The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-06-21 00:00:00

TAXATION ON NEWSPAPERS.

We have been among the last to complain of the taxa-
tion upon Newspapers as far as concerns the Stamp Duty,
for the simple reason that it operates as a kind of protec-
tion against that ruinous and injurious competition which
begins in reduction of price, and inevitably results in de-
terioration of quality. While in England. with the im-
position of a stamp, the Press has become the boast of
our age, a credit to our national intelligence, and the
palladium of British liberty, in other countries it has de-
generated into the mere pander to popular prejudices, or
the root of despotic tyranny ; and in France a stamp has
been recently imposed as the only safeguard against a
licentiousness which had become Intolerable. But ad-
mitting the propriety of retaining the stamp, we cannot
perceive the advantage of the alteration which has been
proposed by the CHANCELLOR of the Excnentren.
Conscious of having, in his former proposition, laid him-
self open to the charge of attempting to purchase the sup-
port of The Times, by a bribery which amounted to more
than £20,000 a year, Mr. GeansroNn has in his new
scheme merely varied the mode of conferring the favour,
without making it less a boon to vone- particular paper,
although he has permitted a few, mere to share in the
privilege. The most objectionable part, however, of the
Budget, relating to newspapers, is the retention of a six-
penny duty on Advertisements, after a direct vote of the
House for its total abolition. There is hardly a solitary
reason on which he can justify this proceeding, which we
can only characterise as a paltry act of petty obstinacy.
The whole amount involved is only £60,000 a-year, and
for this scanty saving the restrictions and inconvenience
which invariably accompany any system of direct taxa-
tion is to be retained, and the public deprived of that
boon to which they are fairly entitled, and which they
bad a right to anticipate. If the CHANCELLOR of the
EXCHEQUER has been so close in his calculations,.and
left so narrow a margin for contingencies that he really
cannot spare the money, the alternative is easy of de-
cision. It is a simple question between. boating
few by the repeal of the Supplement Stamp, or giving the
boon to the many by the abolition of the Advertisement
Duty; and the former should certainly give way to the
latter. He may also refrain from lowering the stamp on,
articles of apprenticeship to attorneys, or even raise it to,
a higher sum. This would be a boon to the profession,
and prevent it from being inundated by men of Inferior
education and standing in society; but to retain the paltry
sixpence on each Advertisement is to preserve all the
worst features of the system, without a corresponding
benefit. It is keeping the word of promise to the ear
and breaking it to the hope, and imposing a restriction
upon announcements through the columns of a newspaper
to which they are not liable under any other form. The
proposition has still, however, to receive the fiat of Par-
liament, and we trust that the members of the House of
Commons will be consistent with their previous vote, and
once more declare their determination to abolish the duty
altogether.