The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1849-07-24 00:00:00

TO CORRESPONDENTS.

De. HAWTHORNE.—We are sick of the man •, and must beg
of our readers, who have inundated us with letters, com-
plaining of his hardness of ht-art, in refusing to exercise his
Infallible cures, without the payment of just a guinea, to re
member the case of Shylock, and his pound of flesh. They
-may depend upon it that such conduct will defeat its own
object. Vie do not believe that our contemporary, the
- Mercury', knows half the harm he is doing to his fellow'
creatures by bringing before _their notice, at- a time when
• cholera is so prevalent, the pretensions of so heartless a
personage. „ .•
THE "SCENE IN THE COUNCIL."—Our correspondent will
see that we have cut down this affair as much as. possible.
We hate to witness " scenes in the Council.": They only
furnish matter for scoffers ; and gentlemen in the Council
would do well to arcid provoking them.
We are obliged to defer a paper on St. Matthias's Church, and
several other communications.
A2.—lt is nothing to us that Dr. Hawthorne drives his ate-
ton, or that the phaeton in vestion is constantly seen stand-
ing opposite the Mercury-office. Possibly the doctor finds
it more convenient to roost on our contemporary's benches,
than in his own house. That is,his taste.

ri7l.ibtrpool gptanbarb.

TUESDAY MORNING, JULY 24, 1849.

IT is impossible to resist the conclusion which is
being forced upon us from every side, that the bur-
den of taxation is daily becoming more oppressive.
Every community in the kingdom is seeking to
diminish its local expenditure. We are compelled
to resort to shifts—to bazaars, and other indirect
appeals to our benevolence—in order to maintain
our various charitable institutions. Local improve-
ments, both sanitory and decorative, which a few
years ago we voted for with enthusiastic liberality,
are being suspended. We seem, in short, as a
community, to have all at once arrived at the con-
viction that the most severe economy is required to
enable us to live within our incomes. Yet we are
reminded that within the last few years about nine
millions of taxation have been taken off articles of
general consumption. We have cheap bread, cheap
sugar, cheap coffee, and other necessaries and com-
forts reduced considerably. The doctrines of poli-
tical economy teach us that we ought to be in a
state of prosperity, whilst every man, from his daily
experience, recognises the fact that the contrary is
the case. Every man feels that there is a secret in-
- fluence at work, which checks the national progress,
and robs alike the capital, the enterprise, and the
industry of the country of their fair reward.
We see ample evidence of the fact to which we
refer, in the recent motions of Mr. Henley and Mr.
Drummond, for a reduction of the salaries of public
officers, and a general economizing of the national
expenditure. It is notorious that there has been
no recent increase in either. We have not more to
pay than before, but a greater difficulty in providing
the means to pay at all. We have been cutting
down the profits of every branch of trade and in-
dustry. We have added to competition at home
competition with the foreigner. We have all been
going to Sir Robert Peel's cheap shop ; and have
forgotten the important fact that, whilst our earn-
ings are on a diminished scale, the public burdens
remain a fixed amount. What is a pound in taxa-
tion is now thirty shillings or two pounds. The
farmer gives to the state six bushels, his produce,
where he formerly gave only four. The artizan
gives six days labour where he formerly gave only
four. The merchant and the shopkeeper give a
month's profits where they only gave a fortnight's.
Free trade has altered the value of our pound, by
diminishing the profits of industry and enterprize,
as effectually as if it had ordained that we should
pay our indebtedness in sovereigns one-half heavier
than the legal standard.
It is undoubtedly easy for such flippant person-
ages as the Chancellor of the Exchequer to treat
proposals for a reduction in our establishments, as
betraying what was once styled "an ignorant im-
patience of taxation." A prime minister may con-
sider that be is not overpaid at £5,000 a-year; and
may even urge that he is fully entitled to enjoy his
share of the cheapness of commodities, brought
about by his free trade policy. But the taxpayer has
an indefeasible right to demur to paying a greater
amount of the labour, mental or bodily, which
is his capital, than he contracted for. And he will
insist upon it, too. Such notions as those of . Mr.
Henley and Mr. Henry Drummond may just now
he mere flashes in the pan ; but they are indications,
nevertheless, of the direction towards which the
popular mind is progressing. They are extensively
sympathized with by the public out of doors ; and
the question which they moot will, bye and bye,
have to be seriously considered. As effectual mea-
sures of relief, neither of the proposals of the hon.
gentlemen are of great import. The cutting down
of a few thousands, or hundreds of thousands, of
the national expenditure, is only like the with-
drawal of a drop of water from an invading flood.
'Mae ..."..."ffrti+!nri however, of the fact that retrench-
ment.is required at all, that the burdens of
taxation are felt to be oppressive, is an acknow-
ledgement that those springs of enterprib.
choked which once enabled us to bear almost double
i nposts without murmuring.
Sir Robert Peel recently enunciated the doctrine
that national policy might be best examined by a
reference to individual examples. We will give
him such an example. One of his own tenants at
Tamworth, paying, say a hundred a year for his
farm, had last year for his total produce to meet
such rent, the wages of his labourers, the expenses
of his family, and pay for manure, seed, &c., four
hundred pounds. This year his produce will only
sell, at the utmost, for three hundred. Instead of
a fourth of his produce representing the rent, it is
now athird ; and it follows that the hundred pounds
has virtually become, measured in labour, one hun-
dred and thirty-three. The taxes and local rates,
viaich the same farmer pays, are aggravated in the
like proportion. Is it unreasonable that he should
complain, both as to the payment to his landlord
and that to the tax collector ? Take Sir Robert's
own case of the tailor and the bootmaker, each of
whom vended articles at los. each, that sum, of
course, representing a certain portion of their labour.
Suppose the selling price of their respective articles
reduced by competition to 7s. ; and let us see the
result. The shoemaker produces 1000 pair of shoes
per annum, the price of which would have been
£5OO. Out of this he has to pay for leather, say
£4OO, and rent and taxes £5O. Reduce his price
to 75.; and he will be in this position. For his
leather he will still have to pay £4OO, and £5O for
taxes. But a thousand pair of shoes at 7s. only
produce £350. Little wonder, when the poor fellow
has to draw upon his capital to pay the landlord
and the tax-gatherer, that he begins to grumble and
call for economy in the national expenditure.
But in this case neither reduction of rent, nor
diminution of taxation, will restore matters to a
proper state ; and there are thousands of cases, in
which a diminished reward for labour and di-
minished profits are producing the same results.
What must follow ? Rent cannot be paid. Taxes
cannot be paid. We shall have first a reduced
scale of expenditure; less customs and excise re-
ceipts; and next a deficient revenue. Englishmen
justly deprecate any thing like repudiation of the
national creditor, or any diminution of the national
expenditure inconsistent with the maintenance of
the national honour and safety. But this outcry
for economy leads inevitably in the direction of
such a policy. We are attacking even the expen-
diture of the Royal Household, criticising estimates
for the army and navy, and calling for reduction in
salaries of ministers of state; and we are impelled
to do so in self-defence. We cannot give the tax-
gatherer our blood. We cannot pay him with our
tears. The shopkeeper looks in his till, and finds
only money for the traveller, who has supplied his
wares, if even he finds that; and demurs alike to
local rates and public imposts. It is a natural re-
sult of that policy, which sacrifices British industry
at the shrine of the Idol, Cheapness; and determines
that the most highly-taxed people on the face of
the globe shall be compelled to descend to the level,
in prices, of the products of labour of the com-
paratively untaxed foreigner.

WE are in a fix it would seem ; at least the
lawyers and the advocates of the Pike Scheme tell
us so. We must go to Rivington, although Riv-
ington has no water to afford us ; and we cannot
get what we have in abundance beneath our feet,
because we cannot devote the money, to be raised
under the Act of Parliament, to that purpose.
We have made contracts for pipes, which we do
not want, but which we cannot get rid of because
of what Mr. George Hall Lawrence styles "the
honor of the Council." But where, it may be
asked, was the good sense of the Council, when
we were brought to this sad condition? We our-
selves certainly thought, when this most stringent
act was applied for, that its being carried out was
perfectly optional; that the main object was to
enable the Council to buy the property of the
-Water Companies, and to have the supply of
the town with water in their own hands. We

imagined, as most other people did, that the first step
of the Water Committee would he to increase the
efficiency of the present works; that, at all events,
during the construction of the Rivington Works,
a proper supply would he afforded to the town.
But it appears that we cannot take a single step
for the purpose. We cannot anticipate a single
hundred pounds of our income for any other pur-
pose than that of proceeding with this new scheme.
We cannot even stand still, and do nothing. If we
were to be favoured by Providence with the sudden
outburst of a river of chrystal water within our
boundaries, we must leave it untouched, neither
construct a reservoir to hold it, nor pipes to con-
vey it, but turn our faces to the pet locality of
Rivington to find there a supply, not so much for
ourselves as for the manufacturers, and bleachers
of Chorley and Wigan.
. .

What is to be done ? The " Honor of the Coun-
cil" is a fine thing; but we remember the pertinent
question of Sir John Falstaff—" Can honor set a
leg ?"—and are disposed to doubt whether the
honor of the Council can render the Rivington
Scheme a very paying, or successful, concern.
We would rather invoke the common sense of the
Council to take the requisite steps to rid themselves
of their present onerous liabilities, and to procure
the privilege of exercising a discretion of their
own. Can there be any doubt that Parliament
would interfere to protect the interests of the town
in such a case ? None whatever. The Legislature
has retraced its steps frequently. I-lon. members
of both Houses know pretty accurately the real
value of the professional evidence, by which this
bill was carried. They would never have passed it
had the sense of the town been expressed against
it, as unfortunately it was not. Liverpool, at the
titne when the Rivington project was being pro-
moted, was half demented in its longing for clean-
liness. We were in a sanitary fever; and with the
exception of ourselves, there was not a journal in
Liverpool which insisted on the fact, developed by
Mr. M'Donald before the commissioners sent down
by Government, that we had within our reach an
ample supply of water. If we have run into a
dilemma. as it is certain we have, Parliament will
not compel us to cut our own throats; and we
trust that the Committee appointed to re-investi-
gate the subject will recommend Ois common sense
course.

WE have all along given to the apostle of free
trade, Mr. Richard Cobden, the credit of adherence
to the truth. We imagined, too, that he was
acquainted with the rudiments of political economy.
It appears, however, that he can stretch a little
when to do so serves his purpose ; and that he is
marvellously uninformed as to politico-economical
science. Some months ago, a very able member
of the protectionist party, Mr. George Sandars,
one of the representatives for Wakefield, urged
upon the House of Commons the fact that a small
duty upon foreign grain would, by reducing the
nett price to be reaped by exports to this country,
in reality be a tax paid by the foreign grower.
Nine-tenths of those acquainted with the grain
trade were acquainted with the fact that the pros-
pect of admission to the British market has always
been the great elementsin determining the price of
grain in foreign markets. With the price in
England, under the old corn laws, at 60s. a quarter,
the price in the grain markets of the Continent has
generally been about 605., minus duties, freight,
and a small margin for profit. As the price in-
creased at home, the duty being less, the price
abroad rose; and vice versa. There is not a corn
merchant in Liverpool or London who is not aware,
from his own experience, of this fact.
Mr. Cobden, of course, demurs to it, as do the
Whig ministry, although Lord John Russell him-.
self distinctly maintained, when proposing his
fixed duty, that a large portion of it, at least, would
he paid by the foreign grower ; and, to back up his
opinion, the former gentleman, in a letter published
in the Manchester Guardian, has stated that Mr.
Sandars, in a private conversation with him,
recently admitted that he had been in error upon
the subject. After such a representation, we were
a little surprised to find that gentleman distinctly
re. annunciating his previously-expressed opinion.
The honourable gentleman said :

"Allusion having been made to a remark which fell
from him in an incidental discussion, that the duty
on corn in this country was paid 'by the foreigner, he
would now repeat that from an experience of from 20 to
30 years in the corn trade, he knew that as prices rose in
England they declined abroad. His general experience
told him that the foreigner accommodated his price to the
price which ruled in England ; and since he had made the
remark, he had taken care to ascertain the opinion of
gentlemen ,who could form a correct one upon the ques-
tion. He had written to a friend in Liverpool to put the
question to 20 of the merchants of the greatest standing
and respectability in Liverpool. They were largely en-
gaged in the corn trade, and 13 of them positively affirmed
their opinion to be that the foreign power paid the duty,
and not English consumer of foreign corn ; two of
dicm were of that there was no rule upon the
subject—that the price would b. ...ciliated by supply and
demand, and that sometimes one would pay tho duty, and
sometimes the other ; the other five were of opinion that,
the duty was paid by the consumer. (Hear, hear.)
Well, but but there was a clear majority of 12 to 5 in his
favour—a majority which would be very satisfactory in
that house.—(A laugh.) Not satisfied with that, he had
himself gone on the Corn Exchange in Mai k-lane, and
he put the question to from 15 to 20 merchants there, and
the unanimity which prevailed astonished him. Out of
the whole number there was only one—an hon. member
of that house—who was a dissentient ; all the others dis-
tinctly gave it as their opinion that the duty in all instances
was paid by the foreigner."

We should certainly much prefer resting upon
the opinions quoted by Mr. Sandars to those of
Mr. Cobden and his school. But the latter goes
further in his letter than to make a misrepresen-
tation of Mr. Sandars. He indulges in sneers at
those political economists who hold his opinion.
Yet these are amongst the ablest of the writers,
on this science, to whose light Mr. Cobden's is but
that of a farthing rushlight. It is perfectly
obvious that, in nine cases out of ten, there is a
wide margin between the price of grain in this
country and the natural price on the Continent,
and in the United States. What is it but the
fact of the markets of England being open to
the foreign grower, which advances prices abroad
to nearly our own level? Impose a five shillings
duty upon foreign grain, and we may depend that
foreign prices will be by nearly as much reduced.
Besides, we may remind Mr. Cobden of a little
fact, viz., that it was one of the leading arguments
of the anti-corn-law agitators, and of himself
amongst the rest, that the opening of the British
market would raise prices abroad ;: and, whilst
enabling the foreigner to buy more from us,
deprive him of one of the elements of cheap
labour. If opening our markets has conferred
upon him an increased profit upon his cultivation,
a small toll upon his produce would not deter him
from giving us the benefit of his supply, whenever
our prices were a single shilling above its cost.
On this ground, and from the necessities of our
position with regard to the revenue of the country,
which are very apparent, we feel assured that the
proposal made by Mr. Herries, on Friday night, to
adopt a moderate fixed duty on corn for revenue
purposes, will, at no distant date, be affirmed by
the house and assented to by the country. It is
in the teeth of all fact and experience to argue that
a duty of ss. or 6s. would, pro tanto, be an addi-
tion of that sum to the amount paid by the British
people for their food. The very fact of a surplus
existing in any portion of the world, and the pos-
sibility of its profitable introduction into a wealthy
country, would, with such a duty, always keep
down prices to a moderate level. Mr. Cobden
himself, we dare say, knows as well as anybody
else that an excess of supply of any commodity has
a far greater effect in reducing prices than any mere
fiscal impost has in raising them. We could no
more raise the price of the whole stock of grain in
this country by laying a small duty upon the sur-
plus with which other countries could supply us
than we could raise the price of the whole stock of
calicoes in Manchester by taxing the few hundred
thousand pieces which some half-dozen millowners
are manufacturing in excess. There is the strong
argument also to be adduced, in favour of such a
duty, that it would return probably a couple of
millions per annum to our impoverished exchequer,
and enable us to dispense with some items of our
taxation which are really felt by the country.

LIVER THEATRE.—This Theatre has been open during
the week for the Walhalla Exhibition of the well-known
and talented Madame Warton. The attractions elsewhere
have been unusually great, yet as an
evidence of the esti-
mation in which this artiste is held in Liverpool, her ex-
hibition has been well supported ; a more liberal reminis-
cence of her former achievements is no doubt reserved by
the lovers of art for the remaining portion of the time
limited for her stay in Liverpool. The fact of Madame
Warton having received the distinguished approval of the
Royal Academy, stamps herself and her company with
the mark of great ability. We observe that she is about
to give morning performances. .01.41. P. Nalk