the probable results of the change would be
an increase of revenue to the amount of several hun-
dred thousands per annum. This we pointed out
clearly and distinctly on Saturday last, and showed
that the House should require additional information
to enable it to deal with the subject, and that the
" guardians of the public purse" should not permit
themselves to be hoodwinked, or to deal on insufficient
data with questions of such vital importance to the
national prosperity. Sir CHARLES WooD, however,
either could not, or would not, furnish that
information. He could make his own calculations that
there would be a loss, but would not show
the grounds on which he formed his judgment. The
Attorney-General also could state exactly to a single
farthing what the loss would be upon conveyances,
which he asserted would amount to 266,299/. 4s. 6d.
We are almost tempted to exclaim with Mr. MAN.
eeeurer, " the sixpence be dem'd !" But no return
would be granted to enable Honourable Gentlemen to
draw their own deductions, and Sir CHARLES WOOD
took something from the weight of his Right Hon.
Colleague's assertion by stating that "it was entirely
a guess." Under such circumstances, it is by no
means surprising, that notwithstanding the numerous
concessions made on almost every clause in the Bill, the
Government was left in a minority of 29 on the very
first division, on Sir H. WILLOUGHBY'S motion, that
the stamp duty on bonds, for sums not exceeding 50/.,
should be Is. in place of 2e. 6d., as proposed by Sir
CHARLES WOOD. This proposition was supported by
164 independent Members, while only 135—includ-
ing place holders—voted for Ministers. The result,
as we have already seen, is the temporary withdrawal
of the Bill, until the Right Honourable Baronet
can make up his mind "on the course he should
pursue."

Not much doubt can remain on this point. The
House and the country will not now rest satisfied
with the existing scale. Sir CHARLES WOOD can-
..

not retrace his foottteps, or continue ' the
system which he designated as " exceed-
ingly unfair, unjust, and unequal." The
Noble Lord the Member for Marylebone stated the
general feeling on the subject, that the true principle
was " that the poor and rich should be taxed pro-
portionately—not the scandalous and disgraceful
principle that the poor should pay infinitely a larger
proportion than the rich, and that it was a great im-
provement for the poor man to pay only twice as
much as the rich man, instead of forty times as
much, as he used to de." The principle of ad valorem
duties must therefore be fully and fairly carried out,
not only on the stamps, or bonds, or mortgages, and
transfers, but on every department, and on every
branch of the national revenue.

A question is now under consideration at Guildhall
of some importance to the legal profession—the utility
to the city of London of a permanent staff of law
officers. The advocates of change say that, inasmuch
as the Corporation have
,always the services of the
most eminent lawyers of Westminster Hall at their
disposal, the permanent retainer of individual mem-
bers of the profession is useless, and, moreover, that a
job is so inevitable an ingredient of civic appoint-
ments, that the system of electing permanent officers
prevents the services of efficient men being secured to
the Corporation.

This discussion has been immediately occasioned
by the promotion of Mr. Buxom( to the rank of
Common-Sergeant, and the resignation of one of the
City Common Pleaders. According to the usual
custom on such occasions, the subject has been gene.
rally referred to the Officers and Clerks' Committee;
and we hear that at a very thinly attended meeting
of that committee, on Thursday last, it was resolved,
by a majority of one, that henceforth the appoint-
ment of Common Pleaders to the city of London
should be discontinued.

It appears that the prospect of two vacancies among
the City Pleaders has, on the present occasion, brought
so many candidates into the field, and family influence
has been exerted to such an extent in favour of some
of the candidates, that a large portion of the Corpo-
ration felt called upon to take some decided steps to
counteract it, and hence the somewhat hasty resolu-
tion of the meeting of Thursday last. As, however,
sudden innovations are rarely productive of the ex-
pected improvement, we are not surprised to find
that a reaction has taken place in favour of conti-
nuing the appointment.

The offices of the City Common Pleaders are of
considerable antiquity, the communes narratores civi-
tatis London being mentioned in some of the oldest
records of the Corporation, their duties requiring
them to act with the Common-Sergeant in counselling

and assisting the citizens, not only in matters pend-
ing in the civic tribunals, but in the courts at West-
minster; and by a by-law of the Corporation of the
date of PusLir and MARY, the Recorder, Common-
Sergeant, and Judges of the Sheriffs' Courts are
directed to be chosen from these learned counsellors
of the City. There are numerous instances cited in Mr.
Sergeant MANNING'S interesting work entitled " Ser-
viens ad Legem," of counsel being in ancient times re-
tained as permanent officers of public bodies, and hardly
a joint-stock company is now started without some
standing counsel being appointed ; and, if such ap
pointments serve any useful purpose in ordinary cases,
there certainly seems good reason for the system
being continued inthe Corporation ofLondon, which en-
joys such peculiar customs and franchises. The reform
party in the Corporation would, perhaps, therefore, be
acting more wisely by endeavouring to check corrup-
tion in their own body than by seeking the abolition of
old and useful offices, which, whilst they are legiti-
mate objects of ambition to the bar, ensure to the
City, at a nominal salary of five pounds a year,
a staff of officers devoted to the rather uninviting sub-
ject of civic law. The Queen's Counsel receive also
such a nominal salary; but even Mr. JOSEPH Hums
has not been heard to complain of this,
.and the rank
of Queen's Counsel is rarely conferred except on the
most distinguished members of the English bar.
Is the Corporation of London, then, confessedly so
corrupt that its members cannot be trusted to elect
from the bar an efficient staff of Common Pleaders ?
Is the system of nepotism so engrafted into the pro-
ceedings of Guildhall that they cannot even retain
counsel for the City, except from the families of their
own members? We hope, for the honour of the
Corporation, this is not the case. Amongst the 232
members of the Court of Common Council are nume-
rous gentlemen of energy, talent, and independence.
They can, if they please, by resisting improper in-
fluence, vindicate the good old principle of local
government, which the city of London is said so pecu-
liarly to illustrate; and if they despair of securing
the proper choice of men to fill such junior offices as
that of Common Pleader, there is little security to the
public that in their selection of judges, magistrates,
&c., any other object will be kept in view by the
Corporation than the providing places for themselves
or their families.

It behoves the city of Lor don on such an occasion
to gravely consider the question before them. The
office of Common Pleader may or may not have be-
come an unimportant one. If it has become so, the
obvious cause is the neglect of the Corporation to ap-
point efficient men to fill it. If it has not, and there
still continues to attach to it something more than
the wretched perquisites of the monopoly of the Lord
Mayor's Court, the Corporation must make up their
minds to leave family considerations out of the ques-
tion, and appoint men who will immediately become
useful officers, and at some future period efficient
judges.

The indefatigable Mr. GEORGE ALFRED WALKER
deserves the felicitations of every sincere sanitary
reformer, seeing that last evening the Cabinet,
through the person of the Home Secretary, took the
initiative step towards the organization of a system
of extramural interment. To that end, during the
sitting of the House of Commons yesterday,
leave was granted to the Government, on
the motion of Sir GEORGE GREY, to bring in
a measure such as will tend to the realisation of a
boon long anticipated by the population. When the
Bill shall have been formally submitted to the con-
sideration of the Legislature we shall find repeated
opportunities for commenting on the merits or de-
ficiencies of the scheme therein to be propounded
by the present Ministry ; but already, at this early
stage of the proceeding, we eagerly press forward to
felicitate the originator of the whole movement, and
to commend the Government for having at length
yielded to the irresistible force of argument, tardily,
it is true, but nevertheless fully and cordially.