The Sun.
London, England, 1842-04-04 00:00:00

Ott ~utti.

LONDON
MONDAY MORNING. APRIL 4, 1642.

We insert from a Leeds paper the specimens,
which Mr. Alderman TOTTIE of that place fur-
nished to the meeting held there on Thursday, of
the sort of inquiries made by the Commissioners
who acted under the old income tax law. If the
retail dealers and merchants of this kingdom,
after reading his statements, are prepared to
acquiesce in the income tax, we can only say,
that there is no degree of political slavery for
which they are not ready. From amongst them
the spirit of freedom must have fled, and its mere
forms, which our ancestors established, will not
long remain reproachfully to remind the nation
of its former liberty.
Amongst the questions put by the Commis-
sioners are such as these—" What sums of money
have you employed in your trade ?" " What
part was advanced by you or ,'ether persons?"
Then follows a demand to know' the traders,
gains, losses, and deductions. In another case
the parties were asked; " What was the amount
of their stock ?" What excise duties t hey paid ?"
" What sums the partners drew out of the con-
cern ?" " What was the average prices which
they bought and sold different axtieles ?"
It is impossible that any trade, the soul
of which is confidence, can long survive
such a scrutiny by the Governmez it. Mr.
BURKE was wont to say of bank pap er that
it was of value on 'Change, because it had no
value in Westminster Hall, implying- that to
legalize credit was to destroy it; so, by cposing
to public sunshine, those transactions wl.Li. ch can-
not, indeed, be too intimately known to all the
parties interested, the Government wil a make
the most goodly prospects of individual c. ipul,?.nce
fade into nothingness. The evil eye of ti ie Com-
missioners filling on a tradesman's books will
slowly, but surely, wither up his fortune ts.
Sir ROBERT PEEL has avowed his int€ t ation to
adopt the regulations of the Act of 1 ir.l )6 with
some modification. Till we see those r a odifica-
tions we cannot judge accurately of his scheme;
but the Act of 180 G forbids a trader tt ► deduct
from his profits any annual interest, or an-
nuity, or annual payment, payable out of
such•profits. Then if a man have hot ight the
good will of a business for a sum of mon y, and
have, moreover, agreed to give the seller an an-
nuity of 2001. a-year for three, or any nut. a ber of
years, he must include that annuity in ;s an-
nual profit, and pay the income tax on it. For
a time it may absorb all his gains, and he will
have to pay the tax out of his capital.
Again, as we read the regulations, the cl% !bts
owing to a man, unless the Commissioners c 011..
sider them to be "irrecoverable arid desperate,"
will be included in his profits, and while he is
mourning over heavy outstanding, unpaid clay ns
which are ruining. him, he will be taxed on thie m
as on a part- of his year's profits. We do not h '-
neve that such another scheme of fiscal inj t ti 5"
tice and fiscal rapacity was ever devised, and t
the people now to submit to it, in order to kee P
on the Corn-law, will be to place their lives an d
fbrtunes at the mercy of the most sordid, and, i:
their corporate capacity, the least scrupulou s
aristocracy that ever existed.

Many of our correspondents, and the corres -
pondents of other journals, have pointed ou t
various inequalities in the proposed tax; but
except in the case of a physician, w:3o it
said to make a large income for only a very
short period, we have not seen any ac count
of its bearing in relation to the periods in -1 vhich
different classes may be considered fit ti la•
hour. A clerk in a Public office, fbr exa► nple,
whose business is regular and easy, wi 11
able to work and receive an income i 'or ; greater number of years than a stage-coach anar
or a captain of a vessel, who is exposed to n,
rous accidents and to all weather. Ther(
some trades, like those of the grinders at Silo,
field, at which no man can work more the.", tei
or fifteen years. There are others which, frort
the particular nature of the occupation, mak(
continual demands on the body, and require thou •
who practise them to be at considerable more
expense than a clerk in sustaining the body in
vigour. There are some professions, like those of
the printers ot the morning papers, which require
men to be up a great part of the night, and which
make prodigious demands on the animal powers..
These men may all have an income nominally
equal, but it may require nearly twice as much
to support one nun as another. Surely, it is as