The Sun.
London, England, 1842-03-28 00:00:00

WEYMOUTH.

The proceedings were resumed to-day before the
Committee.
• John Ploughman, a voter for the petitioners was ob-
jected to on the ground of having personated another
John Ploughman, a saddler. A great deal of
evidence was given to maintain this. point. In
the course of the testimony Mr. Vincent, late
joint overseer, acknowledged that there had been a heavy
default in the accounts of him, Mr. Voss, and another
colleague. Each threw the blame of appropriation on
the other, but they all had to indemnify the parish in
goods or money. But witness was convinced that Mr.
Voss was the person who took the money • and when
Mr. Voss had alleged that witness had pocketed some
of the missing rates as well as another, Mr. Vin-
cent pitched into Mr. Voss with such energy, that he
was soon compelled to run away.—(Laughter.) Another
witness proved that Ploughman admitted that he had no
right to vote, but that after he had done so, he said it
Was a mere election trick. Mr. Pitmann, amongst
others, swore he heard Ploughman say this a fortnight
after he election at the Black Dog.
It appeared the two Ploughmans rushed to the bar
of the booth together, each crying out that he alone
was the Ploughman entitled to vote, but the latter suc-
ceeded in persuading the Deputy that he was
the right man. Therefore John Ploughman, the
baker, was recorded for the sitting members,
said Mr. Ploughman, the saddler, could only. ten-
der his, vote for Villiers and Hope. There were
great bustle, uproar, and pressure
,in and about
the booth at the time. The usual three questions
were put to Ploughman before his vote was taken for
Burma' and Christie. The testimony of Mr. Thomas, the
returning officer, went directly contrary to most of the
foregoing.. He who swore he was not a party man, said,
that Ploughman, . the saddler, never tendered his
vote, nor any one for, ; but that the other Ploughman
tinder eonsideration, who is a baker, voted out of a good
house in Mary-street. He did not even see Ploughinan,
the saddler, at the booth. Some other contradictory evi-
dence was given, and the Committee adjourned at Five
o'clock.

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS,
FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
GLOBE.—Many of our readers have no recollec-
tion of a worthy who was in great repute, some thirty
years ago, when the Income Tax was in all its glory,
and when almost every one thought himself justified
in manoeuvring a little, in order to evade that
prying, hateful, and inquisitorial impost. The
-worthy to whom we allude was a leading function-
ary in those days—not in position, but in practice—
almost universally hated and feared, and sometimes
despised, but more frequently the Tormer than the lat-
ter, as many dreaded his appearance, knowing that
they were completely at his mercy, and that upon
'lfs- whim, or caprice, or interest, depended the
amou:_,t they were to be assessed in the taxation
schedules- of that period. As a matter of course,
this worthY.hadhis likes and dislikes, and he occasion-
ally exercised them, to the annoyance of those who had
the misfortune to offend him, and to the advantage of
those who thought it worth their while to secure his fa-
vour. Thus were a whole community, in a great measure,
dependent for their peace and happiness upon this single
functionary, whom a bad, odious, repulsive, and inequi-
table law had brought into existence and armed with
such hateful powers. This law was the Income Tax. As
the Income Tax will be re-imposed upon the country,
unless some strenuous effort be made to scare the
Premier
,from his pet project, and the worthy func-
tionary to whom we have alluded will be a necessary
appendage of that impcst, we shall attempt to describe
him as he existed in the plenitude of his power, and
in the full flush of our operations, so that our readers
may be prepared for the creature which Peel's
prolific Bill is sure to bring forth ; and if they are
not disposed to be "hand and glove" with this in-
come-imp of taxation, they had better strangle it
at its birth—that is the advice we give them.
Picture to yourself, reader, a little, dapper' -sort of
man, with a shabby coat and a " shocking bad"
hat, walking into your house with a paper in
his hand, and requesting you to fill it up 'at your
leisure, at the same time telling you that he
would call in a few days for it. This • man is
a mere clerk at sixty or eighty pounds a year
—worthy men if kept in their station—and em-
ployed by the surveyor of the district, who receives
his appointment from the commissioners legally con-
stituted to adjudicate in all matters relative to the in-
come tax. You shall see how soon he was converted
jlnto- an important personage, by an ingenious device
of his own, and . which he so managed that almost
all we're" obliged to comply with it—except a few,
who paid dearly for their virtuous, obstinacy, their
heroic honest3r. Mind, reader, we are speaking
from practical knowledge 'of the • facts. All that
we are now relating occurred in- a county town
not one hundred miles from the metropolis, and,
-we make no doubt, the same • facts and the
same functionary were common to the .whole island
—ex uno disce. Some few of the :inhabitants,- not
understanding the nature and method of the filling
up pf the papers, which the seedy, dapper little
man left With them, asked the latter,
,as a favour,
to do it for them, at the same time tipping him, •
as the phrase goes. As a matter of course, he did-
as they requested, and it was soon observed
that those parties who had secured the services
of the sub-surveyor, had no difficulty about the
amount of their returns as stated in the income-sche—
dule. They were never hauled up before the Com-
missioners, nor their books examined, nor their ser-
vants questioned, nor their neighbours pumped ; it was
always taken for granted that all was right—and they
had no trouble on that head. But a far different fate
awaited those who had not the sagacity or the incli-
nation to secure the services of the Income-sub. They
were invariably annoyed in one way or other.
STANDARD.—We hold that the system of large
I. We retrenchments is vicious in principle, and that,
as far as it is possible to effect it, the country
ought to be taxed less in war than in peace.
We hold, too, that a tax on property is the
fairest of all taxes, and that it ought to be the
basis of every sound financial system. It was
our earliest form of taxation—the fifteenths voted
to our old Sovereigns were a property tax in
the strictest sense ; and the subsidies were even in
form an income tax-2s. 6d. in the pound upon com-
mercial and professional incomes, 45. in the pound
upon land, a proportion sufficiently just when land-
holders constituted the great body
which it would now be no less just to reverse, for
the opposite reason, were it not that the some-
what longer tenure in landed than in other in-
come, renders an equal rate of taxation upon the
whole the most equitable. We have already explained
the process, by which indirect tax • has been sub-
stituted and the motive for the substitution—toattfirst,
while
the rich at the expense of the poor. At
indirect taxes were limited to tonnage and poundage
they were as equal in their pressure as an income
tax ; and when we speak of the equality of a tax,
we mean the equality of its pressure, and not in its
specific amount. Tonnage and poundage affected
only the rich—only those whose drank wine, and
those who exported at a profit. But who will
name a sip gle indirect tax that can be called
equal in its pressure ? A weekly contemporary, the
Britannia, seems to recommend taxes on " beer, coals,
salt, and, tobacco." Are these taxes equal in their
pressure ? Will the Marquis of Westminster, or the
Duke of Devonshire, feel any of these taxes as much
as it will be felt by the day labourer ? The truth is,