The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-07-12 00:00:00

THE NATIONAL REVENUE.

TSE usual quarterly statement of the National
Income up to the sth of July, which was pub-
lished on Wednesday, presents, as we antici-
pated last week, a very favourable view of the
elasticity of our resources, and the increased
fporro stpheer iyt ye
year
fthoeurr home
eis a t n
etrade
increase
. Up
of
the
fnl,9account
:
arising from Excise, £531,195; Stamps, £474,487;
Taxes, £51,345; Property-tax, £225,169; Post-
office, £25,000; Crown Lands, £172,888; Imprest
and other Money, £163,785; and Repayments of
Advances, £479,583; from which are deducted a

nDeeocur
se
,a sse
403n,086.
c£osu7,nt4lf2, n 0 r
the
ed
QuarterM i s cel ai
s
still more favourable, there being a net Increase of
no less than £1,146,636: arising from Customs,
441,173; Excise, £352,101; Stamps, £48,322;
Taxes, 6,776; Post-office, £21,000; Crown Lands,
140,888 ; Imprest and other Money, £44,071 ; and
Repayments of Advances, £207,921. The only
items on which there is a decrease are Property-tax,
£3,964, and Miscellaneous, £111,652. The sum
which has to be invested during the quarter for
the reduction of the National Debt amounts to
£615,185, which is larger than during any of the
preceding quarters of the years, and will, no doubt,
have a favourable influence on the value of Public
Securities, as it will tend to relieve the market
of so much floating stock, or lessen the amount
which the CHANCELLOR of the EXCHEQUER will
have to provide for the repayment of South-Sea
stock, which the holders have refused to convert.
This improvement in the position of the national
finances, arising from industrial activity and the
greater capabilities for the consumption of duty-
paying commodities enjoyed by the population, is
of course eagerly seized upon as irrefragable testi-
mony in favour of the success of Free-trade policy,
which, we are glibly told, has removed the fetters
from the springs of industry, and shown an
admiring worli what Commerce can do when left to
its own energies. Such a conclusion should be
arrived at with more caution than our Liberal con-
temporaries bestow on a consideration of this ques-
tion, or we may be attributing effects to causes
which have had nothing to do in producing them.
The especial object of the modern code of financial
policy was to increase the power of consumption by
a general reduction of prices, and thereby to dimi-
nish the value of labour, and in a proportionate
degree to enhance that of capital. It was for this
alone that the manufacturers so cordially joined in
the movement, as they confidently hoped that a
reduction in the price of food would lead to a general
lowering of wages, by which they would have been
enabled to undersell their competitors in Foreign
markets. Providence has, however, worked against
them, and, by the enormous discoveries of gold,
enhanced not only the value of commodities gene-
rally, but that of labour in a greater degree, as the
flood of emigration has tended to reduce the com-

petition of workmen. While Free-trade, therefore,
would have operated to lower prices, the gold dis-
coveries ehrai et s
ohave c
commercial
been e
rt
chi the
iprosperity,
main
and raisingthe
would
conse-
quent increase in the National Revenue, are owing
to causes directly the reverse of those to which they
are attributed. The gold-fields of Californiaand
Australia have saved us from a monetary crisis, into
au se o f
a n d them,t h
e
dread
which we should have been precipitated by Free-
trade,
of
aans
aspect
ee
cit
nth
g n
the calamityfiv o Ipoliticalve d ai
n the affairsu
t the
irnti presenthnoeutime
East,
s expense
have been rendered more disastrous from
considerablyrivingusof
oneaugrnented by the disturbances threa-
tening
enensgseedr eoi-
pis
a general European war. As it is, the
of our great sources for the supply

of food, and we shall not be able to consider our.
selves as a nation in a state of real independence,
until we can once more rely on our own broad acres
far a sufficiency of the first necessaries of life.