The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-03-15 00:00:00

THE PROPERTY TAX

Sir Robert Peel having determined upon proposing a pro-
perty and income tax of sevenpence in the pound, in order to
make good the deficiency in the revenue, a brief sketch of the
former-property tax may not be out of place, nor uninterest-
ing to our readers. The first property-tax was introduced in
1303 by Lord Sidrpouth, frt a rate first of.fiye,per cent. This
was increased by Mr. Pitt to 7-1 per cent. ; by the Mar- .
quis of LatiSdowne, when chancellor of the exchequer, in
1806, to 10 per cent. in 1809 its, exaction began to be rigo-
rous and oppressive • the arrears from this year became heavy,
. a4td payments' throughi tbi• i'Ancec^utivejreaali rat,or otherwise avoided by large masses of the people. hi 1815
the opposition to the tax became so universal throughout the
country, that it was at length found impossible to.withstEind
its ultimate repeal.
In 1815, the property-tax having reached its utmost amount,
raised upwards of 1-11 millions, of which nearly 51 were paid
by landlords, above 21 by occupiers; whence, says a writer
of the period, we may inter that the income of the former
was about 55 millions, and of the latter 28 ; but adding eight
and four respectively for the incomes below £6O, we have the
whole income arising from land, 95 millions. When the
machinery of the tax had attained perfection, hardly.any pro-
perty escaped.
The property-tax ceased on the sth of April, 1815, but was
revived for one year more (1815, ending sth April 1816), in
consequence of the renewal of the war. It was always looked
Upon as a war-tax, and. therefore the nation became clamo-
rous for its repeal immediately after the termination of the
war in 18—.

Paley's opinion, with regard to the property tax, as to the
scale of equitable proportion,-proposing to affix certain rates
of taxation upon certain amounts of property, proportioned
to the general convenieney of subsistence of those by whom
such payments are to be made, is worded thus :

6 6 We are accustomed to an opinion, that a tax, to be just,
ought to be accurately proportioned to the circumstances, or
more correctly perhaps to the amount of property of the per-
sons who pay it. But upon what, it may be asked, is this
opinion founded, unless it could' be shOwn that such a pro-
portion interferes the least with the general conveniency of
subsistence? Whereas I should rather believe that a tax con-
structed with a view to that conveniency, ought to rise upon
the different classes of the community in a much higher ratio
simple proportion of their incomes. The point to
be than thed
is,
not what men have, but what they can spare ;
and it is evident that a man who possesses.a thousand pounds
a year can more easily give up a hundred than a man with a
hundred pounds a-year can part with ten; that is those
habits of life which are reasonable and innocent, and upon
the ability to continue which the formation of. families ,de_
pends, will be much less affected by the one deduction than
by the other. It is still more evident that a man of a hun-
dred
subsistence by a demand from him of ten pounds', as a man
pounds ayear would not be so much distressed in his,
of ten pounds a-year would be by the loss of one ;to which ,
we must add, that the
o p population of the country being re-
plenished by the marriages of the low6t rank of society,
their accommodation and relief becoMe of more importance
p
to the state than the conveniency of any higher but less nu-
merous order of its citizens."