HJ 141.T77 
 
 Six speeches on financial reform . 
 
 3 1924 014 007 698 
 
 Hate a^aUtQt of Agttculture 
 
 Kt Qfntnell IninerHltB 
 
 Mljum. N. f. 
 
 ffiibrarg 
 
The original of tliis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924014007698 
 
SIX SPEECHES 
 
 (m 
 
 FINANCIAL KEFOKM 
 
 BT 
 
 WILLIAM TBAS^ 
 
 OF THE SINANCIAT. HEFOEM iSSOCIAl^OK. f 
 
 LONDON : 
 LONGMANS, GREEN & CO. 
 
 LTVEBPOOL: WILLIAM GILLING, &, LORD STBEET. 
 MANCHESTEB: JOHN HETWOOD, DBANSGATE. 
 
 1874 
 
men,'' 
 
 " As we have therefore oppoztmiity, let as do good nnto all 
 
 S. Faui. (GaUttians n. 10). 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. — Evils or iHsmEoi Tazaiion 1 
 
 n.-rAsTANTAQES OF DiBEOI TAXATION 41 
 
 m.— The Inoidbnoe of Tazaiion .. .. .. .. 67 
 
 IV. — Pbee Trade .. 74 
 
 v. — The National Expenditube 112 
 
 VI. — A Plan of Dibect Taxation 181 
 
 Appendix A 202 
 
 Do. B .203 
 
 Index 2U « 
 
INTEODUCTORY. 
 
 The question of Taxation has been ably and amply 
 dealt with in elaborate treatises on political economy, 
 and in numberless pamphlets of a technical charac- 
 ter. The Author is not aware of any work in 
 which the subject is discussed in an elementary 
 manner, and he has therefore less hesitation than 
 he otherwise would have in publishing, for popular 
 reading, that which was spoken to popular gather- 
 ings. Whenever figures or statistics are quoted, they 
 are the latest that could be obtained up to the time 
 of going to press, and the speeches have been 
 slightly remodelled so as to give them somewhat of 
 a consecutive character. With these two exceptions, 
 they are precisely as they were delivered in the largest 
 towns in England, when they were spoken in sup- 
 port of the adoption of the following Petition to the 
 House of Commons : — 
 
 To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of 
 
 Great Britain and Ireland, in ParUament assembled. 
 
 The Petition of Inhabitants, adopted at a Public Meeting, 
 
 and signed by the Chairman, on their behalf, 
 
 Humbly Sheweth, — 
 
 That in the opinion of your Petitioners an expendi- 
 ture of upwards of seventy nuUions annually is greatly 
 in excess of the real requirements of the State, and 
 
might be most materially reduced without impairing the 
 efficiency of any branch of the public seirvice. 
 
 That the great bulk of the revenue to meet this 
 extravagant expenditure is most improvidently raised, by 
 means of duties ' of Customs and Excise on the necessaries 
 and comforts of life, the effects of which are to extract 
 from the people very much more than the State receives, 
 to check cousimiption, restrict home and foreign trade, 
 diminish employment, and impoverish the people. 
 
 That the fiscal and commercial reforms inangorated 
 by the late Sir Eobert Peel, and since extended, have 
 proved so eminently beneficial, as to warrant farther pro- 
 gress ia that direction, not stopping short ultimately of 
 the entire substitution of direct for indirect taxation, and 
 the estabHshment of perfect freedom of trade. 
 
 That, pending the inquiry which must precede such 
 a complete revision of our fiscal system, the duties on 
 Tea, Sugar, Coffee, and other articles of food, ought to 
 be forthwith abolished. 
 
 Your Petitioners therefore humbly pray that your 
 Honourable House will be pleased to insist on a substan- 
 tial reduction of the public expenditure, the institution 
 of an inquiry as to the best mode of providing directly 
 for imperial, as well as for local purposes, and the imme- 
 diate concession of a free breakfast table for the people. 
 
 And your Petitioners, as in duty bound, will ever 
 pray. 
 
 BocE Febby, Cheshibe, 
 Ut June, 1874. 
 
I. 
 
 Evils of IxDniECT Taxation. 
 
 The petition to the House of Commons which I ask 
 this meeting to adopt, refers to so many important 
 reforms that it would he unwise to attempt the discus- 
 sion of all of them within the limits of a single speech. 
 I shall make no apology therefore for confining my 
 remarks solely to that section in the body of the petition 
 which complains that the great bulk of the Imperial 
 revenue is most improvidently raised by means of 
 duties of Customs and Excise on the necessaries , and 
 comforts of life, the effects of which are to extract from 
 the people very much more than the State receives, to 
 check consumption, restrict home and foreign trade, 
 diminish employment, and impoverish the people. 
 What I have to show therefore is, that so far as the 
 revenue is raised by what is called " Indirect Taxation," 
 it is raised improvidently; thai the system of taxing 
 commodities not only increases the bui'dens of the 
 people, but at the same time diminishes the ability of 
 
EVILS OF 
 
 the people to bear them; and that it taxes the poor 
 in the direct ratio that it pauperises them. 
 
 The origin of customs duties is involved in obscu- 
 rity, though there is ample evidence that they have 
 never been a very favourite mode of raising the revenue. 
 Arbuthnot quotes Strabo, to show " that Britain bore 
 heavy taxes, especially the customs on the importation 
 of the Gallick trade ; " but customs do not seem to 
 have been much thought of as a source of revenue until 
 they were introduced by Edward I., who had seen, in 
 the course of his expedition to Palestine, how easUy 
 money could be extracted from the people by such 
 means. They were abolished as unconstitutional in 
 the reign of Edward II., and, with this exception, "a 
 free import trade was the undoubted constitutional 
 policy of England for six hundred years after the 
 Conquest." A tyrannical and illegal attempt, however, 
 to levy an obsolete tax, without the consent of Parlia- 
 ment, resulted in a war, the execution of the king, and 
 the overthrow of a dynasty ; and the disorganised state 
 of the country after this period gave rise not only to a 
 system of customs duties, but to the still more obnoxious 
 system of excise, of which Blackstone says, that " from 
 its first origin to the present time its very name has 
 been odious to the people of England ; " and which is 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 veiy accurately defined by Dr. Johnson as " a hateful 
 tax levied upon commodities, and adjudged not by the 
 common judges of property, but by wretches hired by 
 those to whom excise is paid." 
 
 Glass -legislation, which stares out from almost 
 every line of the Statute Book, is displayed in 
 the history of Taxation as plainly as in any other 
 section of history. When a parliament of landholders 
 found they had the power to vmng from a king, who 
 was only too glad to be crowned at any price, a law 
 converting themselves from land^Wers into land- 
 oumers, and of shifting their burdens on to the 
 shoulders of the people, they not only had no hesitation 
 in doing so, but they did it in a dishonest, disgraceful, 
 and unscrupulous manner. They not only released 
 themselves from their feudal obligations, and by a tax 
 upon beer, ale, cider, and strong waters, shifted the 
 burden on to the shoulders of the people, but they 
 further enact'Od that the beer, fete., brewed in houses 
 should be exempt from the tax; thus relieving the rich, 
 and imposing the burden almost entirely upon the 
 cottage homes of England : a discreditable transaction, 
 which, however, has a consoling point, inasmuch as it 
 was carried by a majority of only two. 
 
 From that moment the duties of Customs and Excise 
 
EVILS OF 
 
 increased in nulnber and extent with a frightful 
 rapidity, nntil, in the reign of George m., taxes 
 became so numerous that there was nothing further 
 left to tax ; and although premiums were offered for 
 fresh subjects for taxation, none could be found. This 
 state of affairs is thus graphically described by Sidney 
 Smith : " We must pay taxes upon every article which 
 enters into the mouth, or covers the back, or is placed 
 under the foot ; taxes upon everything which is plea- 
 sant to see, hear, feel, smell, and taste ; taxes upon 
 warmth, light, and locomotion ; taxes upon everything 
 on earth, and the waters under the earth; on every- 
 thing that comes from abroad, or is grown at home ; 
 taxes on raw material ; taxes on every value that is 
 added to it by the industry of man ; taxes on the sauce 
 which pampers man's appetite, and the Arug which 
 restores him to health ; on the ermine which decorates 
 the judge, and the rope which hangs the criminal ; on 
 the brass nails of the coffin, and on the ribands of the 
 bride ; at bed or at board, couchant or levant, we must 
 pay. The beardless youth manages his taxed horse 
 with a taxed bridle on a taxed road ; and the dying 
 Englishman, pouring his medicine, which has paid 
 seven per cent., into a spoon which has paid thirty 
 per cent., throws himself back upon his chintz bed. 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 which has paid twenty-two per cent., makes his will, 
 and expires in the arms of an apothecary who has paid 
 a hundred pounds for the privilege of putting him to 
 death. His whole property is then taxed &om two to 
 ten per cent. Besides the probate, large fees are 
 demanded for burying himTn the chancel ; his virtues 
 are handed down to posteriiy on taxed mar^ble, and he 
 IS then gathered to his fathers to be taxed no more." 
 
 It will easily be seen that this state of things was 
 oppressive and could not last long. In 1840, mainly 
 through the exertions of Mr. J. D. Hume, a movement 
 to remit protective duties began ; but it was not until 
 estates became so impoverished that the owners gave 
 them up to the parish because the rates exceeded the 
 rents ; it was not until people were reduced to an exist- 
 ence upon fifteen pence a-week (eight thousand of them 
 in the Manchester district alone) ; it was not until the 
 mills and warehouses were closed, and the ships lay idle 
 in the harbours; it was not until there was a famine 
 in Ireland; it was not until suf&cient revenue to 
 meet the national expenditure could not be found, and 
 the whole nation was on the verge of bankruptcy and 
 ruin, that Messrs. Bright and Cobden drove home to 
 the hearts of the people of England the necessity of 
 relieving at any rate one commodity from an impost 
 
EVILS OF 
 
 which was starving the country. The result was, that 
 in 1844 the Com Laws were abolished, and the hack 
 of Protection was broken. Since then many remis- 
 sions of Indirect Taxation have been made — sometimes 
 with great reluctance, as lately ; at other times, by a 
 coup de main, as in 1854, when Mr. Gladstone fol- 
 lowed the advice of the Financial Reform Association, 
 and swept out of the tariff the duties on no less than 
 four hundred and thirty-two articles at one stroke. It 
 is important to remember that whenever a duty has 
 been partially remitted, there have followed consider- 
 able advantages to the people ; and whenever one has 
 been entirely abolished, greater benefits still have 
 accrued to both consumers and producers alike ; so 
 that at any rate the experience of the past warrants us 
 in asking for further similar reforms in the future. 
 
 Well, then, although we are not so oppressively 
 taxed, in a sly and indirect manner, as we have been 
 in former times, yet the great fact still remains that, 
 out of £77,123,469 drawn out of the pockets of the 
 people in the financial year ending 31st March, 1873, 
 no less than £46,936,782 were raised by Customs emd 
 Excise ; and when it is remembered that of the fiist 
 sum just mentioned, £5,212,145 were paid to the 
 Post-office, and £978,066 to the Telegraph Service, 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 and are therefore not taxes at all, it will be fonnd that 
 the proportion of the taxes raised in a manner which 
 hinders trade, and is nnjust to the people, is so 
 ondnly large as to demand a vigorous agitation 
 for speedy relief. I remember that during last 
 Christmas week I noticed a grocer's shop in a poor 
 neighbourhood, — a shop chiefly supported by poor 
 people. The window was tastefully laid out to 
 tempt people to buy " extras " for their Christmas 
 treats. There was a fine display of teas and coffees, 
 carefully separated by barricades of cocoa and choco- 
 late, the appearance of the whole being relieved by 
 currants, figs, raisins, dried fruits, succades, and other 
 dainties. Every article in that shop window was taxed, 
 and I thought, as I saw the poor old women purchasing 
 Iheir stock for the following week, that it, was hardly 
 fair they should be allowed, in ignorance, to hand their 
 money over the counter to the tradesman under the 
 impression that they were buying food, when in reality 
 they were not only paying taxes, but also a Very heavy per- 
 centage for the surreptitious manner in which those taxes 
 were paid by them. In fact, they were being cheated. 
 Then again, when they got into the train to take their 
 purchases home they were taxed again; and when, 
 on the following day, the husband sat down after dinner 
 
EVILS OF 
 
 to his glass of beer or spirits and his pipe, he was 
 taxed again ; and if he plaj'ed a game of cribbage or of 
 whist, he was taxed again. When I saw this, I could 
 not shut my eyes to the fact, that while indirect taxes 
 hardly pressed on the rich, they pressed hardly on the 
 poor ; and before the people of this country are taxed 
 on what they eat and drink, it would he merely an act 
 of justice to teach them what Indirect Taxation really 
 is, and then ask them if they are willing to submit to 
 such an iniquitous system, when there are so many 
 better and juster ways of raising the necessary revenue. 
 What would the poor women referred to think if, after 
 making their purchases at proper and legitimate prices, 
 a Custom House officer had stopped them and said, 
 " You have purchased two pounds of groceries. I want 
 one shilling for duty, and sixpence for collecting it." 
 That would make every home in England have an interest 
 in the way the money is raised, as well as the way in which 
 it is spent. Messrs. Cope Brothers, of Livei-pool, used 
 to print on their tobacco wrappers a notice, to the effect 
 that in one ounce of tobacco at threepence the value of 
 the tobacco was only three farthings, the rest being for 
 duty and expenses; and if every grocer, tobacconist, and 
 others who deal in^ taxed articles did the same, they 
 would be bestowing a real benefit on their customers. 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 The first great evil, then, of Indirect Taxation is, 
 I consider, that it falls entirely on the consumer, and 
 therefore taxes a man, not according to his means, but 
 according to his needs, not according to the mone^ he 
 has in his pocket, but according to the mouths he has 
 to feed. The fundamental principle in all taxation, — 
 viz., that a man should contribute his share of taxa- 
 tion according to his means, — is therefore violated by a 
 tax on a commodity. Further, it violates another 
 principle of just taxation, which is, that a tax should take 
 as little as possible, and keep as little as possible, out 
 of the pocket of the taxpayer beyond what goes to the 
 State. Now what is the fact in regard to Indirect Tax- 
 ation ? Let us suppose that a commodity is imported 
 into this country of the value of two shillings a pound, 
 and that the duty thereon is sixpence a pound. The 
 importer therefore has to pay half-a-crown a pound for 
 the article; and if his trade is to pay him he must 
 realise a profit on all the capital he has advanced ; that 
 is to say, not only on the two shillings he has paid for 
 the commodity, but also on the sixpence he has 
 advanced for the duty. In other words, he seeks a 
 j)rofit on the half-crown he has virtually paid for the 
 goods. He obtains this profit from the merchant to 
 -whom he sells, and the sixpence duty becomes perhaps 
 
10 EVILS OF 
 
 sevenpence. Then, again, the mierchant sells to the 
 wholesale dealer, and the wholesale dealer to the shop- 
 keeper, and, very often, the shopkeeper to a tradesman 
 in a still smaller way of business ; so that when 
 the commodity reaches the consumer he has to pay 
 not only a series of profits on the commodity, hut some 
 eightpence or ninepence in order that the Government 
 may get sixpence. The Bonding system, it is true, 
 has somewhat modified the modus operandi of this, 
 but not to any appreciable effect, as I shall show here- 
 after. Now the case I have taken is not a supposititious 
 one at all. It is what actually happens in the con- 
 sumption of tea. When the duty was reduced to six- 
 pence, the grocers instantly began selling at a reduction 
 of eigttpence, thus showing that the bonding system does 
 not annihilate all the profits on a duty. The amount 
 of tea imported for home consumption in 1872 was 
 127,661,360 lbs, its value being ^68,928,184, and the 
 amount charged for duty being £3,191,980, or a per- 
 centage of £Q5 15s. Ojd. on its value. Now add the 
 wholesale dealers' profits and retailers' profits, and we 
 find that what came into the country at ^£8,928,184 is 
 sold to the consumer for £17,332,884, while at the 
 very outside it ought to have been sold for £12,667,802, 
 but for the duty. Let there be no mistake about the 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 11 
 
 nature of this grievance. It is no sentimental one. It 
 is a real hardship. Professor Leone Levi, a great 
 authority, has shown that in 1870,' when sugar, tea, 
 spirits, beer, and tobacco were imported to the amount 
 of £70,000,000, before they reached the consumer they 
 were raised to the enormous price of £150,000,000, in 
 order that the Government might get £35,000,000, an 
 extra tax upon the consumer of at least £50,000,000. 
 The state of affairs is only a little better now. Even 
 at the risk of wearying you, I will give you one more 
 instance of the enormous cost of collecting Indirect Taxes. 
 I take it from the Co-operative News. When £46,000,000 
 are paid to the Government by means of Customs and 
 Excise, the consumers are made to pay nearly 
 £60,000,000, because every gi-ocer, every tobacconist, 
 beerhouse-keeper, licensed victualler, every wine and 
 spirit-merchant, maltster, and importer of taxed arti- 
 cles is obliged to be a tax-collector, and is left to pay 
 himseK for his work by an extra charge upon the 
 articles in which he deals. Now, if we could abolish 
 this roundabout mode of collection, nearly the whole of 
 this enormous sum of £15,000,000 would be saved to 
 the public, and would enable us to find permanent 
 employment for 150,000 extra men who are now idle. • 
 But further, from the producer to the consumer it 
 
12 EVILS OF 
 
 is said there are profits to be added amounting to 
 nearly 33 per cent. At this rate, if we could do with- 
 out Customs and Excise, we should be able to turn 
 over the capital, and we should benefit the producing 
 and trading classes by increasing their income by nearly 
 £20,000,000 sterling, which, of course, would have to 
 bear its fair share of taxation, but which it would 
 be well able to bear. 
 
 The tax on a commodity not only falls upon the 
 consumer, it does more, it also injures the producer. 
 If taxes on a commodity, which can be produced and 
 sold for 2s., bring the price up to 2s. 8d., or even more, 
 of course more money is required to purchase that com- 
 modity than would otherwise be the case. That is 
 equivalent to saying that were it not for the tax more 
 of the commodity would be purchased. The tax is 
 therefore unjust to the producer, because it deprives 
 him of a customer. The people are thus impoverished 
 at both ends, so to speak, and duty-fi:ee articles are 
 equally double blessings. 
 
 Another evil in connection with Indirect Taxation 
 is, that a man never knows how much he is contri- 
 buting to the revenue. Indeed I have met whole 
 assemblies of men who did not know they paid any 
 taxes at all. Now, if a man does not know how 
 
INDIRECT TAXATIOlf. 13 
 
 much or how little he contributes to the national 
 reyenue, he feels little or no interest in the way in 
 which it is spent ; and nothing is so likely to produce 
 extravagant government as the knowledge of the fact 
 on the part of the governors, that they can easily conjure 
 the money they require from the pockets of the people 
 without letting them know how they are bamboozled. 
 I venture to say that no government could raise 
 :£70,000,000 a-year in the same way as is now done if 
 the working-classes knew how much they contributed 
 towards it. It is only when they are under the chloro- 
 form of Indirect Taxation that they can be bled freely 
 without feeling it till they awake from their stupor. 
 
 Another objection to an indirect tax is, that it is 
 a voluntary tax. A tax should be certain in its inci- 
 dence. All should pay their share, and be unable to 
 evade it. An indirect tax, however, can be shirked. 
 Indeed it is shirked. The teetotaller escapes a large 
 share, and, however much we admire teetotalism, it is 
 certainly no reason why a man should escape his share 
 of the national burdens. Mr. J. H. Eaper, the able 
 and energetic agent of the United Kingdom Alliance, 
 stated, at the Social Science Congress at Plymouth, 
 in 1872, that he knew of hundreds, — to be emphatic, 
 he repeated the word hundreds, — of persons who drank 
 
14 EVILS OF 
 
 no taxed articles whatever, neither tea, coffee, cocoa, 
 hear, nor spirits ; who did not smoke, and, indeed, 
 who escaped taxation altogether, except when they 
 bought sweetmeats for their , children. Now this is 
 not right, because if. Tom and Dick can shirk their 
 shares of the taxes, Bill and Harry have to pay them. 
 A tax that is a voluntary tax is wrong in principle, 
 and is especially unjust when it taxes the beverages of 
 the [poor, and leaves the silks and satins and luxuries 
 of the rich almost free. 
 
 Having maintained in general terms the proposi- 
 tions with which I began, I will now take the national 
 balance sheet, as pr^ared by the Financial Eeform 
 Association, and see what can be said for or against the 
 various items which make up the vast sum of money 
 extracted from the pockets of the people. First, I will 
 speak of the £18,631,109 which were raised upon 
 spirits in the last financial year. I speak of these first, 
 not only because their importance, fiscally, demands it, 
 but because they are the stumbUng-blook to " free-trade." 
 A great many well-meaning but deluded men (I use 
 the word in no offensive sense) are free-traders in heart, 
 but ihey dare not consent to the release of intoxicants 
 from the present high tariff. They think it would be a 
 leap in the dark. Of course, the more intelligent 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 15 
 
 teetotalers, such as Sir Wilfrid Lawson, Mr. J. H. 
 Raper, and some others, do not hold that opinion. 
 They propose other means to lessen the amount of 
 drunkenness, hut still I have met with hundreds in the 
 course of this agitation who, while desirous of obtain- 
 ing the " free breakfast table," will not venture upon 
 " free traffic in liquors." There can be little doubt that 
 it is the drunkard and those that fear him who at pre- 
 sent form the great stumhling-bloek to Free Trade. 
 This must be my apology for speaking on this portion 
 of my subject at greater length than I should otherwise 
 have done. 
 
 First, it should be borne in mind that experience 
 proves that the same laws which regulate the consump- 
 tion of necessaries and comforts do not apply to the 
 consumption of drink and other luxuries. The sale of 
 the former is limited by price. The sale of the latter 
 is limited by the desire of the consumer, which in 
 a great many cases is of extraordinary strength, and in 
 not a few amounting to a frenzy. To attempt to regu- 
 late this desire by artificially raising the price of what 
 is desired, both common sense and e^)erience show to 
 be futile. Self-indulgence cannot be regulated by Act 
 of Parliament. Morals improve legislation, but legis- 
 lation cannot — or at any rate does not — improve 
 
16 EVILS OF 
 
 morality. The State always flails if it tries to control 
 the habits and propensities of the people. Thns it is 
 that the history of the liqaor-traffic legislation from a.d. 
 995 to the present day is one long list of failures. No 
 licensing or prohibitory Act of Parliament reaches 
 those it was intended to aflfect in the way intended. Nor 
 can any Act do so, as it cannot grapple with the 
 desire. The progress of the Temperance movement 
 in this country proves this. The movement has 
 made most headway amongst the classes least affected 
 by prices. Education and an improved tone in 
 society, not duties of Customs and Excise, are what 
 will lead men to do that which is lawful and 
 right. Mr. John Bright, addressing the House of 
 Commons in 1844, said, " There are honourable mem- 
 bers of this House, older than 'I am, but I am old 
 enough to remember when among those classes with 
 which we are more familiar than with the workiBg 
 people, drunkenness was ten or twenty times more 
 
 common than it is at present If it was 
 
 possible to make all classes as temperate as those of 
 whom I have just spoken, we should be among the 
 veiy soberest nations of the earth." More recently, in 
 September, 1872, the present Lord Coleridge made a 
 similar statement to the working men of Plymoutii 
 
mVIBBCT lAXATIOIf. 17 
 
 and be gafe ait mstanee fduch had come ^ritbin his 
 own e^m@aee oi an mto:dGated leetor and a member 
 ci a good connfy &milj, who, on leaving ibe table at a 
 dinnra'-party, stombled on the staiis, and eoieij com- 
 plained, with a thick oUeranoe, Aat any gentleman 
 should be so r^udless of his ga^ts as to haTe his 
 drawing-room on a different floor to his dming-ioom. 
 This sort of thing, happilv, belongs to a bygone 
 age ; and it is irapcntant to rmnemb^' that doties of 
 Gostoms and Excise hare had no e&ct in bringing abont 
 so desiraMe sm improvement. It wonid be foolish to 
 fnainiain that HnBj Can hsve any effect in res trictin g 
 the sale of commodities among 'Qiose to whom price is 
 no object. Drunkenness in this conntry has deerrased 
 m<^ among Hiose whose powi^ to get dmnk is 
 greatest, bnt whose inclina&n or desire to do so, it 
 appears, is leasL 
 
 The e^erienoe of 1735 tells a Riwiilar story. 
 Dninkenness was tiien so rife that the attention of 
 Parliament iras escited, and stringent measures were 
 demanded. A eonuuittee of the whole Honse resolred 
 "that the lotc price of s^ritaons liqnors is the prin- 
 e^al inducement to the esBes^ye and pemieions ose 
 tiieieof. That in order to paerent this exe^siTe and 
 pemieions ose, a diseonra^ment be giTen tiiereto by a 
 
18 EVILS OF 
 
 duty to be laid on spirits sold by retail. That the 
 selling of such liquors be restrained to persons keeping 
 public brandy shops, victuaUing houses, coffee shops, 
 innholders, and to such surgeons and apothecaries as 
 shall make use of it by way of medicine only." The 
 result of that resolution was the Act of 9th Geo. TV., 
 which provided that spirits should not be sold in less 
 quantities than two gallons without a licence, for which 
 ^50 was to be paid, and that 20s. a gallon should 
 be levied upon gin. What was the result ? Did 
 drunkenness decrease ? Quite the contrary. The 
 attempt to enforce the Act gave rise to great excitement 
 leading to riot and violence. Rebellion and murder 
 were feared, and the troops were called out. The con- 
 sumption of spirits in England and "Wales rose from 
 10,500,000 gallons in 1733, before the passing of the 
 Act, to 19,000,000 gallons in 1742 ; and there were 
 within the bills of mortality more than 20,000 houses 
 and shops in which gin was sold by retail. " Within 
 two years of the passing of the Act," says Tyndal, 
 " though 12,000 persons had been convicted of offences 
 against it, it had become odious and contemptible ; and 
 policy as well as humanity forced the Cotnmissioners of 
 Excise to mitigate its penalties." The prisons were 
 filled with persons unable to pay the penalties required 
 
INDISECT TAXATION. 
 
 19 
 
 by law, and dissatdsfection prevailed thronghoat the 
 country. In 1743, it was given in evidence before 
 a committee of the Honse of- Commons, that the 
 quantity of spirit made for consumption in England 
 and Wales was in — 
 
 1733 ... 
 
 ... 10,500,000 gallons 
 
 1734 ... 
 
 ... 13,500,000 , 
 
 1740 ... 
 
 ... 15,250,000 
 
 1741 ... 
 
 ... 17,000,000 
 
 1742 ... 
 
 ... 19,000,000 
 
 These quantities were consumed by a popul^on 
 not exceeding six millions, the average consumption per 
 head of the population in 1742 being no less than three 
 gallons. The Government, however, repealed the 
 obnoxious statute of 1736 in 1743, substituted a duty 
 of only 7s. 6d. a gallon at the still head, and reduced 
 the licence to 20s. Notice the result. In 1842, one 
 century later, with this regulation in force, and with a 
 population increased to sixteen millions, the consump- 
 tion was only 8,166,985 gallons in the year, or only 
 half a gallon per head, showing a diminished con- 
 Bomption of five-sixths. The consumption of spirits 
 at the present time strengthens the view here taken, 
 and indeed shovrs that tiie consumption increases with 
 
20 EVILS OF 
 
 an augmented rate of duty, for in 1871, with & duty of 
 10s. 5d. a gallon, to say nothing of Excise licences 
 for distilling, retailing, etc., the consumption was 
 33,059,527 gallons, or an advance since 1842 to 1"06 
 gallons per head. After this it can hardly be con- 
 tended that taxation can be employed as a check 
 on intemperance. Teetotalers, therefore, must look 
 to other means of spreading their principles than by 
 artificially raising the price of intoxicating drinks, 
 which, en passant be it observed, is a selfish policy, 
 as a great many of them are inveterate smokers, and 
 are eager enough to see tobacco imported, manu- 
 factured, and sold without any restrictions whatever. 
 A far better plan is that recommended by Mr. T. E. 
 Cliffe Leslie, viz., " education, inducements to saving 
 by reforms in our land laws, rendering investments in 
 land possible on the part of the poor and tending to 
 an improvement of their houses ; and, again, friendlier 
 association on the part of the wealthier classes with the 
 poorer, in order to elevate their habits and tastes." 
 
 There is another consideration, which is too often 
 lost sight of. No one can help regretting the vast 
 amount of money squandered at gin-palaces by the 
 working man. All his earnings, however, are not so 
 spent. Tea, cofiee, sugar, food and clothing are the 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 21 
 
 articles he first purchases, «iid as Professor Fawcett 
 says, it is only, as a rule, what he onght to have saved 
 which he spends at the puhlic-house. This points to a 
 simple remedy; cheapen the articles which compete 
 vrith intoxicants. Let tea and whiskey fight the battle 
 on a fair field with no favour,' and tea will conquer. 
 Let coffee be cheap, and it will largely supersede the 
 use of intoxicating drinks, as it has done with the 
 poorer classes on the Continent. This is proved to 
 some extent by the fact that sailors on the steamers 
 trading between Livetpool and New York, who, having 
 the option of an allowance of rum, tea, or a pecuniary 
 equivalent, usually reject the rum. It is highly pro- 
 bable, too, that cheaper spirits will not increase the 
 amount consumed by each individual. The capacity 
 of a man's stomach is limited. What was the 
 experience of 1872 ? Although the increased ability 
 to purchase, on the part of the working man, in 
 that year, about which so much was made by teeto- 
 talers, resulted in a greater quantity of spirits being 
 consumed than was ever known before, yet the amount 
 consumed per head fell to 0'888 gallon, while in 
 the year 1873 there was a still further decline to 
 0'875 per head of the estimated population. Indeed it 
 seems to me that the increased consumption is to be 
 
22 EVILS OF 
 
 accounted for, not so much by increased drunkenness, 
 that is, certain men drinking more than they used 
 to drink, but by some men, hitherto abstainers from 
 spirituous hquors, availing themselves of the opportu- 
 nity of their improved condition to indulge in a glass 
 or two of spirits. Probably, -though not certainly, with 
 duty-free spirits the total amount consumed would 
 be gi-eater than ever, because doubtless many persons 
 would drink who cannot now afford \o do so ; but this 
 much is certain, that - even if those who drink now 
 drank then, they would have to drink very much piore 
 indeed before they drank away the extra benefits which 
 duty-free spirits (along with perfectly free-trade) would 
 give them. It has been shown by Professor Kirk, that 
 when a man buys for sixpence a gill of whiskey of the 
 " ordinary drinking strength at which Scotch whiskey 
 is sold," he only really gets one-third of a permyworth 
 of whiskey, the rest being for water, duty, and other 
 needless adjuncts. Now double that quantity is more 
 than drunkards regularly take at a sitting, so that 
 supposing a man with his last shilling in his pocket 
 entered a public-house, and then reeled home under the 
 influence of a pint of whiskey of the "ordinary drinking 
 strength," instead of being pennyless as now, he would 
 have ninepence or tenpence in his pocket for his wife to 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 23 
 
 spettd in such things as the family could enjoy in sober 
 gi'atification. 
 
 The whole question may be regarded, too, from 
 another point of view. The amount raised by indirect 
 taxes in this country was £46,936,782 at the close of 
 the financial year 1873. Now, in other words, this 
 means neither more nor less than that this vast sum is 
 withdrawn from production. It is a sum of money, in 
 reality, " needlessly advanced by traders and producers, 
 which ought to be productively employed and repro- 
 duced, yielding profits at each turn of the capital," and 
 the realised profits of which alone ought to be taxed. 
 To show what such a sum is capable of doing, it may 
 be remembered that, when wages were not nearly so 
 high as at present, the wages fund averaged £20 a head 
 of the popula,tioh. On that basis the diversion of the 
 money advanced by the trading community into a 
 productive channel would be equal to founding a town 
 of 2,181,455 inhabitants, or larger than Liverpool, 
 Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, and Glasgow added 
 together, with all the increased material prosperity 
 which such a town would add to the country, and 
 which would be able to bear its share of taxation with- 
 out restricting trade, and would in fact reduce local and 
 national burdens, by employing a vast number of 
 
EVILS OF 
 
 persons now considered as an idle and surplus popula- 
 tion. Truly the question of pauperism cannot be said 
 to have been fairly grappled with while such an enor- 
 mous amount of labour cries in the streets, and a deaf 
 ear is turned to its earnest supplications. The evil 
 of this withdrawal of capital goes further, too, for, as 
 Mr. Eobert Donnell points out, " We can hardly ask 
 the United States to give up their thirty-five per cent, 
 duty on linen if we are to retain our three hundred per 
 cent on their tobacco." Thus, because we tax a luxury, 
 a trade in a necessity or comfort is prevented between 
 two great nations ; and so with other countries and 
 other commodities. Indeed, as Mr. T. E, Clifie Leslie 
 shows, the amount of money advanced as above 
 mentioned is " withdrawn by a system which closes our 
 coasts and rivers to local enterprise and foreign trade, 
 our factories to improvement, and our Ifiboratories to 
 invention ; forbids the free cultivation of our fields, 
 creates monopolies, and maintains exorbitant duties on 
 the produce of foreign nations, who retaliate with 
 duties which, by curtailing the market for our manu- 
 factures, augment, in accordance with a well-known 
 law, the cost of production, and therefore their price to 
 consumers at home." 
 
 There is yet another consideration on this head. It 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 25 
 
 is one which ought to have great weight with honest 
 men. " It is said," remarks Professor Leone Levi, 
 "that the Emperor of China proudly rejected every 
 consideration of revenue when nrged to admit opium at 
 a duty. There was indeed something snhlime in his 
 declaration. ' It is true I cannot prevent the introduc- 
 tion of the flowing poison ; gain-seeking and corrupt 
 men will for profit and sensuality defeat my wishes, hut 
 nothing will induce me to derive a revenue from the 
 vice and misery of my people.' " Now, in this country, 
 teetotalers share with their less rigid compatriots aU 
 the advantages of an organised government. The army 
 and navy protect the property of Sir Wilfrid Lawson„ 
 as well as that of Mr. Bass. The same police super- 
 vision is exercised over the person and property of the 
 one as of the other ; and laws are not made for the 
 good of one which do not equally apply to the other. 
 Yet to a very large extent this is paid for by the 
 duties on intoxicating drin^. Is it a just system 
 which allows hundreds of thousands of persons to 
 enjoy the advantages of government, and yet con- 
 tribute little or nothing towards the cost of that 
 government? Is it not an immoral position in 
 which to be placed, that of sharing the advantages of a 
 government largely paid for out of the sale of that 
 
EVILS OF 
 
 which is the cause of so much misery and vice ? That 
 the drunkard should be the " mainstay " of our consti- 
 tution is, as Sir Wilfrid Lawson pointed out in his speech 
 on the Budget of 1873, "mean, cruel, short-sighted, 
 and fraught with evil to the State." Indeed teetotalers 
 may rest assured that no Government will attempt to 
 legislate effectually on the liquor question as long as 
 such a large sum as the cost of the army ind navy is 
 raised from the consumption of drink. The Chancellor 
 of the Exchequer likes a surplus, and if it be legiti- 
 mate to obtain it from intoxicatiag drinks, it is equally 
 legitimate for him and his Government to offer greater 
 facilities for their consumption, in order that the surplus 
 may be as large as possible. 
 
 The following conclusions, therefore, seem perfectly 
 logical : First, that duties of Customs and Excise do 
 not restrict the sale of intoxicating drinks ; secondly, 
 that the best way to do so is to teach men the folly of 
 drunkenness, and as that is a long process, to at once 
 cheapen the articles which compete with intoxicants, in 
 order that policy may dictate what imprudence neglects; 
 and thirdly^ that it is not only unjust and impolitic, 
 but highly immoral, to raise a revenue from the con- 
 sumption of " flowing poisons." 
 
 There can be little doubt, I think, that if yon would 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 27 
 
 have a nation less drnnk, you must offer it greater 
 encouragement to be more sober ; and above all things 
 do not tax those beverages which are among the prin- 
 cipal inducements to sobriety with those who will drink 
 something or" other. It has been well said . that the 
 concession of the " Free Breakfast Table " would do 
 more good to the working classes than closing haK the 
 gin shops ; and would be a greater benefit to the com- 
 mercial world than the discovery of a gold field. Of 
 course this reasoning leads to the conclusion that it 
 would be better that the consumption of light wines 
 and beer should displace that of spirits to a very large 
 extent. I should not be sorry to see this, and I urge 
 it as an additional reason why the duties should be 
 removed. It is a great pity that there is no pleasant 
 onintoxicating beverage in England, and the nearer 
 we can approach such a thing the better. Indeed, 
 prior to the treaty of Methuen (1703), French wines 
 were drank in this country to a very great extent; but 
 tiie foolish poKcy of that treaty developed a taste for 
 the strongly brandied, wines of Spain and Portugal, — 
 a method of cultivating taste which may have had 
 something to do with John Bull's liking for ardent 
 spirits at the present day. 
 
 Why, in France, where brandy is cheap, I have not 
 
EVILS OF 
 
 seen as much drunkenness in six months as I can find 
 in the heavily-taxed dram-shops of London in one 
 night ; and I am told that in Jersey and Guernsey, 
 where almost every shop is licensed, where rum may be 
 had at twopence-hal^enny and brandy at threepence 
 the half-pint, and a glass of good ale for one penny, 
 there is not a thirtieth part of the drunkenness to be 
 met with which may be found on any similar area in 
 England. Adam Smith says, that if we consult expe- 
 rience the cheapness of wine seems to be a cause, not 
 of drunkenness, but of sobriety. I think, too, that it 
 iS/ worth considering whether it is proper to tax a com- 
 modity which is so often recommended by medical men 
 to those patients who can ill-aflford to purchase wine, 
 the price of which is artificially enhanced. Every shil- 
 ling saved from the consumption of wine, and indeed of 
 all other commodities, would be so much added to the 
 fund applicable for general production and employment 
 of labour. I think I need say no more with regard to 
 the impolicy and folly of taxing wines, beer and spirits. 
 Much of the same reasoning applies to the malt- 
 tax ; and setting aside the fact that it is another tax 
 upon the poor, there are other considerations which 
 render it desirable that it should be aboUshed. It 
 is now admitted that the malt tax prevents the farmer 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 29 
 
 from cnltiTating his land to the greatest advan- 
 tage ; that it obstrncts him in the use of a valaable 
 artide of food for cattle, limiting the qnantity of meat 
 and dairy produce; that it tends to foster two great 
 monopolies, malting and brewing, by calling for a 
 lai^er amount of capital to carry them on; that it 
 encourages the adulteration of beer, and preyents to a 
 great extent the habit of home-brewing by the labooring 
 classes. Mr. Joshna Melden says that in the manu- 
 fectoring districts 76 per cent, of the hooseholders 
 brewed at home; 8 per cent, would, but could not 
 afford it ; 6 per cent, bought their beer at the public- 
 house, and 10 per cent, did not drink beer. Further, 
 it imposes upon the consumer an additional 45 per 
 cent, on the cost of collecting; according to other 
 authorities, it costs £10,000,000 to collect ^66,000,000, 
 and according to others, even still more. 
 
 "With r^ard to the duty on tobacco, similar observa- 
 tions apply. Indeed, I pointed out in a debate on this 
 verr subject, at the Social Science Congress at Ply- 
 month, in 187*2, that at^rding to the publications of 
 liie Anti-Tobacco Association, there were quite as 
 sufficient reasons for the suppression of the tobacco 
 trade as for the prohibition of the liquor traffic. I 
 have lately been reading articles by Professor Newman, 
 
30 EVILS OF 
 
 and other vegetarians, and I am sure a good case is 
 made out against eating meat ; while if a man pin his 
 faith to the Lancet, he will find quite enough in that 
 journal to frighten him, and make him clamour for a 
 permissive hill to restrict the consumption of tea. 
 The fact is, the consumption ,of these articles is not a 
 question ' in which taxation ought at all to interfere. 
 It is a question of a man's own taste. 
 
 Of the duty on tobacco I will only say that the 
 " fragrant weed " vas grown in Ireland in the reign of 
 William IV., and is said to have yielded £60 to J70 
 an acre. It was theQ suppressed by tariffs, which still 
 prevent its cultivation there. It is the natural rotative 
 . crop for potatoes, and it is said to prevent the potato 
 disease. It grew in Yorkshire before its cnltivation 
 was suppressed, and there can be no doubt that in 
 England and Ireland its cultivation and manufacture 
 would employ thousands of hands. So that here is 
 another industry destroyed. 
 
 One remark more before I proceed. If the principle 
 I am advocating be sound, there must be no exceptions. 
 The grounds generally urged for taxing drinks and 
 licensing houses, would apply as well to prostitutes 
 in the one case, and brothels in the other. Are 
 the teetotalers prepared to maintain this doctrine? 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 31 
 
 If everything wliich causes evil and wickedness is to be 
 taxed, why^ot begin with racing and racehorses, and 
 finish ofi" by heavily mulcting the captains of the 
 Oxford and Cambridge crews ? 
 
 Nor is it wise to tax Inxnries. If rich men require 
 caniages, employment is given to body -makers, car- 
 riage-builders, wheelwrights, spring-maters, smiths, 
 trimmers, painters, harness-makers, etc., etc., to say 
 nothing of the builders of coach-houses, stables, etc., 
 etc. ; and a tax upon carriages restricts all these trades. 
 There is no tax upon carriages in Irelaifd, and it is a 
 remarkable fact that in that country there are com- 
 paratively more handsome vehicles than in this. The 
 same argument applies to the tax upon armorial bear- 
 ings, which, if abolished, would give greater employ- 
 ment to lapidaries, printers, and others, as indeed the 
 recent reduction of the tax has already done. 
 
 I do not propose to mention to you now the advan- 
 tages of admitting tea free, because I shall have some- 
 thing to say on that subject when I come to treat of 
 the exchange of commodities by various countries. I 
 will simply say that it is cruel on the part of Govern- 
 ment to put its hands into the teapot. Tea is drunk, 
 Mr. Dudley Baxter informs us, by the poor at nearly 
 every meal, and it really would be more charitable, if 
 
32 EVILS OF 
 
 commodities are to be taxed at all, to tax some article 
 of less general consumption. It is really a tax upon 
 poor washerwomen and seamstresses, who ought to have 
 nearly three pounds of tea for the money which now 
 buys one. I do, however, wish to say a word or two in 
 regard to taxing sugar. This is not only used very 
 largely as an article of food, the Irish putting it into 
 everything they eat when they can get it ; but were it 
 untaxed a new industry would spring up in England, 
 It has been proved that the climate and soil of Suffolk, 
 and other English counties, are eminently fitted for the 
 cultivation of beet-root, which has been so successful 
 on the continent. The cultivation of this root would 
 not only enable us to produce in this country a great 
 amount of sugar, — say one pound of saccharine matter 
 out of twelve and a half pounds of beet, — but it neces- 
 sitates and pays for high and enriching farming ; and 
 as the pulp is used for cattle food after it is deprived of 
 the water and saccharine matter it contains, it is 
 uniformly attended by a great increase in the produc- 
 tion of fat cattle, as well as in the yield of corn. I give 
 this on the authority of Mr. James Caird, who, in spite 
 of the Customs and Excise restrictions, is successfully 
 cultivating this root at Lavenham, in Suffolk. The 
 same gentleman says, " If sugar should come to be 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 33 
 
 regarded as a prime necessary of food, wiiich, like 
 bread, should be untaxed, we might see a very rapid 
 development of sugar culture in England, with advan- 
 tages to consumer and producer even greater than have 
 everywhere followed its introduction on the continent." 
 
 Then, again, Mr. Arnold Barnchson has calculated 
 that if the 300,000 acres of mangold now grown in this 
 country, — ^to say nothing of acres upon which nothing 
 at all is grown, — ^were used for the cultivation of beet, 
 the yield might be twenty tons per acre, which would 
 give 6J per cent, of sugar on the quantity of beet root 
 planted, being an annual value of £17,700,000; 
 whilst the refuse wotild be applicable to all the pur- 
 poses of the mangold. I mention these facts because 
 all this is prevented by the duties at present imposed 
 on a commodity which is univeraaUy consumed, from 
 the child sucldng its lollipop to the countess nibbling 
 her confectionery. 
 
 I might go further on this point and show you, as 
 Mr. John Noble has done, that the duty on sugar has 
 a tendency to prevent chemical investigation, as was 
 proved in Dr. Watson Bradshaw's application for a 
 patent for his Dietetic Grape Sugar, a most inv^uable 
 medicine. Difficulties were raised by the Excise, 
 and ultimately £12 per ton (the highest in the scale) 
 
34 EVILS OF 
 
 bad to be paid. Just in the same way (for it is the old 
 story over again) a great many new inventions in the 
 manufacture of candles and starch were patented as 
 soon as the duties on those articles were removed.* 
 
 It is the same with regard to the cultivation of 
 chicory. Her Majesty's Commissioners of Kevenue say, 
 that unless we allow chicory, to be grown in this 
 country on better terms than we do at present, we can 
 never compete with the Belgian growers. The cultiva- 
 tion has entirely ceased in Northampton, and the only 
 growing is now confined to the neighbourhood of York. 
 So here is another industry prevented from developing, 
 and employing a large number of men. 
 
 With regard to coffee, the same remarks apply as 
 when tea was referred to, though they will have greater 
 force when the people of this country learn how to 
 make a cup of coffee, which would be certain, largely 
 to increase the consumption of this delightful and 
 refreshing beverage. 
 
 I have now shown you the principal sources from 
 which the revenue is derived. It is not my intention 
 to go into the details or to speak of the minor channels 
 whence the State receives its income. I wish, however, 
 to point out that all our licenses, and some of our 
 
 * See Appendix A, 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 35 
 
 stamps, are indirect taxes, and not direct ones, as is 
 often supposed. The receipt stamp, stamps on bills of 
 exchange, promissory notes, etc., are of this kind. 
 They are not oppressive, hut they are very absurd, and 
 have only the merit of convenience. Licenses are 
 different. By the conmion law of England, any man 
 may carry on any lawful business whatever. Statute 
 law, however, steps in and stigmatises some trades as 
 licensed trades, and in this it is very capricious. 
 For instance. Why should a man require a license to 
 sell silver spoons, but not to sell silver watches? 
 What great crime has an auctioneeer, or an appraiser, or 
 a pawnbroker, or a banter, or an attorney committed 
 that he should require permission to trade, and should 
 have to pay for that permission ? Why should a man 
 who makes playing cards be taxed, when the man who 
 makes billiard tables, balls and cues is not? And 
 what more harm is there in making vinegar than in 
 selling lemons, and yet one is taxed and the other not. 
 The tax on railway passengers and railway carriers is a 
 tax on locomotion ; the license to carry guns restricts 
 the Birmingham trade, and so contemptible is this tax 
 in the eyes of those who have guns, that the Commis- 
 sioners of Inland Bevenue have been obliged to issue 
 notices that hereafter the names of those who have 
 
36 'EVILS OF 
 
 paid their license will be afiBxed twice a year on the 
 church doors of their parish, as a warning and intima- 
 tion to those who have not paid. I am not now con- 
 tending that the State should interfere with no trades — 
 that there should be no licenses. It may be necessary 
 that there should be " rules of the road " on sea and 
 land to prevent collisions ; it may be necessary to 
 license certain men as lawyers and doctors to prevent 
 quackery and deception ; it may be necessary to license 
 even omnibus and cab diivers; and it would probably be 
 better if qualified men were licensed as railway direc- 
 tors. What I am contending for is, that no revenue 
 should be so raised. It is not fair to tax a man's 
 trade. It is an indirect tax upon his customers. It 
 harasses trade and gives rise to endless annoyance. If 
 I wanted proof of the way in which trade is harassed 
 I should ask any sugar importer, and he would tell 
 me — as I have often been told — ^that always as the time 
 of the introduction of the Budget approaches, it is 
 dangerous to buy, and therefore no one can seU. It is 
 expected the trade wiU be meddled with in some way or 
 other, and so in the sugar market there is an annual 
 panic. Look, too, at the various associations con- 
 tinually waiting upon members of the government. 
 There are the Tea Dealers and Grocers, the Beer and 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 37 
 
 Wine Trade Societies, the Licensed Victuallers, and a 
 host of others, all crying ont that their trades are 
 harassed, hut you nsTer hear of any association being 
 organised to ask the government to impose duties on 
 cottons, or upon any other commodities. The unfettered 
 trades are content. 
 
 Then there is the immorality" which the system 
 gives rise to. Men smuggle; they see no crime in it, 
 nor do I. As Dryden said, — 
 
 " Customs to steal is such a trivial t:hing 
 That 'tis their charter to defraud their king-'' 
 
 A great quantity of tobacco is smuggled into this 
 country, more than yon think of. I know whole femi- 
 Ues who smoke no thing else but smi^gled tobacco. 
 It comes into Liverpool daily. It comes concealed in 
 bales of hops, in casks of potatoes, even iuside loaves of 
 bread. Men are fined and imprisoned, and yet it goes 
 on day after day and week after week. There are not 
 so many illicit stills in Sngland now, but this is 
 accounted for by the general prosperiiy of the country 
 rather than anything else. Probably they number a 
 few scores ; in Ireland they may be counted by hun- 
 dreds, and the men, when detected, can afford to pay 
 the penalty instead of going to prison, and having so 
 
38 EVILS OF 
 
 paid they begin operations again. "And surely," in 
 the language of Sir Eohert Walpole, " it must be con- 
 sidered an intolerable grievance, that by the frauds 
 which are daUy committed, the very poorest of the 
 peasantry are obliged to pay this duty twice, once in the 
 enhanced price of the articles, — for, though the fraudu- 
 lent trader contrives to save to himself the amount of 
 the tax imposed by Parliament, yet he does not sell it 
 cheaper to the pubHc, — and a second time in the tax 
 that is necessarily substituted to make good the de- 
 ficiency which has by these means been occasioned." 
 To which we may add, that the fair trader's profit is 
 diminished by exposure to unequal competition with 
 the smuggler. 
 
 There is another thing. In the case of sugar you 
 know the duties are levied according to the quality. If 
 a ship have a cargo of the best quality, it will save the 
 owner several hundreds of pounds to have it passed as 
 an inferior quality. It is worth his while, therefore, to 
 slip a fifty pound note into the hands of the Custom 
 House officer, and so get his goods passed. I need 
 hardly say this is often done, and this is how it is that 
 Custom House officials, with J£150 and £200 a-year, 
 are enabled to reside in very big houses, and live 
 at a very fast rate. It is as true in principle 
 
INDIRECT TAXATION. 39 
 
 to-day as when Swift wrote: "Some Custom House 
 officers, birds of passage, and oppressive thrifty squires, 
 are the only thriving people among us." One instance 
 of the immoral effects of taxing commodities may be 
 seen to-day at any American port. In consequence of 
 the high tariffs existing in that country, nearly every 
 subordinate officer, on nearly every ship trading between 
 Liverpool and New York, takes out with him portable 
 goods, so as to cheat the Custom House, by trading on his 
 own account. To such an extent is this carried on that 
 Liverpool firms keep agents specially for looking after this 
 branch of their business. Only the other day I cut 
 this advertisement out of a Liverpool newspaper : — 
 " Wanted, an experienced young man to solicit orders 
 amongst Officers, Stewards, and others for a first-class 
 and wholesale Tailoring Establishment. Must have 
 good references and be well acquainted wifli the bnsi- 
 ness. — Address," etc. Coats, shirts, etc., which the 
 customer can take out on his back, are- sent over in large 
 quantities ; while umbrellas are especial favourites on 
 account of their portability. Indeed, it is a standing 
 joke in America that in consequence of ihe high duties 
 paid on umbrellas they are national property, and may 
 be walked off with from the passage-stands with impu- 
 nity, as no ms^istrate wiU commit. Duties of Customs 
 
40 EVILS OF INDIREGT. TAXATION. 
 
 and Excise, then, give rise to deception, lying, and 
 worse crimes, and engender a contempt for law, which 
 is the next thing to creating a contempt for those who 
 make the laws and those who administer them. 
 
 I have now redeemed my promise. I have shown 
 you that Indirect Taxation is unjust to the producer, 
 because it robs him of customers ; it impoverishes the 
 people, because it restricts their means of living ; it 
 cheats them, because it taxes them without their know- 
 ing it ; and it takes from the labourer more than the 
 State requires, and for which, therefore, the State gives 
 , him no return, thus reducing his wages by that 
 amount. It restricts commerce, harasses trade, and 
 creates monopolies. Finally, the great vice of Indirect 
 Taxation is not only that it is unjust and unequsd, 
 but "that, it limits, restricts, and hampers beneficial 
 eixidha&gejit harasses and prevents a thousand operations 
 of indpstries, ■yhich, when called into existence, would 
 assist to spuead '•Abundance, contentment, and morality 
 amongst, the peop>le of this country; and if England 
 aboJishe(^ such a clumsy and iniquitous system she 
 would set an example of vrisdom and justice to all the 
 natiods'of the earth. 
 
41 
 
 Advantages of Direct Taxation. 
 
 Lord Macaulay wrote : " The discontent excited by 
 direct taxes 15, indeed, always out of proportion to the 
 quantity of money which they bring into the exche- 
 quer." This, it seems to me, is the great recommend- 
 ation of a direct tax. It gives rise to an " impatience 
 of taxation," as it has been aptly called. With a 
 System of direct taxation, every man would have a 
 n'otion he was paying too much, and he would enquire 
 into the circumstances of the case. He would want to 
 inow hoW the money was spent, and why he had to pay 
 more than another man. Let the nation once do this, 
 and the days of unjust taxation would be cut short, 
 and a -system with a just incidence established. It is a 
 foolish thing for a nation to pay taxes and not know 
 1;hat it does -so, for then the governors will keep it 
 •equally in the dark as to how they spend them. I h^ve 
 therefore no hesitation in asking you to adopt a petition 
 to Parliament, praying for an alteration in the mode of 
 
42 , ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 raising the revenue, from an indirect method to one 
 entirely and completely direct. 
 
 I will premise, however, that people often fall into 
 the fallacy of believing that .because direct taxation is a 
 good thing, and all indirect taxes bad, therefore that aU 
 direct taxes ar^e good. This -is an error. A poll tax is 
 a direct tax, but it is not a good one. It is neither 
 equal nor just. So also Schedule D of the Income 
 Tax is a direct tax ; but it is inquisitorial, oppressive, 
 and demoralising. All direct taxes are not good, and 
 are not just ; but of this you may be quite sure, that 
 no tax that is good or that is just is any other than a 
 direct one. All direct taxation is not just. taxation, but 
 all just taxation is direct. 
 
 It is a remarkable fact that the ruling classes, 
 when they made war in bygone days did so not for 
 the people but for themselves. Few wars have ever 
 been made for the people. Formerly the class which 
 legislated was the class which fought, and what was 
 more, it was the class which paid. They therefore 
 made war in the full consciousness that they would 
 have to pay for it. ' The result was, that a national 
 debt was a thing unheard of. It was not until we had 
 indirect taxation that our rulers were able to run us 
 into debt. I am quite convinced that if during the 
 
DIRECT TAXATION. 43 
 
 last century we had had direct taxation, the people 
 of this eonntiy would not haye fenteied upon wars which 
 were of no earthly or heayenly use. John Bull would 
 think thrice before he doubled the Income Tax, or any 
 other tax that he had to pay in hard coin, while he 
 would know little of it if it were concealed in 
 his beer and tea. With direct taxation there wouH be 
 no such thing as a war-fever. Why, in 1860, the then 
 Lord Derby opposed direct taxation on the Teiy ground 
 that, to use his own words, it would he so " odious 
 that war will be avoided, because no party will 
 incur the odium of carrying it on." "They say," 
 he said, "they will secure peace, by taking away 
 the power of making war." As it is, the people of 
 this country — especially the poor people — have to 
 pay for wars not one of which they approve now, or 
 would have approved when they were waged, if they 
 had known the e:^ense they were entailing upon them- 
 selves. It seems to have been the notion of England 
 that it ought to mix itself in every quarrel on the &ce 
 of the earth ; that its arms were invincible — which they 
 were not ; that it must win aU the battles — ^which it did 
 not ; that it would get aU the glory — which it could 
 not; and then that it would pay aU the expenses — 
 which it succeeded in a great measure in doing. Mr. 
 
U ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 Andrew Bissett pointed ont this some time ago. From 
 the time of the Norman dynasty to the restoration 
 of Charles II., a period of 594 years, the period of 
 Direct Taxation, " England kept her national defences 
 in so complete a state that no foreign power dared to 
 attempt invading her ; and carried on, hesides, a vast 
 number of great wars, in the course of which she 
 planted her flag on the waUs of Acre, made one King of 
 France prisoner and dethroned another, restored a King 
 of Spain to his throne, destroyed the Spanish Armada, 
 and finally made the name , of Englishmen as much 
 respected over the world as that of the Eomans had 
 been. And all this she did without contracting i 
 farthing of debt." Then, however, came indirect taxa- 
 tion, and the burdens were shifted on to the shoulders 
 of the people. "From the restoration of Charles EL 
 to the year 1815 is a period of 155 years. During that 
 comparatively short time (little more than a fourth 
 of the former), England, — in carrying on wars which 
 should certainly not have cost her greater efforts than 
 those above referred to ; in making war for the Dutch ; 
 for the succession of the crown of Spain ; in making 
 war first for, and then against, the House of Austria ; 
 in conquering Canada ; in losing America ; in the wars 
 of the French Revolution; and, in the course of all 
 
DIRECT TAXATION. 45 
 
 tbis, sabsddising more than half Europe, — contracted a 
 debt of ap\?aids of eight hundred millions, while taxes 
 to an enormous amoont were levied on the labouring 
 and commercial dass of the commmiity." To all this 
 is to be added the Crimean war, where we got a treaty 
 which is now repudiated ; the Alabama difficnlty, which 
 was bron^t npon us by the iniquitous conduct of British 
 shipbuilders ; and the Abyssinian war, into which offici- 
 alism drifted us; to say nothing of the China war, 
 which might have been avoided ; the various Indian 
 mutinies, fOT whicb in a great measure we were to 
 blame ; and the Ashantee war, about which we know 
 nothing yet ; and I think you will agree with me that 
 ConservatiTes, at any xate^, ought to be in favour of 
 direct taxation, as it is neither more nor less than 
 " recurring to their original policy." 
 
 It was for carrying on such a policy as this, then, 
 that the people of this country have now to pay 
 the espeuBes. Mr. C. E. Macqueen, the iude&tigable 
 Secretary of the Financial Beform Association, whose 
 eneigy, earnestness, and zeal, are only equalled by the 
 indomitable perseverance and immunity &om fatigue 
 with which a sincere, hearty faith in his cause alone 
 (»n inspire a man, is always making extraordinary 
 calculations, by way of removing the difficulties of the 
 
46 ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 mind in conceiving the meaning of stupendous figures, 
 and converting the monotony of page after page of 
 statistical tahles from mere shov?er-haths of figures into 
 telling facts. Amongst other things he has pointed 
 out that if thirty millions of people, which is nearly 
 the population of the United Kingdom, were passing 
 the edge of an ahyss in single file, at the rate of 
 one per minute, and if each of them " threw in £279 
 odd, it wotdd take upwards of fifty-seven years, day and 
 night, without intermission, before the sum spent 
 on war and war debt from 1688 to 1872 could he 
 got rid of in a way about as beneficial as that in which 
 it has been expended." Let every taxpayer remember 
 this. Let every taxpayer remember that of every pound 
 he pays in taxes, whether directly as income tax, or 
 indirectly by tobacco and coffee, no less than 14s. 9fd. 
 is expended for war and war debt, and only the remain- 
 ing 5s. 2^d. for the cost of Civil Government. With 
 this borne in mind — and direct taxes would drive 
 it home — and with the future revenue of this country 
 raised by direct imposts, I am quite sure that however 
 much the passions of the people might be roused, 
 however ai^xious the rulers of the land might be 
 to involve us in national disputes, whether under the 
 name of a vigorous foreign policy, or by any other 
 
DIRECT TAXATION. 47 
 
 title, the people of this comitry would think twiee 
 when they remembered how deeply they would have to 
 thmst their hands into Hieir pockets. Men would then 
 see that it was to their interest to remain at peaee, 
 and when the majority of a nation once feels that, there 
 will be no war. 
 
 Direct taxation, however, is not only a check upon 
 war expenditnie, but it is a preyentive of all other 
 extraragance. "If," sajs Mill, "all taxes were 
 direct, taxation would be much more perceived than 
 at present ; and there would be a security which now 
 there is not for economy in the public expenditure." 
 I have pointed out that when the legLslators were 
 also &e ta^ayers, and knew it, we had economical 
 government. At present, our legislators — the Lords 
 and Commons — pay much less than their fsur share of 
 the national burdens, and they are well aware of the 
 fact. They have not, therefore, the inducements to be 
 economical which they ought to have, as an extravagant 
 expenditure falls more lightly upon them than upon the 
 people. "With direct taxation, howev^-, they would be 
 obli^d to pay their due share, and personal motives, if 
 nothing else, would make them look after their own 
 inter^ts, and in doing that they would be respecting 
 the inter^ts of the nation. "In the days of our 
 
48 ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 laborious ancestors," once said the Morning Star, 
 "taxation was direct, and was taken from the rich. 
 Since we have become civilised we have made taxation 
 indirect, and the poor pay a proportion of taxes one- 
 fourth of which would have caused a rebellion among 
 their richer ancestors." The Americans have found 
 this out. Eecently, in a memorial to Congress from the_^ 
 Taxpayers' Convention of South Carolina, complaining 
 of the " schemes of public plunder which have been 
 openly advanced by corrupt measures," it was pointed 
 out that a majority of the members of the Legislature 
 ovmed no portion whatsoever of the property taxed, and 
 the remaining portion owned so little that their pay as 
 members constituted their entire interest as property- 
 holders. The result is, that those ovraing the property 
 having no voice in the Government, and those imposing 
 the taxes having no share in the burden thereof, the 
 taxes have advanced yearly, until, in many cases, they 
 consume more than one-half of the income from the 
 property taxed. 
 
 We should be more economical if we realised the 
 fact that when John Bull is thrusting his hands into 
 his pockets, he is really spending our money. "If," 
 says Hosea Biglow, " by means of direct taxation, the 
 bills for every extraordinary outlay were brought under 
 
DIRECT TAXATION. , 49 
 
 OUT own immediate eye, so that, like thrifty house- 
 keepers, we could see where and how fest the money 
 was going, we should be less .likely to commit extrava- 
 gances. At present, the poor man is charged as much 
 as the rich ; and whilst we are saving and scrimping 
 at the spigot, the Government is drawing off at the 
 bung. If we could know that a great part of the 
 money we pay in tea, sugar, coffee, and tobacco, goes 
 to buy powder and ball, and in keeping a lot of idle 
 sinecurists, it would set some of us a-thinking." 
 An overflowing revenue is always an inducement to 
 spend. It corrupts both the governors and the 
 governed. The former invent channels of extravagant 
 patronage, the latter expect golden prizes. " A revenue 
 rigorously proportioned to the wants of the people 
 is as much as can safely be trusted to men in 
 power." 
 
 I say, then, that a direct tax is a good tax, because it 
 is a provocative to economy. Another great advantage 
 is, that it win always have a tendency to fall upon the 
 right shoulders. Nothing has pleased me more than 
 the discontent to which the income tax has given rise. 
 There have been cries on all sides that it is unfairly 
 levied, that men are made to 'pay on larger incomes 
 than they really have ; and, indeed, so obnoxious is the 
 
 D 
 
50 ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 whole affair, that a powerfal organisation has been 
 formed to agitate for its removal. Why, gentlemen, if 
 the same amount of taxation had been wrung from 
 these complaining tradesmen by taxes on the commodi- 
 ties they consumed, they would never have known they 
 were overtaxed. Why should we require the pill of 
 taxation to be gilded? It is the fact that hard cash has 
 been demanded from them, that they have had to open 
 their purses and actually pay the taxgatherer in money, 
 which has made them feel the unjust incidence of the 
 tax ; and if the whole of the revenue was raised thus 
 directly, and of coujrse more justly assessed, the nation 
 itself would see that the tax was properly apportioned. 
 
 Then, again, a direct tax is cheaper to collect. To 
 pay a direct tax costs nothing more than the tax itself, 
 and the cost of collecting it ; and this latter item is or 
 should be a very small per centage. 
 
 Under an equitable system, there would be no 
 inducements to adulterate, and therefore the expense of 
 a detective force would be avoided; there would be 
 no more smuggling, and therefore the cost of the 
 Bevenue cruisers all around the coasts would be saved. 
 It would do away with the enormous expense of the 
 Custom House system ; it would aboUsh the Exciseman, 
 and reduce the staff of Bevenue officers, and thus not only 
 
DIRECT TAXATION. 51 
 
 cause a sensible reduction in the price of every article 
 that is consmned, bnt would enable the taxes to 
 be collected at a cost of about Ij or 2 per cent., 
 instead of about a cost of 25 per cent, as at present. 
 If anyone wishes to be convinced of the absurd, 
 dmnsy, anomalous way of collecting the taxes by 
 means of Custom Houses, let him study the return 
 which Mr. James "White, the member for Brighton, 
 succeeded in persuading the Government to issue in 
 1872. It is a return of the total costs of the 
 Customs for the year 1870. Only one similar return 
 has been granted before, and that was iu 1870, and 
 referred to 1868, and it is astonishing how much 
 alike these returns are. Of course, you are aware that 
 all places on the coasts of our island are not ports, that 
 is to say, they cannot carry on a foreign trade, however 
 much they may wish to do so. Her Majesty's Commis- 
 sioners of Customs have selected 133 places to which 
 the privilege is granted. I do not know what has 
 guided these gentlemen in the selection they have 
 made. Doubtless, in the plenitude of their wisdom, 
 they have had suf&cient grounds for all they did ; but 
 the state of afi^urs is anything but satisfsuitoiy. In 36 
 out of these 133 ports, the cost of collecting is double 
 the amount collected; twenty-eight of them collect 
 
52 ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 i99,196, and tke cost of doing it is £26,123, or a cost 
 of £B for every £1 collected. In fact, there are only 
 about nineteen of them at all worth keeping up, and in 
 these the cost is never less than £1 10s. per cent., and 
 it ranges from that figure to 100 per cent. Who would 
 have thought, for instance, that at a port like North 
 Shields, it costs £B0 8s. 5fd. per cent, to collect the 
 Customs' duties ; at Cardiff, £55 8s. 2^d. per cent. ; and 
 those who have seen the busy appearance of the poi-t of 
 Hartlepool, the_ activity of the Custom House ofi&cers, 
 and the ' great shipping trade that seems to be done 
 there, will doubtless be surprised to hear that the 
 amount collected there in 1870 was £5,583, and that 
 the cost of collecting it was £5,631 6s. Bd., or 
 £100 7s. 2Jd. per cent. ; that is to say, that at Hartlepool 
 the Custom House did not collect a sufi&eient amount of 
 duty to pay its own expenses. The case of Fleetwood 
 is still worse ; while at Milford Haven, which I remem- 
 ber my school Geography desci-ibed as "the finest 
 natural harbour in the world," the cost of collection 
 was £1,340 17s. 4d., and that was spent to collect the 
 enormous sum of £4, which was at the rate of 
 £33,621 13s. 4d. per cent. There are even worse 
 cases, and the whole temple of anomahes is finally 
 , crowned with the amusing but disgraceful fact, that at 
 
/ DIRECT TAXATION. 53 
 
 Aberystwitii, Cardigan, Guernsey, Jersey, Kirkwall,' 
 Maldon, Padstow, Stranraer, aijd Wigton, the total 
 cost of the Custom Houses was £6,778 4s. 4d., and , 
 there was not a single penny collected, all' the work 
 done being the restriction of trade as much as possible. 
 The total cost of the collection of the Customs dues was 
 £787,876 lis. Id., which was nearly four per cent, on 
 the amount collected. Well, this peculiar state of 
 things must exist as long as the taxes are collected with 
 such a clumsy contrivance as the Custom House. With 
 a system of direct taxation, this would be done away 
 with, and in addition to the skving thus effected, trade 
 would be allowed to expand as much as possible. For, 
 while indirect taxation cramps and prevents trade, any 
 steps towards direct taxation relieve it, and allow it 
 to expand. From 1842 to 1866, there were, repealed or 
 reduced fustoms or Exdse duties to the net amount of 
 £19,692,895 ; and during the same period the revenue 
 derived from these two departments increased from 
 £35,667,679 in 1842, to £42,973,000 in 1866. The 
 amount of prosperity here shown is very great, and 
 I am quite sure that with further reforms in the 
 same direction equally great benefits will follow. As 
 Voltaire says, " Taxes are necessary/ the best mode 
 of levying them is that which most facilitates labour 
 and commerce." 
 
54 , ADVANTAGES OF 
 
 Again, a tax is a -payment for services rendered by 
 the State, from which every individual ought to derive 
 an equal benefit. The tax ought, therefore, not only to 
 be equitably assessed, but deemed as obligatory as any 
 other payment for services rendered. Now, all indirect 
 taxes can be entirely or in part avoided and shifted on 
 to one's neighbours, without the neighbours knowing it, 
 while a direct tax, equitably assessed, must fall upon 
 the parties intended. " The certainty of what each 
 individual ought to pay," says Mill, "is in taxation a 
 matter of so great importance, that a very considerable 
 degree of inequality, it appears, I believe from the 
 experience of all nations, is not near so great an evil as 
 a very small degree of uncertainty." Adam "Smith 
 expresses a similar opinion ; and again, Dr. Chalmers : 
 " A fpee people ought to know what they pay for free- 
 dom, and should scorn to be cheated into paying for it." 
 
 I am aware that the immediate substitution of 
 direct taxes would be unpopular. People have been 
 so used to paying without knowing it, that it would 
 be some time before they became reconciled to the 
 visits of the tax-gatherer in propria persona. But I 
 am equally sure that when once a man realises the real 
 advantages of a just system he must infinitely prefer 
 it to being fleeced in the price of commodities ; and as 
 
DIRECT TAXATION. 55 
 
 1 ' ■ 
 
 Handel Cossham says, "If a man knows what he pays, 
 he is anxious to know why he pays." With direct 
 taxation, from half a dozen to a score of memhers of 
 Parliament, always with a majority of officials, wonld 
 no longer be left at one, two, or three o'clock in the 
 morning, as at present, to vote away millions of the 
 pnbUc money in an extravagant and merciless manner. 
 
 I say, then, in conclusion, that direct taxation is 
 the only jroper and equitable mode of raising a 
 revenue. To say that it is impracticable is absurd in 
 the face of the &ct that our local rates are nearly all 
 raised in that manner, and no sane man would wish 
 that the municipal rates should be raised by taxes on 
 eonunodities. A direct tax is in accordance with the 
 canons of taxation. It takes no more out of the tax- 
 payers' pockets than is required by the State, with a 
 miniTTium cost of collection added ; it is the only kind 
 of tax that can be equitably adjusted ; under it a man 
 knows what he pays, and can therefore discover if he 
 pay too much ; it is the only check upon the extrava- 
 gance of the Government : and it releases trade from 
 the shackles which enslave it. 
 
 "Instead of taxing Nature, let us tax our- 
 selves." Let us have no more taxes on trade; 
 they are the barbarous contrivance of a barbarous age. 
 
56 ADVANTAGES OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 when the industrious were outside the pale of the con- 
 stitution, and only warriors were within it. They are 
 the deadly enemies of production, of manufacture, and 
 the free intercourse of nations ; they are opposed to 
 the interests of peace, and to the progress of civilisa- 
 tion, and they are unworthy the days of the Electric 
 Telegraph, the Suez Canal, the Mont Cenis Tunnel, 
 and the Great Pacific Railway. Let us remove this 
 solecism, this anomaly, and substitute a system of 
 direct taxation, equitably assessed, cheaply collected, 
 and equally imposed, leaving commerce as free as 
 the air we breathe, and restraining that governmental 
 extravagance which, as Mr. Bright said, every govern- 
 ment in its turn condemns, and none seems able to 
 reduce. 
 
57 
 
 m. 
 
 The Ixcidesce of Taxation. 
 
 Probably no subject has given rise to more crotchets' 
 than that of the Incidence of Taxation. So long ago 
 as 1690, the great John Locke maintained that, levy a 
 tax how yon will, it ultimately falls' npon the land. 
 " The merchant will not bear it," he says, " the 
 labourer cannot, and therefore the landholder mnst." 
 He then pertinently asks the landowner whether he had 
 not better bear it "by laying it directly where it will at 
 last settle, or by letting it come to binri by the sinking 
 of his rents, which, when they are once fallen, every 
 one knows are not easily raised again." This great 
 thinker has had nnmerons followers, and there are still 
 "many persons who believe in his doctrine. Others 
 say that the coltivators of the soil reconp themselves 
 by paying less wages, and that therefore any tax Mis 
 upon the labourer ; others maintain that it falls upon 
 profits, others again upon capital; while it is also 
 argaed, with great plausibility, that a tax, however 
 
B8 THE INCIDENCE 
 
 levied, acts and reacts between labour and capital and 
 land, untU it has the very peculiar incidence gi falling 
 nowhere at all in particular, but diffusing itself among 
 the entire population ; that is to say that it has no 
 fixed incidence. However originally levied, say these 
 economists, it moves for ever, and never finally reaches 
 a resting place, and says, " thus fer will I go and no 
 further." 
 
 It seems to me, however, that though interesting 
 as samples of politico-economical puzzles, these specu- 
 lations are of little practical moment. The question 
 to be considered is. Who makes the sacrifice of a 
 certain portion of his means in payment for the 
 protection he receives from the government of his 
 country ? There is a great misconception on the 
 subject. A great many persons think the poor pay 
 no taxes whatever ; others think they pay very little, 
 and that in any readjustment of taxation they ought 
 to be more heavily taxed. I can only account for 
 such a misconception by concluding that the middle 
 class forget all about indirect taxation. They forget 
 they pay such taxes themselves, and it never occurs to 
 them that the poorer classes are thus reached. They 
 measure their payments to the State by the receipts for 
 Income Tax and Inhabited House Duty, which they 
 
OF TAXATION. 59 
 
 can see on their files, and knowing that few of the 
 labouring classes pay taxes of that description, they 
 imagine that their poorer brethren are altogether 
 exempt. I trost, therefore, I am not departing from 
 the subject mider disenssion, in pointing ont that 
 the working classes of this coimtry are paying much 
 more than their share, and that the remark of Mr. 
 Gladstone, that the working men pay more in propor- 
 tion to their incomes than tlie proudest nobleman in the 
 land, is ahnost as applicable now as when it was nttered 
 in 1866. 
 
 Mill ai^es, with very great force — and, indeed, it 
 is now admitted — that the jnst incidence of taxation 
 should be in obedience to the rale, that each snbject in 
 the State ought to make an equal sacrifice. This is what 
 is called " the equality of taxation," and it is defined as 
 meaning that the contribution of each person towards 
 the expenses of goYermnent should be so apportioned, 
 " that he shall feel neither more nor less inconTenience 
 &om his share of the payment than CTcry other person 
 experiences firom his." If a person be overburdened by 
 taxation, then some one is escaping his fair share ; 
 and of course, if one man is unjustly spared, then 
 another is unjustly oppressed. If, therefore, it can be 
 shown that the working classes are paying more than 
 
60 TEE INCIDENCE 
 
 their share, then the wealthy classes are paying less 
 than theirs. 
 
 Mr. Dudley Baxter, the eminent Conservative 
 statistician, estimates that the manual labour class in 
 the United Kingdom consists of twenty-three millions 
 of persons, and the upper and middle classes of seven 
 millions, the income of the former being £324,000,000 
 sterling, and that of the latter £489,474,000. Now 
 the principal Imperial taxes paid by the manual labour 
 class are Customs and Excise, of which it is probable it 
 pays an equal share per head to that paid by the other 
 classes, because, as Mr. Bright pointed out, twenty men 
 sitting at one table will eat and drink about the same 
 quantity as twpnty men sitting at another table, though 
 of course the quality of the viands may be different, 
 as one twenty may be worth nothing' at all, the 
 other twenty may be millionaires. The manual labour 
 class, therefore, contributes £33,000,000 sterling. 
 " Assuming that the remaining ten millions of Customs 
 and Excise, and the whole of the other Imperial taxes, 
 amounting to twenty-two millions, are contributed by 
 the upper and middle classes, [which is assuming a 
 great deal,] they will pay, as their share of the public 
 revenue, £32,000,000 sterling. It thus appears that 
 the upper and middle classes, with an income of 
 
OF TAXATION. 61 
 
 £189,474,000, pay £32,000,000, and that the manual 
 labour class, with an income of £324,625,000, pays 
 £33,000,000 ; in other words, that the former pay 
 6|- per cent, on their income, and the latter 10 
 per cent, on their income. The due share of the 
 manual labour class, if it contributed in proportion 
 to its income, would be £25,000,000, or £8,000,000 
 less than the sum which it now pays. To this class, 
 therefore, the concession of a 'firee breakfast table' 
 would be a simple act of justice." 
 
 The matter was put still more strongly by Sir 
 Charles Dilke, in his speech to his constituents, in 
 January, 1873. He then pointed out, that as Bentham 
 proposed and MUl adTOcated " a certain Tninim nTi^ of 
 income, sufficient to provide the necessaries of life to a 
 moderately numerous family, should not be heavily 
 taxed, but only the surplus beyond this. Suppose this 
 TnininiTiTn to be £50 a year for each fsunily, and 
 supposing the worknten to be five millions of families 
 (which is not mu(^ above the mark), this would give 
 £250,000,000 for necessaries. But their whole income 
 is computed at £325,000,000 by Mr. Dudley Baxter, 
 leaving only £75,000,000 of superfluiti^, which on this 
 principle would be taxed; on this sum, £30,000,000 
 of taxes are raised. The rich are two millions of 
 
62 THE INGIDJENCE 
 
 families, which gives £100,000,000 for necessaries ; 
 but they hate ^£500,000,000, leaving £400,000,000 to 
 be taxed, which bears little more than £50,000,000 of 
 taxes." 
 
 These statements show not only that the working 
 classes are at present unduly taxed, but also, it must be 
 acknowledged, that under the present system, if duties 
 of Customs and Excise were abolished, they would 
 almost entirely escape taxation. But no free-trader 
 proposes to abolish indirect taxation, unless a complete 
 and just system of direct taxation can be substituted. 
 What that substitute should be I hope to have an 
 opportunity to suggest ; and this much I here premise, 
 that it is certain that no scheme can be accepted which 
 does not reach the working classes in their' fair 
 and proper proportion. And I will say of the working 
 men — and I think that having been brought up 
 amongst them I am entitled to speak for them — that 
 they do not wish to shirk their share of the national 
 burdens. They complain now, nolf so much that they 
 are overtaxed — ^they hardly know it — but that the taxes 
 are obtained from them in a sly and surreptitious 
 manner. 
 
 It is a mistaken notion that working men prefer 
 to pay their taxes indirectly in sugar, tea, and beer, and 
 
OF TAXATION. 
 
 that they would rebel against paying the tax-collector 
 in hard cash. Sach an assertion is a libel upon the 
 intelligence of the British workman. Ever since work- 
 ing men haye learned to ask for anything, they have 
 asked for. direct taxation. In almost every manifesto 
 they issne, at almost every public meeting theyjaddress, 
 at every election, their cry is for direct taxation ; and 
 believing as tiey do, that the wealthy oppose it to save 
 their own pockets, it is one of those causes of social 
 discontent which do so much to set class against class. 
 True, in addition to the very poor, there is a small 
 section of the working class who now pay through their 
 breakfasts, their beer, and their tobacco, who would 
 es(»pe a direct tax, but they are those whose occupa- 
 tions take them £rom town to town, whose wages 
 though high are precarious, and for whom no town 
 can offer sufficient inducements to make it their per- 
 manent residence. These would be free from tax- 
 ation, and I would much prefer that they should go 
 free than that in order to reach them the whole of their 
 fellow- workmen should be unduly taxed. It is foolish, 
 however, to hope for any justice from a system of taxa- 
 tion which taxes the choice tobacco of the wealthy man 
 to the extent of only 8 per cent, upon the dearest, and 
 the tobacco of the poor to the extent of between 400 
 
64 THE INCIDENCE 
 
 and 800, and even up to 1800 per cent, upon the 
 cheapest, and which, while it admits free the pine- 
 apples, grapes, and almonds of the wealthy, taxes the 
 raisins, currants, and figs of the poor. In fact, all 
 things considered, it is no exaggeration to say that the 
 working classes pay twice as much per cent, on their 
 incomes as do the rich upon theirs ; and there is this 
 injustice also to be borne in mind-, that they contri- 
 bute chiefly through necessaries, while the wealthy 
 contribute through superfluities, the former contributing 
 96 per cent, of their taxes from the necessaries of 
 life, while the wealthy only contribute 42 per cent, 
 from that source. Indeed, it has been carefolly calcu- 
 lated and published by the Council of the Financial 
 Eeform Association, that, whilst the payment of Cus- 
 toms and Excise duties may absorb one-fourth of the 
 earnings of the working man with a family, the rich 
 man, besides the privilege of getting his tea, cofiiee, 
 sugat, etc., wholesale out of bond, thus paying no more 
 than the Government receives, may contribute in this 
 way less than a thousandth or a ten-thousandth part of 
 his annual income. 
 
 There are other ways of showing the same irregu- 
 larity. For instance, in 1872, the Secretary of the 
 Rawtenstall Co-operative Stores pointed out that upon 
 
OF TAXATION. 65 
 
 the six articles, malt, sugar, coffee, tea, and cur- 
 rants, sold &oin their stores, there was paid to the 
 BeTenae £1 5s. 10^. per man. All of them were 
 working-men; and a similar calcnlation, made some 
 years ago hy three other co-operative stores, folly proves 
 the incidence to he as stated by Mr. Dudley Baxter. 
 
 I have prepared two tables on this subject, to 
 which I invite your attention. The first one shows 
 the expenditure of a labouring man, whose family, 
 including himself and wife and children, consists of 
 five members. [See next page.] I have not selected 
 a drunkard, nor have I chosen a teetotaller, but 
 one whose expenditure on excisable articles is such 
 as is met with in the majority of cases. It will 
 there be seen that the commodities enumerated, 
 which cost the labourer 17s. 6d., could have been 
 bought for 16s. l^d. had no indirect taxes been 
 imposed. Now, the addition of 2s. 4Jd. to 15s. l^d. 
 is equal to 15*702 per cent., and that is the rate of 
 taxation to which the necessaries and comforts of life 
 in use amongst the poor are subjected, independently 
 altogether of the repressive influence which such taxa- 
 tion produces, by impeding the efforts of industrial 
 genius. The per centage of 15*702 on the commodities 
 is equal to 11*875 on the whole income of 20s. a-week. 
 
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66 
 
 TEE INCIDENCE 
 
 
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OF TAXATION. 67 
 
 Again, deducting the money spent for the tele- 
 graphic and postal services, the expenditure for govern- 
 ing this country amounted, last year, to £2 Is. 5d. per 
 head of the estimated population. But what does our 
 poor labourer pay? Why no less than £6 Is. 4d., or 
 nearly three times as much as the average. The man 
 therefore, who ought in common fairness to pay so 
 much less than the average, we find contributing a 
 very great deal more. It is no answer that he can 
 avoid the taxes on luxuries. I have dealt with that 
 question before. That is a question for him, not 
 for us. 
 
 We come now to the second table, which is the 
 expenditure of a middle-class family, of the same num- 
 ber as the labourer's, but which is in receipt of £5 
 a- week. [See next page.] Here we find that what cost 
 £1 9s. 3d. might, but for taxes, have been obtained for 
 18s. Id., which is a tax of 61*751 per cent, on the cost 
 of the commodity. But he also pays 1*27 in direct 
 taxes, and these are together equal to 12i per cent, on 
 his income. 
 
 Now, a similar table, giving the expenditure of a 
 man with jE1,000 a-week, would show that he would 
 pay jE17 10s. 7d. a-week in indirect taxes, and about 
 £18 3s. in direct taxes, making a total of £35 13s. 7d., 
 or only 8*568 per cent, on his income. 
 
68 
 
 THE INCIDENCE 
 
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OF TAXATION. 69 
 
 Here, then, we have shown a striking anomaly ol 
 the present system of taxation, as shown hy the nneqnal 
 amonnt of taxation paid apon the same amount of 
 income in the possession of different classes of persons- 
 
 1 Wealthy Person who enjoys^ 
 a weekly Berenae from the 
 OpeTations ol Trade or the 
 Employment of Hon^ oat of 
 
 £1,000 pays in Taxes, £35 13 7 
 
 200 Middle Class Men who ool-\ 
 lectively have a, gimiliiT 
 .Amount of Income from 
 Professional or other exer- 
 tion ont of . . 
 
 £1,000, pay in Taxes, £123 6 8 
 
 1000 Labourers whose weekly 1 
 
 _ . .. f£l,000,payiiiTaxes, £118 15 
 
 Xiamings amonnt to . . j 
 
 So that we find that while the lowest and the 
 middle classes bear the burdens of taxation, those 
 whose incomes are princely escape a great deal of the 
 taxes which onght in justice to be borne by them. I 
 hope, therefore, we shall hear no more about the work- 
 ing classes not paying their share of the taxes. If the 
 wealthy classes were taxed in the same proportion to 
 their means as the daily labourer and the middle-class 
 man are to their means, and if all went into the Exche- 
 quer, the requirements of the State, even on the present 
 extravagant scale, would be amply provided for, and, 
 as Mr. Paton, of Montrose, has shown, the surplus 
 
70 THE INCIDENCE 
 
 would suffice -to pay off our enormous National Debt, 
 in the bourse of from a dozen to fifteen years. 
 
 Some people cry out that taxation and representa- 
 tion ought to go together. I would warn such people 
 not to lay too much stress upon that point, because the 
 working-classes of this country all pay taxes, and ought 
 on that theory to have the votes which are now with- 
 held from them. 
 
 There is a very common fallacy, — indeed Mr. 
 Dudley Baxter has fallen into it, — which I should not 
 like to pass unnoticed, and that is, that, in large house- 
 holds the master of the house pays, the taxes of the 
 servants because he pays thegrocer's bill. It must be 
 remembered that there are two ways of paying ser- 
 vants : either a salary and board, or a larger salary 
 without board. It is therefore at once seen that the 
 amount deducted, so to speak, when the servants are 
 boarded, is part of their wages, and as it is spent at the 
 grocer's on their behalf, they, and not their employers, 
 pay the tax. When a family goes on the continent 
 and shuts up its town house, the servants are then 
 put on " board wages," thus proving beyond a doubt 
 that, although they may not " go shopping," they as 
 veritably pay for the commodities and pay the taxes 
 when they are not on board wages equally as if they 
 
OF TAXATION. 71 
 
 were. The tax, therefore, falls on to the servants 
 not the masters. This must be taken into considera- 
 tion where the expenditure of the middle class man in 
 the Table just quoted is dealt with ; and it will of 
 course lessen the difference between the proportion of 
 taxes he pays according to his means, and that which 
 the labouring man pays according to his means. But 
 even if there were anything in the objection I have 
 answered — which there is not — it would not much 
 improve the question, for, as was pointed out by a 
 correspondent in the Financial Reformer, taking the 
 income of the Marquis of Bute at ^300,000 per annum, 
 the Marquis would have to support seventeen thousand 
 adult consumers of taxable articles before he would be 
 paying the same proportion of indirect taxes ?is a man 
 with 20s. a week. 
 
 I think, then, I have shown that the incidence of 
 taxation at the present day presses most' severely upon 
 the middle and the working classes; and although 
 there has been some improvement since the last few 
 years, when Prof. Leone Levi, in 1860, estimated the 
 proportions paid by the classes at 12 per cent, for the 
 upper, llj per cent, for the middle, and 14 per cent.' 
 for the labouring class ; and although the remission of 
 indirect taxation has been a benefit to the working 
 
72 THE INCIDENCE 
 
 class more than to any other, yet these benefits have 
 been at the expense of the middle class rather than of 
 the rich, and there can be no doubt that in any scheme 
 of re-adjustment a great deal more of the taxation of 
 the country ought to be borne by the wealthy class. 
 In this respect, too, it is better to be charitable, and 
 err on the right side than otherwise. The class which 
 has levied the taxes has not always used the best 
 language when speaking of those who have paid the 
 taxes. The working man may not be a paragon of 
 perfection, and he may not always speak in the choicest 
 language of those above him. He probably remembers 
 that they have dubbed him "thug," "dreg," and 
 "scum;" he may not forget that even "residuum" 
 can be twisted by men who are supposed to know Latin 
 into a term of opprobrium ; while, perhaps, he also 
 recollects that even one who pretends to be a " working 
 man's friend " has styled the class " the vile substra- 
 tum." The poor fellow has had all that to put up 
 with — as if poverty were a crime — and I therefore 
 think, that if any leniency is to be shown at all in 
 regard to taxation, it should be to those who hitherto 
 have suffered so much and endured so long. It is 
 infinitely better that the poor should pay too little 
 and the rich too much, than, as at present, the rich 
 
OF TAXATION. 73 
 
 too little and the poor too nrnch. I would rather that 
 the rich should be taxed to spare the poor, than the 
 poor to excuse the rich. St. Paul says, " We that are 
 strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and 
 not to please ourselves." 
 
74 
 
 rv. 
 
 Febe Tbadb. 
 
 Great and important as the question of taxation is, 
 when considered in the light of raising in just, propor- 
 tions the sum necessary for carrying on the govern- 
 ment of the State, yet there is a question of wider 
 scope and deeper importance in the prbposal to substi- 
 tute a system of direct for that of indirect taxation. 
 That question is the principle of Free Trade, which, 
 as Douglas Jerrold says, "is a spell by which the 
 world will yet be governed." 
 
 I am glad, therefore, that the petition before you 
 states that " the policy inaugurated by Sir Eobert Peel 
 has proved so eminently beneficial as to warrant further 
 progress in that direction, not stopping short, ulti- 
 mately, of entire freedom of trade, and the substitution 
 of direct for indirect taxation." What is meant by 
 that prayer is, that every step in the direction of free 
 trade has been a good thing for everybody, and there- 
 fore we ought to crown the edifice by removing all 
 
FREE TRADE. 75 
 
 existing impediments, hindrances, and embarrassments. 
 What is alone surprising is, that a great many mem- 
 bers of Parliament, who- ought to know better, and a 
 great many newspaper writers and contributors to the 
 reriews, are constantly speaking as if Free Trade were 
 an accomplished fact. They are so intoxicated, so to 
 speak, with the splendour of the results of Corn Law 
 repeal, that they can conceive no higher heaven — no 
 further advance in the same direction. They think 
 they have afihieved the Be all. End all, and that no 
 more can or need be done. These gentlemen forget 
 that above half the revenue is still raised by a system 
 entirely opposed to tree trade. Any one who imagines 
 that free trade is an accomplished fact should endea- 
 vour to land a cargo of tobacco at Ipswich, or to have 
 wine tested at Hartlepool; or to import tea at even 
 any place except London ; or he should try to get his 
 vessel to Worcester Bridge ; or to plant his waste acres 
 with beet, with chicory, or with , tobacco ; or to brew or 
 distil, or to roast coffee ; and he will soon see that his 
 house is anything but his castle, and that there are 
 many products in which there is no such thing, at 
 present, as free trade in England ; and when there is 
 not free trade in every trade, there is not perfect free- 
 dom in any. 
 
76 FREE TRADE. 
 
 Indeed, let it be borne in mind that so long as we 
 have a single custom-house or exciseman, no trade is 
 or can be free. To abolish the duties on some com- 
 modities is but to slacken the bonds of trades. None 
 are free so long as any remain fettered. Mr. Gladstone 
 pointed out this when proposing the abolition 6f the 
 duty on soap. " It may," said the great financier, " be 
 thought there is a wide interval between the premises 
 and the conclusion, if I say, in order to extinguish 
 the slave trade, repeal the soap tax. But at all events 
 a connection of ideas more legitimate cannot well be 
 imagined. The map would show how many are the 
 rivers of the coast of Africa; those rivers may for the 
 most part become depots for the trade in palm oil. 
 The quantities you i!nay receive from that source are, it 
 is stated, almost immeasurable. There lie the great 
 materials for a, trade which, if you can only relieve it 
 from restraint, will show that the energy and capital 
 of the country are as well entitled to carry the prize in 
 this particular direction, as they show themselves to 
 be in so many others." Some similar observations 
 might be made in regard to every industry. No one 
 can foresee where the advantages of perfect freedom 
 end. As Mr. Cliffe Leslie wrote, "Liberty only can 
 reveal the directions the development of commerce and 
 
FREE TRADE. 77 
 
 industry are destined to take, and financial statesman- 
 ship consists mainly in permitting it to do so." 
 
 Let me still further illustrate this by a paragraph 
 from the Times : — "A lady who buys one of Sir Titus 
 Salt's alpaca dresses little thinks how much the world 
 has been set in motion to enable her to do so. - Messrs. 
 Hailing and Pearce, or Swan and Edgar, go to the 
 London warehouse, London warehouse goes to the 
 Bradford merchant, Bradford merchant goes to the 
 dyer and finisher and to Titus Salt, who goes 
 to Liverpool agent to bring his wool to Saltaire 
 from South Australia ; and the shipper _at Liver- 
 pool sets the Lairds and Napiers to construct his 
 ship to go to Melbourne, where again the shipper 
 at Australia toils to get the fleeces from the sheep 
 farmers, who are employed by my lady's cousin who 
 emigrated some twenty-five years ago, who has made 
 his fortune and is now in the Legislative Council. And 
 then to consider the multitude of forces at each stage 
 of. the business — how the fleece is sorted into some 
 twelve or more lengths and kinds, some good for Titus 
 Salt, and some good for Gott of Leeds, and others 
 useless to either. The worsted useful for Bradford, 
 and the wool useful for Leeds, are two very different 
 things, although coming from the same sheep's back. 
 
78 ERBE TRADE. 
 
 Iron and steel then come forward ; and the Whitworths 
 make tools, and the Platts make the machines; and 
 the alpaca is spun, and woven, and dyed, and pressed, 
 and sold through several hands, each of which collects 
 his percentage for his labour and skill, until at last my 
 lady buys it."i To tax any one of these processes is 
 to obstruct all, and therefore to restrict every trade, 
 even the grocer, the butcher, the baker, and the tailor. 
 It is seen, then, that the most obvious result of 
 releasing an industry from the trammels which beset 
 and harass' it, is an increased consumption in the 
 produce of that industry. The adoption of partial 
 Free Trade in this counijry has trebled its foreign trade. 
 I might show you this, but it would simply be display- 
 ing before you a huge mass of figures, which could not 
 possibly impress the mind with the real nature of the 
 circumstance. The fact, however, is beyond dispute. 
 Before the abolition of the Corn Laws, the quantity of 
 British goods exported amounted in value to £1 18s. 9d. 
 per head of the population. The quantity of British 
 goods we now export amounts to £8 Is. Od. of the 
 present population. Now, let me ask, what is the 
 result of an increase in the consumption of any 
 commodity — say tea ? You know that in 1865 
 the duty on tea was reduced from 2s, 2Jd. a pound 
 
FREE TRADE. 79 
 
 to 6d. a pound. The immediate effect of that 
 reduction was a great falling of price, and a great 
 increase in the consumption of tea. In 1849; when 
 the duty was at the former figure, the annual con- 
 sumption per head in the United Kingdom was 1'81 
 lb. ; in 1865, when the duty was reduced, the yearly 
 consumption rose to 3J lbs. per head ; and last year 
 the average consumption had risen to 4 lbs. a head. 
 Now, of course, this means that a great many niore 
 families were able to regale themselves with tea 
 than had previously been able to do so. All of you 
 who appreciate and enjoy a good cup of tea will 
 acknowledge that there, is a great advantage in that. 
 But an increased consumption of tea means much more 
 than that. It signifies, in the first place, that more 
 ships have been required to fetch the tea from China, to 
 build which ships more men are required, and to man 
 them more sailors are wanted. The ships require rigg- 
 ing, which is good for the rope-makers, and the sailcloth 
 manufacturers, "as well as several other industries. 
 Then when the tea arrives here, it requires more ware- 
 houses and employs more Warehousemen, as well as an 
 additional number of carriers, both by rail and road, to 
 distribute it over the country ; it requires more paper 
 to wrap it iri parcels, more string to tie them with ; and 
 
80 FBEE TRADE. 
 
 indeed it is difficult to imagine any industry whatever 
 .which does not receive some advantage from the 
 increase in the consumption of this or any other 
 article. Remember, , also, that all these processes to 
 which I have alluded are not confined to England, hut 
 it stimulates in a similar way the various trades in the 
 distant land which cultivated the plant, and thus two 
 nations mutually benefit each other, and feel that they 
 have an interest in each other's prosperity. As the late 
 Napoleon said, " The, greater the riches and prosperity 
 of a country, the more it contributes to the riches and 
 prosperity of all other countries." 
 
 Let us, however, still pursue the theme, for I have 
 not yet finished the argument. The tea is not sent 
 here for nothing. We send out other commodities in 
 exchange for it. The cotton fabrics from Lancashire, 
 the woollen cloths from Yorkshire, hardware goods 
 from Birmingham^ and steel and iron manufactures 
 from Sheffield, are gathered to our ports, and sent 
 to the East, employing labour at every process, and 
 whenever they are moved, from the time the raw 
 material is landed on our shores, until the time that it 
 is delivered over to the consumer or the wearer in a 
 distant land. An increase in the consumption of a 
 commodity, therefore, gives work to thousands of men 
 
FREE TRADE, 8L 
 
 who would otherwise he idle ; and wheii men are earn- 
 ing money they spend it. They buy more furniture for 
 their homes, more clothes for their back, more and 
 better food ; and it is only when they are out of work, 
 and as poor as Christopher Sly, that, like him, they have 
 " no more doublets than backs, no more stockings than, 
 legs, nor no more shoes than feet." The prosperity 
 of the working man, then, increases . the prosperity of 
 the butcher, the baker, the publican, the tailor, and 
 all the manufactures and industries upon which these 
 , trades depend. To tax one- is to restrict the trade 
 in all. It is therefore evident that an increase in th& 
 consumption of any single commodity affects, and 
 beneficially affects, the whole of the labour market, 
 from one end to the otherJ 
 
 Now, as we cannot restrict one trade without all 
 trades suffering, so we cannot have free trade so 
 long as any single trade is trammelled, and no scheme 
 could be more cunningly devised for restricting and 
 annoying trade than our Custom House system. As 
 procrastination is the thief of time, so Tapidity in 
 despatch is the very life and soul of modern commercial 
 enterprise. Every delay increases the cost of a com- 
 modity; every additional person employed in its pro- 
 duction or movements increases the cost, and it is. 
 
 F 
 
82 FREE TRADE. 
 
 therefore essential that there should be as few causes as 
 possible for the one, and as little necessity as possible 
 for the other. I have pointed out on a previous occa- 
 sion the extraordinary and farcical operation of the 
 CuStopa House system. And yet sufih a state of 
 things is inseparable from anything less than perfect 
 freedoni of trade. It is one of the anomalous results 
 that must inevitably follow Custom House manage- 
 ment wherever these institutions exist. Great Britain 
 has,- in fact, only sixteen pol-ts and landing towns at 
 which it is really worth her while to collect duties. 
 But all the other ports, must, be watched at enormous 
 expense, in order that the present system may b^ 
 carried on. 
 
 Let me say a few words about this system of 
 Customs and Excise. It is deeply to be regretted that 
 the public do not know more than they do of these 
 twin-horrors. The reason is that Parliament is not 
 inclined to talk much about them. '* It is not," says 
 Mr. Leslie, whose admirable essay on Financial Keform 
 you ought all to read, " the policy of Finance Ministers 
 to find fault with taxes so long as it is convenient 
 to retain them." In the first place, the army of 
 Custom House officers in the United Kingdom nearly 
 reaches the number of 6,000, exclusive of that part 
 
FREE TRADE. , 83 
 
 of the Coastguard Service employed in the protec- 
 tion of the revenue, and vsrhich amounts to about 
 the same number. These form a cordon around our 
 coast, preventing trade being carried on at any except 
 licensed ports, and thusj it may be observed at the 
 outset, preventing many a fishing village from develop- 
 ing into a thriving seaport town. Nature and the 
 requirements of trade would naturally select the most 
 apprppriate spots whence to trade ; but Her Majesty's 
 Commissioners of Customs arrogate to themselves 
 greater wisdom than the former, and have very little 
 respect for the latter. They have, therefore, as I 
 pointed out on another occasion, limited to certain 
 places the exercise of the universal right to trade, 
 both by importing and ^ exporting also, although, as 
 there are no duties levied whatever on exports, one 
 would have -thought that merchandise might have been 
 allowed to leave England vdthout let or hindrance from 
 the most convenient places that could be found. 
 
 Any goods, whether imported or exported, may be 
 weighed, searched, unpacked, repacked, and a whole 
 host of other things done to them besides. The 
 number of authorised places where any or all of 
 these things can be done is, as already stated, 133 ; 
 and , at no other place, however well adapted it may 
 
84 FBEE TRADE. 
 
 be for an export or an import trade, can ships load 
 their cargoes and merchants buy them. It is seen 
 therefore that, when a ship is approaching this country, 
 the price of its cargo to the community may be increased 
 by its not being allowed to make for the nearest safe 
 port, but by its being obliged to conform to these Cus- 
 toms regulations. It may, however, be thought that 
 133 is a sufficient number of inlets or outlets to 
 satisfy the wants of the trading community. It is 
 therefore well to remember that trading cannot be 
 freely carried on at even all these ports. The right 
 of importing wine, for instance, is limited to 59 of 
 them, and wine imported into any other is forfeited. 
 The wine trade, too, is subject to a stiU further 
 restriction respecting the ports at which wine can be 
 tested for duty, of which there are only eleven in the 
 kingdom. The importation of tobacco, again, is limited 
 to 35 of the 133 authorised ports, and it is only recently 
 that so many as are now allowed to do so have been 
 permitted to import tea ; and the privilege is so ham- 
 pered with restrictions as to be almost useless in every 
 port except London. 
 
 There are, it is seen, three sorts of places around 
 our coast. 1st. Those at which no importation or expor- 
 tation whatever can take place. 2nd. Places at which 
 
FREE TRADE. , 86 
 
 goods generally can be imported and exported, but where 
 the importation of some classes is forbidden, and of 
 others impeded : and 3rd. Those which are permitted 
 both to import and export under certain conditions. 
 Now, one would have thought that in the selection of 
 Custom House officials the Commissioners at any rate 
 would have selected men who had some means of know- 
 ing the circumstances and capacities of each creek, bay, 
 and estuary around the coast. On the other hand, the 
 fact is, the men who have been selected to carry out 
 the Custom House system, from the Chief Commis- 
 sioner downwards, seem to have been chosen because 
 they were inspired with a notion that it was their special 
 function to restrict trade as much as possible. It is 
 not surprising, therefore, to find that when the inlia- 
 bitants of certain places have seen the advantage of 
 their towns being made into ports, and have applied 
 for that privilege, the request has been flatly refused. 
 This is no rare thing, but has often taken place. An 
 instance occurs to me. 
 
 A short time ago I was at Wprcester, and as I stood 
 on the graceful bridge which spans the Severn there, I 
 could not help wondering how it was that a river 
 so adapted for navigation, should loiter lazily along and 
 waste itself iu the ocean. I was struck also at a quay 
 
86 FBEE TRADE. 
 
 with the rusty railway lines half buried in the dust 
 drift, and wondered why they had ever been laid, if 
 instead of the busy traffic which one would have 
 thought had called for them, there was no further 
 use for the quay and its lines than to serve as a prome- 
 nade for two nurse girls with perambulators, and two 
 idlers with short clay pipes. It seems that the inha- 
 bitants of Worcester were, some time ago, actuated 
 by the very natural desire of increasing the wealth of 
 the town. With that 'view, a large sum of money — 
 no less than a quarter of a million sterling — was 
 spent in rendering the river Severn navigable as far 
 as Worcester, in making, the qtay and the railway 
 lines, preparing bonding warehouses, and doing all they 
 could to make the dull old cathedral city into a lively 
 port. Ships of 160 tons burthen, larger than that in 
 which Coltimbus discovered America, could be brought 
 up to the bridge, and had even taken — illegally, I 
 suppose, as permission had not been given for their 
 owners to trade— ^cargoes to the Mediterranean. The 
 effect of Worcester being a port would be that Birming- 
 ham, Worcester, Kidderminster, and other large towns 
 in the neighbourhood would all be brought, as it were, 
 thirty miles nearer the sea, and any commercial man 
 knows the advantage of that. There could be no doubt 
 
FEEE TRADE. 87 
 
 that the result would be a very large increase in the 
 iron, earthenware,- and other trades. 
 
 Such, was the hopeful future which seemed' to dawn 
 upon the people of Worcester. Blessed, however, is he 
 who expects nothing, for he shall not be disappointed. 
 • The authorities said in effect to a deputation on the 
 subject, "We admit that you have completely made out 
 your case. We believe that, as you say, there would be 
 ■a very considerable trade ; but to permit vessels to go 
 thirty miles up a narrow river would lead to so much 
 smuggling, and would require such an expensive esta- 
 blishment to prevent it, that it cannot be allowed." So 
 this explains the desolation visible from the bridge 
 at Worcester. Our system creates smuggling; but 
 because there would be smuggling, you shall not 
 have the advantage of our system. Strange logic ! 
 The quay might be busy with men collecting and 
 distributing the products of a thousand industries. 
 The quay is deserted. Magnificent warehouses might 
 take the place of the present humble buildings, and 
 the river might be crowded with shipsj instead of lazily 
 wasting itself in the ocean. Because, however, it 
 is necessairy to levy Customs duties, the quarter of 
 a million was thrown away, a large and populous 
 district is forbidden direct communication with the sea, 
 
88 FREE TRADE. 
 
 and all is lost that was done with so much care, 
 labour, and expense. 
 
 The people of Worcester and its district, including 
 such towns as Birmingham, Wolverhampton, and 
 Droitwich, are at a disadvantage as compared with other 
 places, and have not only to pay an extra tax in the 
 way of increased cost of land carriage, but they are 
 deprived of a large foreign trade. This is all the more 
 galhng, biBcause other places with not half the claims of 
 Worcester have been made ports, and avail themselves 
 so little of the privilege that they do not even collect 
 the expenses of the Custom House ; and others, 
 although honoured with large Custom House establish- 
 ments, do not collect a single penny. Verily Worcester 
 — with the brand on its forehead of being forbidden to 
 trade — is in itself an energetic protest against the 
 iniquitous system of indirect taxation, which at present 
 deprives the country of the advantage of free trade. 
 
 I do not know how to give you an adequate notion 
 of the inconveniences, and therefore losses, attendant 
 on our Custom House system^ I could weary you with 
 instances. I was reading the other day the Customs 
 Officers' Manual, which, amongst other things, startled 
 me with the information that, though tea may be 
 legally admitted into many of the ports in the United 
 
FREE TRADE. 89 
 
 Kingdom, yet the restrictions are so exacting that the 
 impoi-tation of that commodity is virtually confined to 
 London, while Hartlepool, Lynn, Ipfewich, Greenock, 
 Newcastle, and other place's, are not considered fit 
 places for its reception ; so that I suppose if a vessel 
 arrives in Newcastle with a cargo for that town, part of 
 which is tea, it must land all hut that, and then 
 proceed to London with the tea. The instructions 
 to the officers in the book I have mentioned, shewing 
 how they have to hoard, to rummage, to seal up the 
 exciseable stores in the ship, and to examine them 
 every day, and a host of other things, take up twenty- 
 ' two pages, while instructions as to waijehousing, etc., 
 nearly all of them of an absurdly intricate character, 
 occupy other twenty-seven pages. The process of delay 
 a commodity is subjected to in the warehouse is 
 remarkable. A writer, in the Produce Markets 
 Review, has calculated that if the various forms which 
 have to be filled up whenever any commodity arrives in 
 England were pasted together, they would form a 
 carpet 29 feet 9^ inches long, by 28 feet 2 inches wide. 
 These forms are thirty-eight in number, and of course 
 require a great number of clerks to work at them, who' 
 might be more productively employed. I have read let- 
 ters upon letters detailing the inconvenience, expense. 
 
90 FREE TRADE. 
 
 absurdity, and waste attending taxed articles, even in 
 the bonding warehouses. To illustrate the kind of 
 annoyances to which merchants are subjected by the 
 obnoxious system of Custom Houses, I will give an 
 -extract from a letter from a firm of Liverpool ship- 
 brokers with which I am acquainted, written to one of 
 their foreign clients. The letter is dated 16th August, 
 1873, and the extract is as follows : — " Delay has been 
 caused entirely by vexatious Customs regulations, which 
 we had never previously come into contact with, or even 
 heard of. We mentioned, in our last that we had 
 obtained permission to draw off the spirit into tins as 
 required, but we found at last that this by no means 
 included permission to mix medicines or perfumery 
 with it, and this we were flatly refused. However, we 
 found that in London, though not in Liverpool, per- 
 fumery might be mixed with spirit, and accordingly 
 you may expect the Ess. Eossb, Geranii, Menth., Pip., 
 and Alkanet by the first steamer next month ; but the 
 other articles we are not allowed to prepare in this 
 free country, and therefore cannot send. We must 
 say we feel mortified and ashamed that such stupid 
 restrictions upon trade should still exist in England 
 at this time — but we cannot overcome them. If you 
 would like the medicines and spirit separately we can 
 
FBEE TRADE. 91 
 
 send them without difficulty; but we suppose our 
 ^ Customs authorities have discovered that mixing is a 
 crime and misdemeanour." 
 
 Sometimes, too, the , departments get ^ at logger- 
 heads. Not long ago, a firin imported 300 pipes of 
 wine, and, for a good reason, bonded half of them 
 in the Custom House vaults, the- other half in those 
 of the Inland Kevenue. Subsequently, the merchant 
 had an order for 200 pipes. He got the 150 frota the 
 Custom House, but on application to the Inland Eeve- 
 nue for 50 from the other lot, he was refused, and 
 the Customs authority he showed was laughed at by 
 the Inland Eevenue, officers j and to such a pass .did 
 the quarrel between the two Government departments 
 get, that after great delay and inconvenience the 
 Customs officials broke open the doors of the ware- 
 house of the others, and the 50 casks required were 
 obtained by force. 
 
 , I must not ^eary you by pursuing this uninterest- 
 ing phase of the question. No description or mere recital 
 of instances can convey an adequate idea of the incpn- 
 venience and annoyance to the trades concerned, of the 
 vast ampunt of corruption the system gives rise to, and 
 of the loss to the public. Every trade is harassed, 
 and every commodity which gets into the claws of the 
 
92 FBEE TRADE. 
 
 Custom House, becomes so much dearer to the con- 
 sumer. I conclude by calling attention to what is 
 called " racking." Backing, I believe, is the pumping 
 of spirits from one cask into another, or the filling of a 
 number of small casks from a large one. Until 
 recently, I am told, this was done either by the distiller 
 or the retailer, free from Excise intermeddling, and 
 therefore without any cost to the public; whereas 
 racking in warehouse is now performed under Excise 
 supervision at th& public expense. Books and forms 
 are prepared in London BiUd distributed over the 
 kingdom, not for the public use, but for that of private 
 traders ; and the time of, public-paid servants is largely 
 occupied in attendance on processes in which the public 
 have not the slightest interest or concern. In this 
 racking business any deficiency not exceeding 1 per 
 cent, is to be disregarded ; yet 1 per cent, of the spirit 
 duty amounts to £110,000 annually ; no small sum to 
 be thrown away, just that publicans and others may be 
 saved the trouble of sorting their own spirits, and 
 which sum, if " racking" were not done by public ser- 
 vants, would of course find its way into the exchequer. 
 
 Although the bonding system somewhat alleviates 
 the evils I have mentioned, yet the wine trade com- 
 plains that the saving is very little; and competent 
 
FBEE TRADE. 93 
 
 judges show that if the bonding system were abolished, 
 10 per cent, would be saved ; while from " loss in 
 warehouse " another 5 per cent, are sacrificed, and by 
 gauging, 10 per cent., making a total loss of 25 per 
 cent. " at the Very least." As a large importer says : 
 " It may possibly be said that these interruptions and 
 impediments of Customs regulations are trifling and 
 insignificant, or, at least, of no great importance ; but 
 in commerce, no check, however apparently slight in 
 itself, can be disregarded as insignificant in effect. 
 Fetters, however slight, are stiU fetters, and must more 
 or less impede progress. As in some mighty engine, 
 the intrusion of the smallest particle of a foreign , sub- 
 stance into its machinery causes immediate derange- 
 ment or suspension of its action, and, if not promptly 
 removed, might eventually cause its destruction. So 
 in commerce. An accumulation of petty impediments, 
 with ' damnable iteration,' may at last, like the 
 threads that bound Gulliver, prove sufficient to paralyse 
 even the most healthy and persistent vitality." To 
 all tljese annoyances have to be added the fact that 
 shippers have to employ , clerks on purpose to- attend 
 to Custom House business, which of course is an addi- 
 tional item in the cost of commodities. 
 
 I think, then, that I have shown that the system of 
 
fl4 FREE TRADE. 
 
 Customs and Excise ia really a blockade of our own 
 coasts, rivers, and harbours, against free intercourse 
 with all the natidns of the earth. Custonj House 
 duties impede the exchange of commodities with foreign 
 countries. Their collection necessitates numerous and 
 expensive buildings, warehouses, revenue cutters and 
 cruisers, and innumeiable Government ofiBicials ; and 
 the abolition pf the whole system would not only cause 
 much less money to be required to pay for the collec- 
 tion of the revenue, thus reducing the national burdens, 
 -but would materially increase the ability of every sub- 
 ject to bear his share of those Jburdens. 
 
 Gentlemen, if Free Trade be not a good thing, let 
 us sacrifice what we have of it and go back to pro- 
 tection. Ought commodities to be taxed? Then go to 
 Middlesborough or Barrow-in-Furness and advocate a 
 duty on the manufacture of Iron. Go into Lanca- 
 shire and propose a duty on cotton. Go to Yorkshire 
 and suggest a tax upon Australian wools. "Why the 
 whole British army could not carry out such a policy. 
 People would see that the withdrawal of so much 
 capital from the workshops would be followed by less 
 work, and a great many of the artizans now in full 
 employment would soon be clamouring round the doors 
 of the workhouse. On the other hand, it has been 
 
FREE TRADE. 95 
 
 stated, by a competent authority, that were customs and 
 excise abohshed, we should be able to buy for nine- 
 pence that for which we now have to give a shilling. 
 It will at once be seen that this is no exaggeration, 
 because when a person now spends one shilling at the 
 grocer's for cocoa, If d. is for the Government ; out of 
 one shilling's worth of coffee, 2^A. is for. the State ; 
 out of" one shilling's worth of currants, 3f d. ; raisins, ' 
 2^d- ; tea, 4Jd. Why need I suppose a case ? Did 
 not Mr. Lowe attempt a retrograde policy by his insane 
 •proposal to impose a duty on matches ? He failed to 
 see the restrictions which such a tax would impose 
 upon other industries than match making : . the manu- 
 facturing chemist, the timber trade, the printing trade, 
 the paper trade, and I know not how many others. It is 
 no argument to, answer, It was to be a small duty. The 
 annoyance and , the expense are the same, whether the 
 duty be great or small. Look at the case of America. 
 The imposition of, duties has ruined the ship-building 
 trade in -America. In six years that trade fell off one- 
 half. In 1860, no fewer than fifteen thousand men were 
 employed in New York in building and repairing 
 marine steam engines. In 1870, fewer than seven 
 hundred found employment in the same branch of 
 industry. You will be surprised to hear, that in the 
 opinion of the Hon. D. Kelly, late presideiit of the 
 
96 FBEE TRADE. 
 
 American Institute of Mining Engineers at Phila- 
 delphia, the effect of what free trade we have in Eng- 
 land has been to foster anarchy in Ireland, and to rob 
 the life of the labourer in England and Scotland of all 
 its joys. " The millions of sturdy men " declared this 
 paragon of. a politician " represented by Bradlaugh, 
 Odger, Joseph Arch, and the travelled and humane 
 patrician. Sir Charles Dilke, know that the world owes 
 every man a living, and that it is only by protection 
 that the' means of living can be secured to the people." 
 The Hon. David WeUs, the Cobden of America, 
 has recently pointed out to Englishmen the great evils 
 that have fallen upon his country in consequence of its 
 blind and foolish policy. His terse eloquence is so 
 convincing that I make no apology for quoting largely 
 from his speech. He tells us that the present Ameri- 
 can tariff has produced nothing but "disaster aind' 
 failure." Wages have not increased in the same pro- 
 portion as in Europe ; the purchasing power of the 
 dollar is less than ever it was. Exports were never 
 less, and imports never dearer. " The flag of the 
 American commercial marine has been almost swept 
 from the ocean." When the Shah visited Liverpool 
 there was only one ship which could float the Stars 
 and Stripes ; while, I have been informed by a 
 
FREE XBADE. 97 
 
 Liverpool shipper, that a few years ago, American 
 vessels were "fashionable," so to speak, and were pre- 
 ferred to the English ships, but that now American 
 ships cannot be found. " There was exhibited," said 
 Mr. Wells, ■ " at Vienna last summer, one of the recent 
 wonders of Ameriban invention ; namely, a model of a 
 Yankee shoe factory, in which all the work essential for 
 the making of a shoe ^ the cutting, pegging, sewing, 
 shaping, heeling, and polishing — are performed by 
 machinery, and in which one man is enabled to do in 
 greater perfection the work formerly performed by two ; 
 and yet, more surprising than all, is the fact that, 
 not^ithstandipg this machinery has come into general 
 use, boots and shoes in the United States now cost 
 fifty per cent, more than they did prior to its invention, 
 and our export trade in these commodities, which was 
 formerly large, has become very inconsideifable." 
 
 ' Perhaps the climax of Anti-Free Trade principles is 
 shown in the following extract : — " In short, the whole 
 aim and object of this school of economists has been to 
 engraft upon the country a sort of Chinese policy of 
 prohibition and exclusion ; and their great leader and 
 teacher, Henry C. Carey, of Philadelphia, has not hesi- 
 tated to publicly express his opinion that the very best 
 thing which could happen to the United States would 
 
98 FBEE TRADE. 
 
 be to have the ocean that foils between the two conti- 
 nents converted into a sea of fire so impassable, that if 
 Dives wa^ in Europe and Lazarus in Pennsylvania, 
 they could not under any circumstances enter into com- 
 mercial correspondence. And within a comparatively 
 recent period, also, this same individual, who, it will be 
 remembered, aspires to the reputation of a great 
 teacher, has over and over again expressed the opinion 
 that the death of Richard Cobden was one of the 
 crowning mercies for ^hich the United States had 
 cause for gratitude ; for the reason that if Mr. Cobden 
 had lived, it was his purpose to have again visited 
 America, and that such was the universal respect of the 
 people for his name and his services, that they would 
 in crowds have flocked to his speaking, a contingency 
 especially to be dreaded, lest in hearing with their ears, 
 and understanding with their hearts, they should have 
 become converted to his principles." 
 
 There is, however, still some hope for that great 
 nation. The shoe is beginning to pinch. The woollen 
 manufacturers, the agriculturists, and the steel manu- 
 facturers are crying out. " The mills of the gods," 
 said Mr. Wells, " though grinding exceedingly slow, 
 nevertheless grind sure and fine, and the time now 
 draws near when the judgment of the American people, 
 
FEES . TRADE. 99 
 
 long delayed, is likely to be so manifested in opposition 
 to the doctrine of. protection, as to cause it to disappear 
 for ever, as an element, from the fiscal policy of the 
 Government. But this result, when it occurs, will not 
 be due so much to argument or individual effort as to the 
 force of circumstances, which are compelhng thought 
 and conviction amongst the masses, whether they will 
 it or no. Thus, within the past two years, the United 
 States^ as you all well know, have been visited by two 
 remarkable and terrible conflagrations — the one in 
 Chicago and the other in Boston. The first impulse in 
 both cases, as soon as the people recovered from the . 
 shock of their disaster, was to petition for a removal of 
 the tariff on the import of those articles necessary for a 
 reconstruction pf their habitations and places of busi- 
 ness ; thus uncbnsciously testifying that the general 
 result of protection was diminution of abundance — a 
 premium on- scarcity and a restriction on growth, that 
 in the time of calamity was scarcely endurable. The 
 request in the first instance was acceded to on the part 
 of Congress,^ but in the second refused — the protec- 
 tionists becoming alarmed at the inevitable logic of the 
 transaction ; but the circumstance, nevertheless, occa- 
 sioned not a few to ask themselves why a course of 
 legislation that, was acknowledged to be beneficial to 
 
100 FREE TRADE. 
 
 those temporarily made destitute, was not likely to 
 prove equally satisfactory to those made permanently 
 pioor by reason of other circumstances." 
 
 Again, gentlemen, I repeat that every step, however 
 faltering that step may have b6en, which we have made 
 ' towards free trade, has been beneficial. The history of 
 the importation of every commodity proves this. No 
 sooner was the duty off paper than a large import 
 trade in rags set in. Before the duties were taken off 
 timber, furniture being admitted duty free, English 
 carpenters actually had to emigrate to make furniture 
 for their own country, because it could be made 
 cheaper abroad. Now, however, there is a great export 
 trade from England. Ask anyone if it be desirable to 
 re-impose the timber duties. What was the result of 
 the French treaty, which it was prophesied would ruin 
 Macclesfield and Coventry ? Coventry and Macclesfield 
 will tell you they have suffered nothing, but gained 
 much. The increase of trade between England and 
 France, which that treaty gave rise to, was enormous. 
 The result was well pointed out by an American paper. 
 "By exchange with England, France gets for eighty 
 dollars in silks, cottons which would otherwise cost her 
 ninety-six doUars, — a handsome gain of twenty per 
 cent. England gets, for cottons costing a hundred 
 
FREE TBADB. 101 
 
 dollars, silks which ifonld otherwise have cost her a 
 hnndred and twenty dollars, — another handsome gain 
 of twenty per cent." As soon as the treaty was ratified, 
 the Bradford hotels filled with hnyers from France, 
 and firms in Manchester, Birmingham, London, Leeds, 
 Sheffield, and other towns opened branch offices in Paris. 
 Then, again, when the tea dnty was redaced, I find 
 from the Times, that India rejoiced with an exceeding 
 great joy. " Xew tea companies, all sound, are spring- 
 ing np every day, and several coffee companies have 
 been established in Madras. A gentlemen, who has 
 jost retomed from a visit to Cachar, says the whole 
 valley is now owned by English settlers, nnder Lord 
 Canning's waste ' land rules. Savage Koobies, who 
 nsed to cat each others throats, and those of our sub- 
 jects, are now thriving labourers in n^t cottages. A 
 valley, destitute of population and worthless to the 
 State before the mutiny, now yields a good revenue, 
 besides the purchase-mon^ of the land, and is as 
 smiling as an English county." " Already," says Mr, 
 John Noble, "two of our colonial possessions have 
 established &ee trade with the best results. It has 
 raised Singapore &om the condition of a fishing vil- 
 lage to that of a prosperous mart ; while in the West, 
 Vancouver's Island had followed the example, and in 
 
102 FREE TRADE. 
 
 three years its imports of British goods rose from 
 458,511 to 2,000,000 dollars." Go back to protection, 
 forsooth! Ask the British merchants. One more 
 instance. Mr. Edmund-Potter, ex-M. P. for Carlisle, in 
 addressing his workpeople a short time ago, reminded 
 them that when he started the calico printing works at 
 Dinting Vale, in 1825, there was not a single article 
 nsed in the works which was not taxed, whether it were 
 timber, glass, soap, starch, salt, paper, cotton, madder 
 dyes, or oil. It was, Mr. Potter says, very np-hill work 
 in these days. " If," said he, " I were asked to what I 
 owe my prosperity, I should say that it was based 
 simply on the good free-trade measures which have 
 been passed within the last forty years." I hope you 
 will not think I have dealt too much in quotations. I 
 have done so advisedly. I think it much better, when 
 speaking of the influence of certain restrictions on trade, 
 to select the testimony of those who are competent to 
 speak of its influence, rather than give in my own words 
 what could only be the opinion of an amateur. On 
 such a subject, too, as the abstract question of Free 
 Trade, I believe that my argument is strengthened by 
 quoting the opinion of those whose authority is acknow- 
 ledged, rather than give the same opinion without such 
 authority. 
 
FREE TRADE. 103 
 
 ' Taxes on imports are Tirtoally taxes on exports as 
 well, by diminishing oar demand for those commodities 
 in which the foreigner pajs us. They therefore limit 
 the good which might otherwise be accomplished, and 
 bring abont the least good to the least 'nnmber, instead 
 of, like free trade, the greatest good to the greatest 
 number. It must be remembered that no country can 
 export an article or product to any extent unless it is 
 prepared to seU the same as cheap as other nations ; 
 and therefore the ability or inability to export becomes 
 a true test of the ability or inability, profitably, to 
 produce for the domestic market. That is to say, that 
 if fore^ers will not buy of us, it is because we are 
 charging too much for our commodities ; and if we are 
 doing that we are causing a loss to our own country- 
 men. It is no answer to say. It is no loss, because 
 we never had them cheaper. I hold that where a 
 man, or a nation, might hscve gained, and is pre- 
 vented firom doing so, he, or it, suffers a loss. 
 A gentleman once drew my attention to the &ct, 
 that a printing-press had been purchased on the con- 
 tinent by one of the London newspaper proprietors, 
 and my firiend said, " See what &ee trade is doing ; 
 the foreigners are able to buy iron in this country, 
 make it into machines in their own, and then bring it 
 
104 FREE TRADE. 
 
 over here and undersell us in our own market." He 
 thought that a sign that the country was going to 
 pieces. I saw nothing alarming in the fact. The 
 machine must have been able to do the same or a 
 greater amount of work at a less cost than others they 
 could buy here or it would not have been purchased, 
 in which case capital was liberated for the employment 
 of labour in other channels, while the machine itself 
 caused more paper, more printing ink, et cetera, et 
 cetera, to be used than were used before, and thus 
 industries were stimulated and employment increased. 
 
 I mention this, because now-a-days we hear some- 
 thing of " Revivers of Industey " and others, who cry 
 aloud for Reciprocity, and talk a deal about the Balance 
 of Trade. I will not insult your intelligence by dwell- 
 ing on such vagaries. When we buy more than we sell, 
 we must be gainers. When we buy cheaper than we 
 can produce, we are also gainers. Exportation repre- 
 sents labour, importation wealth. In fact, the exports 
 cannot increase if the imports are restricted ; and the 
 answer, that when we change goods of different prices, 
 one party must lose, is fallacious. It is the compara- 
 tive, not the actual, value which must be looked to ; 
 and all that concerns us is the value to' us. This was 
 well put by the American paper I have just quoted. 
 
FBEE TRADE. 105 
 
 What we have to do is to fredy admit all the imports 
 we can get. Take care of the imports, the exports will 
 take care of themselves. The " balance of trade " 
 and the " reciprodly " arguments have no weight wilii 
 me. Mr. Bright clenched aU such objections by ask- 
 ing, "If the foreigner refuses to buy cheaply of us, 
 will it mend the matter if we refuse to buy cheaply of 
 him?" 
 
 Of course, in peaking of free trade, I mean £ree 
 trade in everything, including land and banking. 
 These are, however, two phases of the question too 
 elaborate in detail to be treated of on this occasion. 
 The Bank Charter Act creates a monopoly and causes 
 panics. ^The, pectiliar tenure of land creates a worse 
 monopoly stiU. The Bank Charter Act has often to be 
 suspended, and ought to be suspended altogether, while 
 as to free trade in land I cannot do better than give its 
 definition as in the words of John Bright : " It means 
 the abolition of the law of primogenitnie, and the limi- 
 tation of the system of entails and settlements, so that, 
 ' life interests ' may be for the most part got rid of, and 
 a real ownership substituted for them. It means also 
 that it shall be as easy to buy or seU land as to buy or 
 sell a ship, or, at least, as easy as it is in Australia, 
 and in many or in all the States of the American 
 
106 FREE TRADE. 
 
 Union. It means that no legal encouragement shall 
 be given to great estates and great farms, and that the 
 natural forces of accumulation and dispersion shall have 
 free play, as they have with regard to ships, and shares, 
 and machinery, and stock-in-trade, and money. It 
 means, tjoo, that while the lawyer shall be well paid for 
 his work, unijecessary work shall not be made for him, 
 involving an enormous tax on all transactions in con- 
 nection with the purchase and sale of lands and houses. 
 A thorough reform in this matter would comple,t6, with 
 regard to land, the great work accomplished by the 
 Anti-Corn Law League in 1846. It would give an 
 endless renown to the Minister who made it, and would 
 bless to an incalculable extent all classes connected 
 with, and dependent on, honest industry." 
 
 Gentlemen, I have not laid before you the whole 
 case of Free Trade. That was done thirty years ago 
 by Mr. Cobden and Mr. Bright, and to the history 
 of that time I must refer those who are not yet converts 
 to its principles. All I have attempted is to draw your 
 attention to a few of the arguments in its favour which 
 seem to be forgotten to-day. There seems to be still a 
 lingering after the Custom House and the exciseman. 
 Have I not shown how they hinder commerce, restrict 
 trade, cramp industries, and really tax labour ? Com- 
 
FREE TRADE. 107 
 
 merce, Isaiah says, is a "hoKness unto the Lord." 
 Surely that should be remembered when it is proposed 
 so to surround it with restrictions that its condition 
 becomes one of thraldom and its results oppression. 
 I might also show, that customs and excise interfere 
 with and prevent inventions. "It is a well-known 
 fact," wrote J. Stuart MiU, " that the branches of 
 production in which fewest improvements are made 
 are those with which the Revenue officer interferes.' 
 Probably, if coffee were introduced free, the English 
 people would know how to prepare it. At any rate, 
 the prevention of new discoveries is witholding com- 
 forts from the people. I might have pointed out many 
 other things, but I hope you are already acquainted 
 with them. 
 
 I trust I have ^hown that every duty is a spolia- 
 tion of the masses for the profit of the producer; 
 a robbery of the many for the benefit of the few; 
 making the rich richer, and the poor poorer. It 
 is sometimes said, " Tax luxuries only." It is true 
 that luxuries are consumed by the rich, but their 
 production employs thousands and thousands of the 
 poor. Wine is the staple product of the whole of the 
 South of Europe, and a population of from forty to 
 fifty millions is more or less engaged in its produc- 
 
108 FREE TRADE. 
 
 tion ; a population, top, be it remembered, not of . 
 Asiatics, not of half-civilised and half-clothed people, 
 but of like habits and of similar civilisation to our 
 own, inhabiting also countries easily accessible to our 
 ships, and consequently in every respect in a condition 
 the most favourable to the trade of this country, and 
 doubtless requiring many of its productions. 
 
 Free schools, free churches, free land may be 
 wanted; but above all, free importation is wanted. 
 Labour is not fiee so long as the fruit of labour 
 is not. It is not enough that the farmer should be 
 at liberty to grow what he likes, or the handicraftsman 
 to make what he likes ; they should be free to procure, 
 in exchange for what they have produced, the utmost of 
 all other things that they want. " Surely," as Mrs. 
 Somerville once said, " as much food as a man can buy 
 with as much wages as a man can get, for as much 
 work as a man can do, is not more than the natural, 
 inalienable birthright of every man whom God has 
 created with strength to labour and vrath hands to 
 work." 
 
 Sir Robert Peel, Cobden, and others 'have stated, 
 over and over again, that if the principle of Free Trade 
 be good for corn it is good for everything else ; and 
 Cobden added that, if any one have dou"bts as to 
 
FREE TRADE. 109 
 
 whether indirect taxes obstruct commerce, impede 
 manufactures, and check the production of wealth, he 
 ought to compare the progress of a free port like 
 Hamburg with a Custom House . bound place like 
 Havre. What does England now fear from bad 
 harvests ? She knows she may suffer from them,, but 
 she knowp also she cap bear the trial. The misery of 
 the Corn Laws can never be repeated. We know that 
 when we have bad harvests at home we can rely upon 
 corn from distant regions whose very whereabouts as 
 cornfields were never dreamed of during "the time the 
 Corn Laws were in existence, and would never have 
 been thought of but for the stimulus to trade which the 
 repeal Of those laws gave. This is how it is with corn. 
 England is becoming the corn mart of the world ; shci 
 might be the same for sugar, and indeed, from her 
 central position,* for all the commodities produced in 
 every country on the face of the earth. 
 
 Gentlemeui although I have not mentioned the 
 higher and nobler, the deeper and wider mission ,of 
 Free Trade, I have not forgotten it. There is no 
 
 • "It is a fact," wrote Sir John Hersoliel, "not a little interesting 
 , to Englishmen, s(nd, combined w^th onr insular station in that great 
 highway of nations, the Atlantic, not a little explanatory of our commer- 
 cial eminence, that London occnpiea nearly the centre of the terrestrial 
 hemisphere." 
 
110 FSEE TRADE. 
 
 country now entirely independent of all others for 
 everything it requires. Cosmopolitanism is day hy da.y 
 hecoming a fact. Cobden said, "Free Trade is the 
 International Law of the Almighty," and he spoke 
 truly. He never spoke falsely. Wliy, then, not recog- 
 nise the truth ? Why encourage anomalies ? To unite 
 na,tions, on the one hand, with railways, telegraphs, 
 and the general shortening of distances, and to separate 
 them, on the other, by the establishment of artificial 
 barriers, are two sorts of incompatible things, of which 
 one ought and must necessarily destroy the other. 
 
 In the earliest stage of society, robbery and plunder 
 were mare honourable than labour — commerce was 
 unknown. In the dark ages, nations, only came into ■ 
 contact with each other sword in hand amid the din 
 of war. Then it was thought that the prosperity of a 
 nation depended upon the subjection in which it could 
 keep its neighbours. Commerce is fast making all this 
 obsolete. The " Eule Britannia, Britannia rules the 
 sea" doctrine is giving place to the fraternal strife 
 of industry. As Mr. Gladstone says, "It is not that 
 one country extorts from another that which another 
 reluctantly yields as the dictate of an imperious neces- 
 sity ; but that each freely and intelligently gives to each 
 that which each can best afford, and for which it 
 
FREE TRADE. Ill 
 
 receives in return tax more than the value." The 
 removal of all ohstructions to this intercourse would 
 tend to the annihilation of national jealousies, preju- 
 dices, misunderstandings, and the other causes which 
 have often led to Actual warfare. No one can consider 
 the various products of different climes without seeing 
 that fair exchanges, to the benefit of all, may be made 
 between the frigid North and the luxurious South, the 
 wide prairies of the West and lihe looms of the East. 
 No one can fail to see an identity of interests all over 
 the world. However much the various nations of the 
 earth may differ in manners and customs, however 
 widely they may be separated in religion, whatever may 
 be their language or their colour, there is one bond — 
 Free Trade, unshackled industry — that binds them 
 together with the golden clasps of brotherhood, and 
 spreads from zone to zone, and from pole to pole, that 
 goodwill among men which is the safest, the surest, 
 and the best way of securing peace upon earth. 
 
112 
 
 The National Expendittjee. 
 
 In approaching the question of National Expen- 
 diture, a strong objection is met with at the very outset. 
 It is said that it is impossible justly to criticise 
 proposed reductions without a departmental knowledge 
 of the offices to which those reductions refer ; that no 
 man is competent to speak of a less expenditure on 
 our defensive forces without an intimate acquaintance 
 with the innermost workings of the Admiralty, the 
 Horse Guards, and the War Office ; that we ought not 
 to advocate the reduction of Ambassadors' salaries 
 without having held the post of Foreign Secretary ; nor 
 object to the sinecural office of the Lord Privy Seal, 
 unless we have been fortunate enough to have had 
 a seat in the Cabinet. 
 
 There is considerable force in this objection. No 
 man can fathom the workings of all the departments of 
 the State, and no man is therefore competent to point 
 out the exact places where reductions may be made. 
 But,, on the other hand, certain things come to light 
 
THE NATIONAL MXPBNDITURE. 113 
 
 which make men stare mth astonishment. ' If the 
 various blunders, corrupt practices, and the expensive 
 whims and oddities which are continually brought to 
 the surface be an outward and visible sign of the 
 hidden depths of incompetency, extravagance, and a 
 reckless disiegard for what is right and proper, which 
 lie buried beneath the delicate politeness of officialism, 
 then no one can be at a loss as to how and where 
 great reductions in the national expenditure should be 
 made. 
 
 It must be remembered, too, that those most likely 
 to know the truth are day by day calling aloud for 
 a reduced expenditure. Mr. Gladstone has called the 
 expenditure " immoral," Mr. Bright has asked for an 
 earnest public opinion to check that extravagance which 
 every Ministry in turn condenms, and which none 
 seems able to reduce ; while the latter on the one 
 hand, and Lord Derby on the other, as well as others 
 who are competent to form a judgment, have fixed upon 
 £10,000,000 as a minimum amount by which the 
 national expenditure might be reduced. I take it, then, 
 that there is no disputing that our expenditure is much 
 too great, and the fact that an order-loving people like 
 Englishmen — the most easily governed people on the 
 fece of the earth — should cost nearly £5 apiece per 
 
 H 
 
114 TBE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 annum to be kept secure and in order, a cost greater 
 than that of aoy other nation, is a disgrace upon those 
 who rule us, and a sad reflection upon our character as 
 a business nation. 
 
 Perhaps it would be as well at the outset to point 
 out how it is that money is so easily granted for the 
 Government to spend. Those who have been in the 
 House of Commons when it has been in Committee of 
 Supply must have looked upon the whole thing as 
 a perfect ferce. In the early hours in the morning 
 about a dozen members— often less — lounge on the 
 seats of the House of Commons. Some of them are 
 yawning, others are sleeping ; a few are chatting, while 
 fewer still are paying any attention to the work of the 
 Committee. The Chairman is rapidly gabbling some- 
 thing about thousands and hundreds of thousands, and 
 in a very short time a few millions of John Bull's 
 money have been ordered to be spent, either upon guns 
 or pensions, or folhes of one kind or another. When 
 Sir John Pakington rose to continue the debate on Mr. 
 Fowler's motion for the reduction of the army by ten 
 thousand men, in the Session of 1872, there were pre- 
 sent exactly ten stewards of the national purse ; and 
 the last time Mr. Goshen introduced his Navy Esti- 
 mates, there were not forty members present. Perhaps 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 115 
 
 Mr. White, Mr. Dillwyn, Mr. Rylands, Mr. Mellor, or 
 some other financial reformer opposes a certain vote. 
 The chances are, he wUl be induced to withdraw his 
 motion, on account of sojne specious excuse which the 
 Government has at hand. Occasionally, however, a 
 division will be demanded, and as soon as the bells 
 ring it is found that the "Whip" has sufficient mem- 
 bers lounging about the smoke-room ready at any 
 moment to form a majority, who come and vote they 
 know not and they care not on what, and having voted 
 in obedience to the command of the " Whip," they go 
 back to their cigars and their billiards, sadly complain- 
 ing of those " bores," the economists. Now, how is it 
 that the " Whip " is enabled to have at his beck and 
 call a small army of obstructives to economy ? I will 
 tell you, and when I have done so, I thtak you will 
 acknowledge that there is something more than a mere 
 illustration of apposite phrases in Cobbett's Grammar 
 when it says, " House of Commons — Den of thieves." 
 
 A short time ago, I was told by the representative 
 of one of the largest constituencies in this country, 
 that if a member of Parliament would only support his 
 party by his votes for a few years, through evil report 
 and good report, whenever called upon to do so by the 
 " Whip," he could then have as a reward for his obedi- 
 
116 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBE. 
 
 ence, a baronetcy if he wanted it, or an appointment, 
 or a pension ; or if he were above all that sort of thing, 
 
 V then some such favour could be shown to those of his 
 friends whom he chose to select. This seemed to me 
 so extraordinary that, although shortly afterwards it 
 was repeated to me by an ex-M.P. who had had great 
 experience in the House of Commons, yet I could 
 hardly believe it. Nevertheless, I determined to see if 
 I could learn anything further on the subject. The 
 public utterances of members of Parliament soon satis- 
 fied me that my informants' statements were true. 
 In A^ril, 1873, Mr. Joshua Fielden, the Conservative 
 
 ' member for the Eastern Division of the West Biding of 
 Yorkshire, was addressing a portion of his constituents 
 at Birstal, and speaking of the sum of money voted 
 for the Civil Service, he characterised it as "that 
 fund from which pensions were provided for those 
 who sat and said nothing behind the Government, 
 but who steadily voted for them " ; and the very next 
 month the same honourable member in the House 
 of Commons itself moved the rejection of the Super- 
 annuation Act Amendment Bill, on the ground that 
 it led to men being employed who were inefficient 
 public servants, and because "when a Government 
 was hardly pressed there was such an inducement 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 117 
 
 to abolish old offices, to pension off the holders of 
 them, and to create new ones for the hangers-on 
 of the Government, that the system became most 
 demoralising in its operation." These are the words 
 of a Conservative member. Now I wiU give you 
 the words of a suppoi-ter of Mr. Gladstone. In 
 September, 1872, Mr. McCombie was addressing his 
 supporters in West Aberdeenshire, and with great 
 Jidiveti he spoke as foUows : "I have had the 
 pleasure of obtaining situations for some of my 
 friends in West Aberdeenshire, but in some cases I 
 have failed ; but I trust no one will attribute my failure 
 to any unwillingness on my part to oblige my con- 
 stituents. When I say that there are over three hun- 
 dred and fifty Liberal members in the House of 
 Commons, all of them striving to obtain situations for 
 their friends, and that one hundred of them may be 
 applying for one situation, you will understand how 
 difficult a task the Government have to perform in the 
 distribution of their patronage. I have had no reason 
 to complain, for I have had a very fair share of the 
 patronage of the Government." Having thus given 
 you the words of a Conservative and a Liberal, I 
 will tell you what a Badical says. Sir Charles Dilke, 
 in a speech at Glasgow, in September, 1872, said, 
 
118 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 " I can name to you offices which are perfect sinecures, 
 and to which fresh appointments have been made 
 within a year, with a public statement to Parliament 
 that there are duties to perform, and a private 
 admission that such is not the case." When I stated 
 the above facts at Kendal, in October, 1872, Mr. 
 Whitwell, the member, gave a qualified confirmation 
 of the fact, and indeed right and left, and all around, 
 there is abundant evidence of this disgraceful state 
 of things. I might give you much more evidence of a 
 like nature. Professor Fawcett objects to the national- 
 isation of land, because amongst other things it would 
 give more patronage to the Government, of which they 
 have, he says, already too much ; while Lord Derbv 
 makes a similar objection to the appropriation of rail- 
 ways by the State. Amongst the amenities of the 
 Tichborne trial, is the answer of Mr. H. D. Sejrmour 
 to the question, "What has become of Sir Edward 
 Doughty's valet?" when the honourable member for 
 Poole replied, " I got him a berth in the Customs," — 
 while the appointments that are made, no one knows 
 how, the baronets that are created no one knows why, 
 all tend to show a state of things at St. Stephens 
 of which voters have little idea. The whole system 
 is so permeated with all that is bad, that, as 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 119 
 
 Mr. Gladstone once said, nothing short of a revo- 
 lution could sweep it away. We lift np our hands 
 witii pions horror when we hear of the Canadian 
 Scandal and the Fisk frauds. It would be as well to 
 look a little nearer home; and although Hosea Biglow's 
 American senator, could sing^ — 
 
 A marciM ProvidoQce hez £Eishioiied ns holler, 
 ' O' purpose ihet we might oar principles swaUer ; 
 
 yet the British senator is not whoUy exempt from the 
 same sort of thing.* 
 
 Having, then, shown you the character of the 
 stewards of the national purse, and pointed out the 
 modus operandi of voting the supplies, you will hardly 
 be surprised to hear that the State Departments show 
 little beyond inefficiency, mismanag^oaent, extravagance 
 
 * Both political parties are equally cnlpalde in respect of these practices, 
 and the following instance is given for no other reason than that it is of 
 recent occnrreoce. A few years ago a certain gentleman, ambitioas for a 
 seat in the House of Commons, was proposed as a member of the Seform 
 Club, but was blackballed. He at once tnmed ConserratiTe, and as money 
 was no object, a seat was soon fonnd him. It is said that he has invented 
 a sncoessfol mode -of contesting elections, and that having spent £40,000 
 on behalf of the party he adopted, he is looked at as certainly a fatnre 
 baronet. He has been already rewarded with an office under the present 
 Government. All his pleasure, however, is not nnalloyed, as he has earned 
 the sovbriqutt ai "charlatan of the tory party," and it is humoronsly 
 observed that he ought to be a " right honourable " as ** First Commissioner 
 of Dirty Works," with a seat in the cabinet. 
 
120 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 and worse. The Audit Dispartmeiit cannot audit, and 
 the result is, there is no such thing as a clear and 
 intelligible National balance-sheet. If one thing more 
 than another would open people's eyes to the truth of 
 the matter, it would be the publication of an annual 
 balance-sheet, such as our merchants and tradesmen 
 could understand. The Government shrinks from 
 such a task which, however, has been undertaken by 
 Mr. Lloyd Morgan, of London, whose services the 
 Financial Reform Association have been fortunately 
 able to secure, and thus, in the Almanack of that 
 Association, a clear and concise balance-sheet is always 
 to be seen. Do not think I am exaggerating when I 
 say that the Government accounts are in a muddle, 
 such as the paltriest tradesman would be ashamed of, 
 and such as would draw down on the head of a 
 bankrupt the severest censure, if nothing worse, of the 
 presiding judge. 
 
 One would think that in a commercial country like 
 England, the system of book-keeping was the most 
 perfect it was possible to conceive. Marvellous to 
 relate, however, just the contrary is the f^ct, and the 
 loose, complicated plan on which the national accounts 
 are kept, is as absurd in principle as ridicnlons in 
 detail, with results unintelligible to the public and to 
 
THE NATIONAL BXPENVITUBE. 121 
 
 accoantants erroneous in fignres and facts. It will be 
 sufficient to give one instance in support of an other- 
 wise incredible statement. The amount of Customs 
 Revenue is to be got &om two sources, viz., the Beport 
 published by the Commissioners of Customs, and the 
 Statistical Abstract published by the Board of Trade. 
 Surely these returns, being official, otight to give 
 exactly the same result. What is the feet, however? 
 Why, that for the year 1870, the former stated that 
 the Customs Bevenne was ^3,182,276, while the 
 latter gave the same item as ^1,529,000, being a 
 difference of £1,653,276 for that year ; while the cost 
 of collection for the same year according to the one was 
 ^£799,351, and according to the other £979,918, being 
 a difference of £180,567 ; making a total discrepancy 
 for 1870 of £1,833,843, or more tiban the total pay- 
 ments of the Income Tax of Manchester, Liverpool, 
 Birmingham, and London combined ; or more than the 
 whole assessment of Manchester. The other years are 
 like unto 1870 ; and for the six years ending 1870, the 
 difference between the two accounts is £7,936,105. 
 Now, if these fects mean anything at all, they mean 
 that we have such a miserably inefficient way of keep- 
 ing the national accounts, that a mere huckster would 
 be ashamed of it ; or else during six years £7,936,105 
 
122 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 sterling have vanished, and the taxpayers have a right 
 to know where the money has gone. Nay, even in the 
 halance-sheet for 1872. the Income is put down at 
 £77,123,469, the Expenditure at £71,102,866, leaving 
 a surplus of £6,020,573. Of the former, Mr. Morgan 
 says: "The amount of Income is stated in the Cash 
 Account, page 8, to be £76,608,770 ; but in page 12 
 the details of Income are stated to be £77,123,469; 
 there is, consequently, a difiference of £514,699 between 
 the Cash Account and the Statement of Actual 
 Income." 
 
 Now, having shown you how the stewards of the 
 national purse fulfil their functions, and having hinted 
 at the incapacity of the Government book-keepers, let 
 us take the various items of expenditure which is 
 indulged in by our Governments, — an annual expendi- 
 ture consisting of nearly as many pounds as there are 
 letters in the Bible.* The first item, on what is to the 
 taxpayer the wrong side of the balance-sheet, is the 
 item of £26,804,453 for the interest and management 
 of the National Debt. 
 
 Mr. Disraeli has called the National Debt a " flea- 
 bite." I will not quarrel with that description. A 
 
 * The Expenditnre for the year ending Slat March, 1871, was 
 £71,102,896. The nnmber of letters is the Bible is 71,339,600. 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPBNDITVSE. 123 
 
 flea-bite may not be anytbing so serions as to render 
 necessary the assistance of a doctor, bnt it is a very 
 annoying, nncomfortable sort of thing. It is a thing 
 which, like the toothache, no man can endnre, and the 
 sooner it is got rid of the better. Flea-bite as the debt 
 is, it represents 5s. 4d. a minnte, or d£16 per hour, &om 
 the moment of Adam's creation ; and did we not owe it, 
 we coold employ 15,384,615 men (above half the entire 
 population of England, men, women, and children) for 
 one year, at 20s. a-week. The history of this debt is 
 one of the most disgraceful chapters in English history. 
 It was nearly all contracted for foolish and wicked 
 wars. Sir Bobert Peel once said that it wbold hare 
 been better to have thrown the money into the sea. 
 However, we have this debt, and the hononr of the 
 eoontry demands that it shall, be paid. We cannot 
 repudiate onr obligations; and all I can say with regard 
 to it is, that it famishes an additional reason why the 
 upper classes shonld not be so squeamish about the 
 working man paying his share of taxes. The National 
 Debt was never contracted for the artizan. It was 
 chiefly iucorred when, more than now, the spending 
 class was distinct from the paying class. It was in- 
 vented at the same time as were Customs and Excise, 
 and is a fit companion of the twin sisters. The debt 
 
124 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 was, comparatively speaking, trifling (a little over half a 
 million) when William, of glorious memory landed on 
 our shores in 1688. But William had a notion, pecu- 
 liar to sovereigns, that it was necessary to maintain the 
 ■' balance of power in Europe." I need hardly say that 
 there is no such thing as the " balance of power." It 
 is a mere figment proceeding from royal brains. That 
 notion cost us about twelve miUions. The advisers of 
 Queen Anne pursued the same intermeddling policy, 
 chiefly against France, which added twenty-four 
 millions to the debt; while shortly afterwards the 
 necessities of the Spanish war increased it stiU further. 
 The war, and the subsidies, first for and then against 
 the Pragmatic Sanction, added a few millions more ; 
 and then came the blind, reckless, mistaken rule of 
 George III., which added seven hundred millions, the 
 greater portion of the debt, and added it, too, for wars 
 the most unjustifiable in history, and which can hardly 
 now find a single advocate to defend them. They were 
 the wars of aristocrats against the people. If I wished 
 to produce historical evidence of this I should quote 
 that passage from Sir Archibald Alison's history, in 
 which he points oat that, inasmuch as the passions of 
 the people were aroused by the struggles for liberty 
 which were taking place on the continent, and as there 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 125 
 
 was a strong feeling in faTonr of innoyation under the 
 name of Beform growing up simongst the people at 
 home, it was considered a wise poKcy to draw off the 
 attention of the people from these things, and to 
 arouse the ancient chivalry of the British people. We 
 plunged therefore into a war with France, to put up the 
 Bourhons, adding seven hundred millions to our deht. 
 As my friend, Mr. J. Alun Jones, expresses it, " It was. 
 neither more nor less than a crusade against the 
 growth of liberty abroad, and the progress of Beform at 
 home." By an atternpt to impose an indirect tax upon 
 the Americans, striving, you see, to carry still further 
 the principle that those who pay shall have no voice in 
 the matter of spending, we not only lost our American 
 colonies, but added eighty-two millions to the debt. 
 Then we fought again against the French ; this time to 
 prevent them electing their own ruler, in the person of 
 Napoleon I., and as to the stability of the success of 
 that war, it may be remembered that, contrary to the 
 obligations of the treaty which followed, we recognised 
 his successor. Napoleon HI., as soon as he succeeded in 
 shedding sufficient blood to reach the throne. Gentle- 
 men, I venture to assert that if the taxpayers had had 
 a voice in the spending of their own money, this deht 
 would never have been incurred. Balances of power. 
 
126 TEE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 Pragmatic Sanctions and dynastic wars may be a very 
 nice thing for aristocrats and kings, but they are death 
 to us. The people have to suffer for the faults of 
 kings; and I do hope, therefore, that in any re- 
 adjustment of taxation, the great landowners of 
 this country will have the manliness to remember 
 that the industrial classes have for generations paid 
 the greatest portion of the interest on a debt 
 which was not contracted either for them or by 
 ithem. 
 
 I now come to the second item in the balance- 
 sheet, viz., our defensive forces, which in 1873 cost us 
 £24,956,200. We have the most expensive army and 
 navy in the world, and as I have already pointed out by 
 far the greater part of our expenditure is for war and 
 war debt. As Leone Levi put it, " Between the legacy 
 of past misdeeds and the excesses of recent exigencies, 
 our military expenditure monopolises the best part pf 
 our public funds." The mind can hardly conceive what 
 an enormous sum is spent upon soldiering and sailor- 
 ing. Since the Crimean war, the Military and Naval 
 expenditure has averaged more than £26,000,000 per 
 annum. To aid the mind in comprehending this vast 
 sum, a writer in the Nonconformist points out that 
 according to ,the ofSciallyrpublished annnal statistics, 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 127 
 
 the total amount of coal produced in the United 
 Kingdom has averaged for the past seven years an 
 annual valne of 22 million pounds sterling, or 4 millions 
 less than the average cost of the army and navy. ' 
 Hence aU onr coal mines united would not suffice to 
 mauitain onr army and navy. And all the coal, iron, 
 copper, lead, tin, zinc, silver and other metals produced 
 in the United Kingdom have averaged in value (for 
 seven years past) 37 million pounds per annum, or 
 about 18 millions less than the year's expenditure for 
 past and present wars. The total capital accumulated 
 in the Post Office Savings' Bank was, in 1867, 
 ^9,749,929. The total capital in other Savings' Banks 
 in the Kingdom in 1867, was ^36,476,408. Total, 
 £46,226,337. Hence the annual war expenditure (for 
 present and past operations) &r exceeds the total 
 deposits of the industrial and economic classes invested 
 in aU the Savings' Banks. The total annual receipts 
 of aU the railways in the United Kingdom for pas- 
 sengers and goods are about 38 million ^unds, or 
 17 millions less than the money demanded on account 
 of war. The average value of aU the wheat, barley, 
 oats, maize, and flour imported into the United 
 Kingdom (for seven years past) is 30 million pounds 
 per annum, or only four millions more than the 
 
128 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 annual expenditure for army and navy alone, irre- 
 spective of national debt. The average value of 
 the cotton imported into the United Kingdom (for 
 seven years past) is 29 million pounds, exactly 
 the cost of army and navy alone in 1868. No 
 wonder the manufacturing population have to work 
 hard to get a livelihood ! All the paupers in the 
 United Kingdom cost in the year 1870-71, £9,590,787, 
 or about one-third of the expense of the army and 
 navy. 
 
 Now, in criticising the expenditure for the army 
 and the navy, I shall be at once told that having served 
 in neither service I am not in a position to judge. 
 But, gentlemen, when a man spends twice as much on 
 an article as that article is worth, I say that he is 
 extravagant, whether he purchase an Armstrong gun or 
 a bale of cotton. Straws show which way the wind 
 blows; and when I find the Times stating that five 
 logs of wood — worth a few pounds — were towed in a 
 special steamer from Sheerness to Chatham at a cost of 
 £50 ; and that a bell was carried from Portsmouth to 
 Liverpool at a cost of from £200 to £300, I have a 
 notion that there is mismanagenaent at any rate in 
 those departments, and I think it does not require a 
 man to be either a soldier or sailor to see that. The 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 189 
 
 Admiialtj recentlv in£ide a peciiliar bargain. They 
 sold the Medtcay for d£"2,180j hot promised to bay back 
 the old stores out of her, which they actually did for 
 £4,211. The Government, therefore, not only sold that 
 ship for nothing, but they gave the purchaser £2,041 
 to take it away with him. This is not an exceptional 
 thing ; it is an instance under tiie mark. The practice 
 is general, and sometimes the Government re-purchase 
 the old stores at four or five times the priee they get 
 for the vessel. One vessel was sold for £300, and the 
 copper re-purchased by the Government for £5,000, 
 while the Pelican was sold by our authorities for 
 £5,000, and the man who bought her sold her to the 
 Portuguese Government for £40,000. I do not think 
 it requires a man to be an admiral to see the folly of 
 such transactions as th^e, and I can only say that 
 there is in existence such evidence of gross neglect and 
 mismanagement — if not worse — that it is appalling to 
 think of it. 
 
 - There might of course be some excuse if our army 
 and navy were efficient. But such is not the case. 
 Ton know that we now indulge occasionally in what 
 are called Autumn Manoeuvres. That is to say, we 
 put a handful of men on the Downs, and play nt 
 fighting. Foreign military critics come over to wat«^ 
 
 I 
 
130 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 VLB, and they go back laughing at our blundering. 
 And well they might ! For in a friendly country, with 
 no real enemy to fight, we are unable to manage an 
 army of the size of one Prussian army corps. The 
 Commissariat continually breaks down, telegrams are 
 sent to the wrong places for food, so that the men are 
 sometimes twenty-four hours without rations, and the 
 meat when it arrives is tainted. All this sort of thing 
 is carried on at a great expense. Everything is dearly 
 bought, and as a sample of how the money goes I will 
 state that for the last Autumn Manoeuvres horses were 
 bought at £42 each, and were afterwards sold off at the 
 rate of one hundred a week for £23 10s. each, the loss 
 on this item alone being £35,000. 
 
 On the other hand, look at the cheap efi&ciency of 
 the Prussian army. You know how a few years ago, on 
 the shortest notice, the Prussian Government were able 
 to put into the field a large army of 400,000 men, well 
 equipped, well officered, and, as results proved, able to 
 carry on a war vsdth rapidity and success. Now, at the 
 time Prussia was able to do all this so well, and 
 we were able to do our little so badly, was the Prussian 
 expenditure for defensive purposes so large as ours? 
 On the authority of Mr. James White, the late member 
 for Brighton, the whole revenue of Prussia, from all 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 131 
 
 sources, for the year preceding the oatbreak of the 
 war, was two xaillions less than our expenditure for 
 the year for army and navy alone. In fact, quite 
 recently, Moltke has asked for a standing army of 
 401,000, which is only to cost iE15,000,000, about the 
 cost of our small army of less than 100,000 men ; while 
 France is proposing a standing army of no less than 
 1,200,000, which is only to cost about 25 J millions. "If 
 an enemy landed on our coast," said Mr. Trevelyan'in 
 1871, " we should be able to put 35,000 men in line ; 
 in other words, at twice the cost of the whole Prussian 
 army, we should be able to bring into the field one 
 Prussian corps." 
 
 I think I hear some one remind me of the dif- 
 ference in the military systems, inasmuch as there 
 is conscription in the continental plan. I observe, en 
 passant, that this forced service is a form of direct tax, 
 and if it have no other recommendation, it must make 
 the people take a great interest in the officering and 
 cost of the army. But I do not foi^et this difference 
 in the two systems. If the bulk of the expenditure for 
 the army and navy were devoted to paying the men in 
 the two services, the comparison would be fair; but 
 such is not the fact ; and if that be allowed for, we stiU 
 compare very badly with other nations. No, gentlemen. 
 
132 TBE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 it is not what we pay the rank and file, but maintaining 
 crowds of useless and well-paid officers, that swells the 
 estimates, and makes the cost of officering {i.e., pay 
 and allowances of officers) the British army no less than 
 £20 13s. 4d. per man. Let me give you an instance. 
 There are, you know, such beings as Honoraiy Colonels. 
 These are men with very good salaries, and nothing to 
 do. They usually hold their colonelcies in addition to 
 something else, and are really , for ornament, and 
 nothing more. I remember that, at a public meeting 
 in Kidderminster, a gentleman stated that he had served 
 in a fighting regiment for seven years in India, and 
 during the whole of that time he had never once seen his 
 colonel. Upon hearing this, a man who had served in 
 the Life Guards, which is not a fighting but a lounging 
 regiment, said that his experience was quite different, 
 as in his regiment there were swarms of colonels. So 
 it is. We have swarms of these gentlemen paid from 
 £900 to £2,000 a year each, and aU the work they 
 have to do is to receive their pay. The cost of these 
 honorary colonels alone last year was £203,500 ; and 
 when the Estimates were before the House last Session, 
 Mr. G. 0. Trevelyan moved that no further honorary 
 colonels should be appointed. Of course, the motion 
 was rejected. It was said that the honorary colonelcies 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 133 
 
 were given as rewards of merit for distinguished ser- 
 vices. I am afraid that if we investigate the careers of 
 the fortunate holders of these sinecures, it will he 
 found that they have done very little to merit such 
 positions, heyond cringing to some relative in office, or 
 serving some nobleman of position. Besides, if dis- 
 tinguished services are to be rewarded, let it be done 
 openly and straightforwardly, and under the name of 
 "reward," instead of by scattering broadcast appoint- 
 ments ia which the duties are purely imaginairy. 
 
 The great fact is, both the Army and the Navy are 
 over-officered. Why do we require in this country three 
 officers to do the work vrhich is done in Prussia by 
 two ? In the Indian battalions in India, there are 
 1,500 superfluous claimants for pay, having pay and 
 pensions amounting to the immense sum of i6740,000 
 a year. Taking the English and Indian lists together, 
 there are over 2,000 lieutenant-colonels and colonels, 
 all of whom are supported by the State, though they 
 have only a very small proportion of work to do. In 
 the two branches of the Indian and English army, there 
 are' upwards of 800 generals, either active or idle. 
 And all of these are in some shape or another a burden 
 to the State. Of these 800 generals, how many are 
 employed? There were employed, last year, 15 in 
 
134 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 administrative duties at home; 21 commanded at 
 home, 12 in the colonies, and 43 in India — that is to 
 say, 91 in all. Of these, 23 were colonels doing the 
 work of brigadier-generals with local or temporary 
 rank. Thus it will be seen that for every general who 
 had the least atom of work to do, there were ten totally 
 unemployed. The cause of this state of things, says 
 Mr. Trevelyan, scandalous and cruel as it is to the 
 taxpayers, is that successive governments have mixed 
 up all their generals in one immense and undis- 
 tinguishable list. Mr. Trevelyan also remarked that 
 in a recent year the ofBlcers of the seven battalions of 
 Guards had enjoyed among them just 23,648 days' 
 leaye, or at the rate of three months and a half for 
 every officer. 
 
 It is hardly credible that we have nearly one 
 admiral for each ship in the navy in commission, 
 including block drill, gunnery, receiving, store, training 
 and surveying ships ; that we have three captains, or 
 commanders, for every ship, big or little; and other 
 officers are in proportion. Then in regard to the 
 army, there is one general for every two regiments, and 
 seventeen generals to spare. If we had ten more 
 lieutenant-generals, there would be one for each regi- 
 ment; in addition to which there is a major-general 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 135 
 
 for each regiment, and 94 to spare. Of the colonels 
 who have nothing to do, there are seven to each regi- 
 ment, and 21 over ; and of the lieutenant-colonels who 
 are snpjx^ed to do the work which the colonels ought 
 to do, there are nine to each regiment, and 125 over, 
 and so on. When these fiEUits are remembered, it will 
 easily he seen how it is we have such an enormous 
 expenditure for naval and military purposes. If there 
 he one place more than another where more work and 
 less play are required, it is in those departments which 
 provide us with "an army of raiments that cannot 
 march, and b fleet of ships that cannot swim." 
 
 It is hot only amongst the officers that the recklessly 
 extravagant way of doing business displays itself. It 
 permeates the whole system. In almost every thing 
 that is done, from building an iron-clad to buying an 
 anchor, £rom appointing the "First Lord" to pro- 
 moting a cadet, the efficiency of the service suffers in 
 some way or other. When Mr. W. E. Baxter took 
 office, he found that bribery, corruption and fraud were 
 so great in the Admiralty Department that no res- 
 pectable firm would do business with it ; and although 
 an example was made by e:qK>sing two officials, yet the 
 whole system is so laced round with trickery that the 
 conviction and its results, however just as a punish- 
 
136 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 ment, proved of no avail as a deteiTent. It has never 
 yet been satisfactorily explained how one favoured firm 
 has been paid thousands upon thousands above the 
 market price for anchors, and anchors, too, which have 
 long been disused by the Merchant Service, as being 
 far too dear and too inefficient when compared with the 
 one which is used on the Queen's ya«ht alone of all the 
 ships paid for by taxes ; and to other firms thousands 
 upon thousands in excess of the real price of cables. 
 It is not generally known that when the market price 
 for oil was £126 a ton the Admiralty paid £134. It 
 would have been more satisfactory, too, if the vast 
 quantity of pig iron which paves Devonport Dockyard 
 had been either used for its proper purpose or sold. 
 Neither is it pleasant to hear that Deptford Docl^ard 
 had been sold privately to a friend of the chief solicitor 
 in the Naval Department; and that the sale was not 
 completed for twelve months, dming which the pur- 
 chaser transferred his interest to the Corporation of 
 London, and by that transfer, without the payment of 
 a single penny, he put into his pocket £21,000, which 
 ought to have gone into the National Exchequer. Now, 
 £21,000 is about the same amount as the City of Bath 
 paid in income tax in 1870, the year the transaction 
 took place, so that the good people of that city, who 
 
TBE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 137 
 
 have been so prominent in their outcry against the 
 principle of the tax, havcthe additional chagrin of know- 
 ing that not only have they had to pay a tax which was 
 onjastly levied, bnt that having paid it, the. whole 
 amount went into the pocket of one favoured individual 
 for no earthly reason whatever. 
 
 When men in high positions are guilty of such 
 things, we must not be surprised to find that the sub- 
 ordinates take upon themselves to copy the example of 
 their superiors. Thus we have the farce known as a 
 " Dockyard Sale." No intending purchaser is admitted 
 to the sale until he has first paid £S for a catalogue, 
 the amount to be returned if he make a purchase. 
 The practical result of this is, that a certain number of 
 fellows form a " ring," to take an American word, and 
 arrange the sale, and after the sale is over they adjourn 
 to a neighbouring public-house and divide their profits, 
 the whole process having the euphonious title of a 
 " knock-out." Thus it is that overcoats, lined with 
 wool all through, and almost new, go for six shillings 
 each; and Highland beavers, with ostrich plumes:, 
 of which the first-cost was £3 19s. each,, for 
 38. 6d. 
 
 It must not be supposed either that these sales are 
 of surplus stores. If one department wanted certain 
 
138 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 things, and another department had too many of them, 
 the most natural process would be to take from that 
 department which hath, and transfer it' to that which 
 hath not. That, however, is too direct a way for 
 departments to go. Their plan is to sell off at a great 
 loss in the way above described, and to purchase new 
 stores for the other department; and the new stores 
 purchased for one department are very often the very 
 same as those which have previously been sold as " old 
 stores " by another. It is not therefore surprising to 
 hear that, recently, twelve tons of soldiers' buttons were 
 sold by the Government as "old metal," although the 
 packages had never been opened, much less used, and, 
 if rumour be correct, they were resold to the Govern- 
 ment as new buttons. The West Cowntry Lantern is 
 a Plymouth newspaper, which, being published near 
 Devonport Dockyard, has vrisely kept its eyes open on 
 the doings of the pig-iron paved yard. I hope it will 
 continue to expose all the abuses it can find out. The 
 other day this newspaper drew attention to what it calls 
 " one of those extraordinary phenomena, a doc^ard 
 sale." " We see," said the editor " among the articles 
 to be sold are nineteen boilers, seven lathes, by Glas- 
 gow makers, fourteen anchors, two steam engines, 
 eighty-five tons of iron, six tons of nails, fifteen tons of 
 
TBE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBE. 139 
 
 galvanized wire, and lots of other nsefiil articles, and 
 also lots of wom-ont things and rubbish. Last year 
 heaps of things were sold that had not been used, and 
 are continually wanted — things new and unused — 
 perhaps slightly tarnished by lying by. Brass and 
 copper, tools, instruments, fittings, stores, etc., were 
 sold by the ton {new, good, and uniised), that would 
 have to be immediately replaced; and it has been 
 repeatedly stated that in the same week many thirds 
 were rebought from tke purchasers at from twice to 
 thrice tAc cost at which they were sold — there not 
 being sufficient left in store for the daily wants of the 
 yard. Now, why should they sell the iron or the nails, 
 which are both articles of daily need? Last year, a 
 broker bought some cwts. of brass screws quite a bar- 
 gain ; why were they sold ? They are constantly 
 required in ship-building. If there happens to be a 
 surplus of stock, the reasonable plan is to suspend the 
 purchase of &esh stock for a time, and not to sell off the 
 surplus at what it will fetch, as might be justifiable for 
 a tradesman in difficulties. Last year heaps of unused 
 brass and copper articles were sold, which would have 
 to be replaced at double the cost which they fetched at 
 the Dockyard sale, and some taxpayers present were 
 puzzled to account for such folly, and ind^nant also. 
 
140 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 They thouglit it might have something to do with the 
 making accounts look pleasant at a certain time ; but if 
 such is the case, 'tis greater folly than that committed ^ 
 by the silly management of a mismanaged railway in 
 paying swinging dividends out of the spare capital. 
 Bearing on this is the^ fact repeated to us by several 
 naval ofBcers of a ship returning to port, of unused 
 boatswains' and engineers' stores, instruments, tools, 
 being thrown overboard to make things come square 
 with the accounts at home, so much being allowed for 
 use, and therefore so much miist be used up; and if not 
 used properly, must be otherwise made away with ; 
 hence this reckless folly and waste. Why, twenty 
 millions won't, do for our navy a few years hence with 
 such wasteful and incompetent management." 
 
 One more instance : The treatment of two ships 
 at Portsmouth affords a striking sample of the way in 
 which Her Majesty's Navy is managed by the Board of 
 Admiralty and its functionaries. The PHnce Regent, 
 built in 1823, as a three decked sailing ship to carry 
 120 guns, and afterwards " converted "' into a two 
 decked screw liner, was recently broken up by order of 
 "my Lords." Her framework and timbers generally 
 were so sound that she would have been good for some 
 years' further semce. Another ship, the Boscawen, 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 141 
 
 built in 1844, as a sailing two-deekei% and of late 
 employed as a training ship for boys at Portland, 
 having been sent to Portsmouth for a thorough over- 
 haul, was found to be so unsound that the truest 
 economy would obviously have been to break her up. 
 But not so thought the Board ; for the sound ship was 
 broken up, and the rotten one was ordered to be 
 repaired ! 
 
 One word more, and I will leave this branch of the 
 subject. I wish to impress upon yon that all this has 
 taken place not ages upon ages ago, but in the present 
 day, and is now going on. I wish I could hold out any 
 hope that the House of Commons would soon improve 
 in this respect. " My experience," once said Mr. 
 Bemal Osborne, " has taught me that the Members of 
 Parliament are the worst body of men that can be 
 found to control the expenditure of the nation ; " and 
 when you find the House so careless, you can hardly 
 blame the Departments. , Only last Session it was 
 determined to continue the fortification of Aldemey. 
 The Sailing Directions for the Channel would serve to 
 convince any one not too stupid and self-willed for 
 conviction, that there is not, and never was, any occa- 
 sion for spending a penny on the fortification of 
 Aldemey, although a sum approaching to £2,000,000 
 
142 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 of the public money has been thus utterly thrown away. 
 Alderney is a place to which all captains give the 
 widest berth they can, and never come near if they can 
 possibly avoid it. Alderney Race is never safe excepting 
 in the very calmest weather. No large vessel can get 
 near the island, as it is surrounded on all sides by 
 dangerous rocks, the enumeration and description of 
 which occupy full five pages of the Sailing Directions. 
 The only two spots where a landing can be effected 
 have been converted into harbours of refuge, which are 
 only available for vessels whose hard fete drives them 
 near the spot, at high water, and when the wind is not 
 from the east. But for risk to the vessel, officers, and 
 crew, it would be well to sentence Lord Viscount 
 Halifax, and my Lords of the Admiralty, and all who 
 have taken part in this further most needless waste of 
 the public money, to a cruise in the Warrior round the 
 island, with obligation to, land every day, for a month, 
 or until they were fully convinced that the fortification 
 of Alderney, either to " watch Cherbourg," or for any 
 other purpose, is one of the most stupendous follies 
 that ever entered the mind of man. Rather than 
 these extravagances should be sanctioned, I would 
 much prefer to see done what has been done before, 
 and for anything I know may be done now, viz., that 
 
TEE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. U3 
 
 the Lords of the Admiralty send a ganboat down to 
 the Frith of Forth to take care of the Duke of Buc- 
 clengh's fisheries, as was done in 1869, and another to 
 be similarly employed on behalf of the Heme Bay 
 Oyster Company. 
 
 Welli I now pass on to the j619,341,843 spent last 
 year on the Civil Service, which has been described 
 as that fimd from which members of Parliament are 
 paid for sitting behind the Government, never saying 
 anything, but always voting as they are told. Of 
 course some excuse has to be made for finding oppor- 
 tunities for supporters and their Mends. This is 
 generally done by what is called the " Reorganisation 
 of Office," which means neither more nor less than 
 pensioning off a lot of men in the enjoyment of 
 good salaries, and appointing others in their places; 
 or else pensioning off clerks in one department, 
 and appointing fi-esh ones in another. The Govern- 
 ment no more think of transferring clerks from an 
 over-stocked to an under-stocked office, than they would 
 tbinV of transferring stores from one dockyard to 
 another, and if they attempt it they blunder so that 
 the attempt is a failure. It has often been pointed 
 out that a great saving might be effected, if, instead 
 of pensioning off redundant clerks in one department 
 
144 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 and appointing others to departments which are short- 
 handed, the overplus clerks in the crowded office were 
 transferred to thbse departments which required them. 
 A man may be very unfit for the department to which 
 he was first appointed, but very well fitted for other 
 departments. He may be useless in the War Office, 
 but a very jewel in the Census Office, and yet it seldom 
 suggests itself to the official mind to remove him 
 whence he is useless to the place where he might be 
 useful. Recently an attempt has been made to do 
 this, and the bungling which accompanied the attempt, 
 consequent upon red-tape and departmental jealousy, 
 is quite worthy of our Governments. 
 
 It appears that on the 21st February, 1872, the 
 Exchequer and Audit Department wrote to the Trea- 
 sury stating that the existing staff was insufficient for 
 the work of the office, and asking for sixteen additional 
 " examiners," which, it was suggested, might be sup- 
 plied from the " Redundant List.^' This letter lay idle 
 at the Treasury Office until the 13th April (twenty 
 days), when a letter was written to the War Office, and 
 another to the Admiralty, asking them each to find 
 eight clerks to fill up the sixteen vacancies. The 
 Admiralty took forty-three days to consider this letter, 
 and the War Office eighty-two, when the former stated 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 145 
 
 (16th May) that they had clerks willing to accept the 
 transfer on condition that their " standing " dated from 
 the time they entered the service of the Government as 
 temporary and not as permanent clerks (which, of 
 conrse, affected their lebgth of service, and conse- 
 quently their salary and pension) ; while the latter (on 
 the 24th June) stated that they conld not find any 
 clerks willing to be transferred, being unwilling, it is to 
 be presumed, to relinquish the honour attached to the 
 War Office clerks of being the best waltz dancers in" 
 the west end of London. In the meantime (6th June) 
 the Exchequer and Audit Department had again written 
 to the Treasury complaining of the delay in answering 
 their letter of the 21st February, stating that " unless 
 the assistaiice be speedily afforded, it would be impos- 
 sible for the department to report satisfactorily upon 
 the accounts within the time prescribed by Parliament." 
 Consequently, on the 8th of June, the Treasury wrote 
 to the Admiralty agreeing with the request of the clerks 
 that their " standing " should date from the time of 
 their entering Her Majesty's service as temporary 
 clerks ; and on the 11th of the same month the 
 Admiralty famished a list of eight redundant clerks. 
 In consequence of the refusal of the clerks in the War 
 Office, the Treasury wrote on the 29th June to the 
 
146 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 Customs Department, making a similar request for 
 four redundant clerks, which was not answered until 
 the 15th July (17 days), during which time one of the 
 Admiralty clerks had declined the offer of transfer and 
 found another in his place. These lists were duly sent 
 to the Exchequer and Audit Department, upon which 
 that department took offence, that the nominations had 
 heen made without consulting the "Head of the 
 Department," as stipulated in the first letter of the 
 correspondence (2l8t Fehruary). To this the Treasury 
 snappishly replied that they had the power, under the 
 8th section of the Exchequer and Audit Act, to nomi- 
 nate without consulting the Comptroller and Auditor 
 General, but that they had no objections to obtain 
 certificates of the proficiency of the nominated clerks 
 from the Civil Service Commissioners. These, how- 
 ever, the Civil Service Commissioners refused to grant 
 unless the Comptroller of the Exchequer and Audit 
 approved of the nominations, which the latter refused 
 to do unless the clerks were subjected to additional 
 examination. The Treasury, not to be baffled, then 
 said they should transfer the clerks without such certi- 
 ficates, repeating their power under the Exchequer and 
 Audit Act, and accordingly, on the 6th February, 1873 
 (a few days within twelve months after the original 
 
THE XATIONAL BXPENIilTURE. U7 
 
 application), the Treasmy told five of the clerks they 
 most go and take their places in the Exchequer and 
 Andit Deparbnent on a six months' probation. The 
 Comptroller of the Exchequer and Andit Department 
 therenpon said that when the first month's salary of the 
 newly transfeired clerks became dne, he should decline 
 to pay them, as he would not take npon himself the 
 responsibility of putting into the estimates the expenses 
 of so irr^nlar a proceeding; and so the matter has 
 rested tiiere since the 19th of March, 1873. This is 
 only a meagre outline of the correspondence, and can 
 give but a vagae idea of the red-tape employed in this 
 simple little question which any man of common sense 
 could haTe settled in ten hours, but which is not settled 
 yet. Orders in Council, Treasury minutes, and Acts of 
 Parliament and other documents were quoted whole- 
 sale, untQ at last the muddle was so great that the 
 best way to bring about the crisis was for the Andit 
 Department to refuse to pay the newly transferred 
 derks, and wait for the result, which I do as anxiously 
 as the Comptroller of the Exchequer and Audit Depart- 
 ment. 
 
 The return &om which I ha,ve got this information 
 cons^ts of fifty-two pages of printed matter, and con- 
 tains the correspondence between twenty-four ofScials, 
 
148 TEE NATIONAL EXPBNDITVBE. 
 
 besides numeroas other docnments ; and all on account 
 of the transference &om, one department to another of 
 a few clerks, the highest salaried amongst them being 
 i£150 a-year, which transfer is not accomplished yet. 
 Another question naturally suggests itself, viz. : How 
 dare the redundant War OflBce clerks refuse to be 
 transferred ? Why was not the option given them — . 
 transference or dismissal? And, indeed, taking all 
 things into consideration, it just shows the circumlo- 
 cution, the red-tape, and the how-not-to-do-it, which 
 are the guiding stars of departmental management. 
 It win readily be admitted that under such a system 
 of bungling and blundering, sinecures may be created 
 ad infinitum. Useless offices breed like maggots and 
 flies, by corruption — and are like maggots and flies 
 ever breeding it. 
 
 Leone Levi says : " It is the expenditure which 
 determines the income, and not the income the expendi- 
 ture." In this, Mr. Leone Levi is decidedly wrong. 
 That is how it should be ; but so elastic are the 
 resources that Governments feel they have the power to 
 spend the largest amount they can get voted. " The 
 House of Comnjons," once said Mr. John Bright, 
 " does nothing to check extravagance ; it encourages it. 
 Its members are not so much of the tax-paying as the 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 149 
 
 tax-consaming class. They come from, and they 
 chiefly represent, those whose families ha^e for 
 generations considered the taxation of the people as 
 their lawfal patrimony." Every experienced member 
 in the House knows that the exttovagance in certain 
 Government departments increases jnst in proportion 
 to the amount of money they can obtain from the 
 Treasury. Now, one of the simplest ways of spending 
 money is, to pay a lot of men large salaries for doii^ 
 nothing; and this system is so well acknowledged by 
 the upper classes, that cases are known in which an 
 annuity has been left to a younger son, to be paid 
 " until such time as he receives a Government appoint- 
 ment," and the whole method has been aptly described 
 as "a sytem of out-door rehef for the younger sons 
 of the aristocracy." 
 
 Not long ago, Mr. Lowe stated that he knew of 
 a case of a man getting i6500 a year, who was only fit 
 to, and did only, tie up and address parcels, not being 
 competent to do anything else ; and even when Chan- 
 cellor of the Exchequer, the same gentleman said he 
 was unable to say whether that state of things had 
 ceased. Mr. WaJmsley, the late Clerk of the Parlia- 
 ment, who retired last year on his full salary of £1,150 
 a year, received his appointment before he was fourteen 
 
150 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBE. 
 
 jears old ; and I might spend hour after hour in the 
 bare enumeration of the jobs exhibited in the sinecure 
 offices. A paragraph was recently published which 
 must Jiave astonished all who read it. It appeared in 
 a , periodical usually well-informed on political matters, 
 viz., Vanity Fair, and was as follows : — " There are 
 things done at the War Office, the Colonial Office, 
 the Custom House, and the Foreign Office, enough to 
 make the hair of sober folk to stand upon end. Not 
 , long ago I was dining with a Cabinet Minister, when 
 his private secretary laughingly pointed out that an 
 iidividual clerk in a public department had actually 
 paid i628,000 of public money in one year under a snug 
 family arrangemeM to his brother-in-law ; and that the 
 same gentleman — whose very name is unknown beyond 
 Downing-street, but which is quite at Mr. Vernon 
 Harcourt's service — was in the habit of distributing 
 royal rewards and sinecures to his friends, which 
 rewards varied from £1,000 to £4,000 a year. He had 
 the power of giving a man lieutenant-general's rank^ 
 too, though he never served a day in the army or out of 
 it; and by these means he drove such a thriving trade 
 that his business profits out of public money consider- 
 ably exceeded £30,000 a year." 
 
 I have endeavoured to discover the leech who is 
 
TBE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBE. 151 
 
 thus allowed to suck at the public purse ; and although 
 I have not succeeded in ascertaining his name, I have 
 received ample information to lead me to believe that 
 the above-quoted paragraph states a fact ; and if the 
 person suspected of being the individual referred to be 
 actually 'the man, he has also been honoured with 
 a peerage, though I should have thought that the quiet, 
 easy, gentle way in which he has taken the widows' 
 mites, and the hard-earned wages of poor and ignorant 
 agricultural labom-ers, and buUded for iiimself there- 
 from a fortune, which is the price of blood if anything 
 ever was in this world, ought to have been honoured in 
 quite a different way. 
 
 It was Dan O'ConneU, I think, who used to tell an 
 anecdote showing that the "Elliot" family had such 
 influence that anyone bearing that name could easily 
 obtain a Government appointment. There was much 
 of truth in, the notion, because hundreds and hundreds 
 of appointments are now made for no other reason than 
 that the appointees are relatives of the governing 
 fiamUies. It cannot fail to be noticed how comfort- 
 ably family arrangements are made, and that Allen, 
 Anderson, Baker, Elliot, Hamilton, and a score of 
 others seem to be favoui'ed households. The follow- 
 ing list of the pickings of the RomiUy family is given 
 
152 TME NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 as a fair sample of this kind of nepotism : — Lord 
 Eomilly (late Master of the EoUs), official salary, 
 ie6,000 ; Edward Eomilly, Esq. (Audit Office), £2,000 ; 
 Charles Eomilly, Esq. (Crown Office), £1,200; Col. 
 F. Eomilly (Customs' Commissioner), £1,000; Hon. 
 Edward Eomilly (Secretary to Lord Justice), £500; 
 Hon. John Eomilly (Clerk of Eecords), £1,200 ; Hon. 
 William Eomilly (Clerk in Enrohnent Offioe), £1,200. 
 All these drew their salaries at one time, and with the 
 exception of the first named (who has a pension) are 
 drawing them still. 
 
 It is not surprising that with such a system 
 scattering sinecures broadcast among our aristocratic 
 families, there should be an equally scandalous system 
 of granting pensions. Pensions are bad things in 
 themselves ; they are a premium on improvidence. By 
 all means, pay a man a fair day's wage for a fair day's 
 work, but let him know that he must, by prudence and 
 care, prepare for a rainy day. The taxpayers receive 
 no pensions, and "in no case," says Montesquieu,"^ 
 " ought the people to be deprived of the means to meet 
 their real wants in order to provide for the imaginary 
 wants of the State." Of course, there are seeming 
 exceptions. When a man has performed some great 
 service to his country, he deserves a reward, and 
 
THE NATIONAI. EXPENDITURE. 153 
 
 if he hacve perished in his work it would he ungratefdl. 
 - indeed on the part of the State to allow his &mity 
 to snffer anj loss or privation, while of coarse a 
 person who is induced to give np a Incrative pro- 
 fession for a public office, which he loses with a 
 change of Minisby, require more than the ann nal 
 salary of his office after he has ceased to hold it. 
 There is, however, no reason why a pension should he 
 given Tear _ after year and gen^ation after generation 
 for ever. Because the Duke of Schombei^ was Idlled at 
 the Battle of the Bojne in 1690, by an accidental shot 
 from his own side, we are now paying his descendant 
 £2,160 a year, and will continue to do so until a loud 
 expression on the jHirt of the public against such 
 a thing demands its cessation. The Ihike of Marl- 
 borough was certainly a brilliant soldier in the days of 
 Queen Anne, but surely he was amply recompensed 
 at the time, while the succeeding Dukes have each 
 leoeived £4,000 a year. The present Duke receives it, 
 and his successoi^ will continue to do so. That is 
 a pension that may be very well done away with. For 
 sixty years we have paid £2,000 a year for the militaiy 
 services rendered to this country in 1814 by Lord 
 Combermere and his descendants, and a similar sum 
 for a similar time - to Lord Exmouth (for naval 
 
154 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 services) and his descendants, and these ought to 
 be done away with bn the deaths of the present 
 recipients. "Who Mrs. Sarah Hamilton was, and 
 who her children may be, and what either one 
 or the other has done for the State, I know not; 
 but for the last seventy-six years the sum of 
 £47,502 10s. 8d. has gone to them in the shape of 
 pensions, while nine more of the "Hamiltons" are 
 also in receipt of annual incomes for doing nothing. 
 We have the largest pension hst in the world, and 
 by the process of " reorganising the department " men- 
 tioned before, it is increasing every year. The Esti- 
 mates for 1873-4 include a reinforcement of 187 
 recruits to this list. Of these, 96 owe their release 
 from work, or rather from office, to ill-health and 
 infirmity, 38 to reduction, revision, reorganisation or 
 abolition of office, 84 to age, and 19 to causes not 
 specified. 
 
 With regard to those gentlemen who have retired 
 from office on account of ill-health and old age, I am 
 afraid that in a great number of the cases the reason 
 stated is a mere excuse. Bismarck says that those 
 VTidows of soldiers who receive pensions live a long 
 time; and anyone who looks over the pension list 
 of England will find that the death-rate of those 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPBNDITUBE. 155 
 
 pensioners who are ill is mach lower than the death- 
 rate of non-pensioned persons who are weU. I find 
 that Mr. B. R. Mudge, of the Woods and Works 
 Office, retired on account of ill-health in 1843, and he 
 is still drawing his pension, having been Ol for no less 
 a period than thirty-one years. Mr. Matthew Carter 
 has snffered &om a still longer illness, having retired 
 on acconnt of Hi-health thirty-fonr years ago, since 
 trhich time he has regnlarly drawn his pension ; while 
 Mr. R. B. Hoppner, formerly a consul at Venice, was 
 taken ill in 1825, and remained in that deplorable 
 condition for forty-seven years. A very peculiar case is 
 that of Sir Alexander T. Spearman, who was formerly 
 in the Tieasarj, from which he retired on accoont 
 of ill-health upon a pension of Jl,350. He had not 
 been ill long when he was appointed Comptroller 
 of the National Debt Office, at a salary of £1,500 
 a year, in consideration of which the pension from 
 his former office was reduced to £1,000 a year. 
 After Sir Alexander Spearman had received £1,000 a 
 year for being too ill to work in one department, and 
 £1,500 a year for at the same time controlling another 
 department for about thirty years, he last year retired 
 on a farther pension of his full salary, £1,600 a year. 
 The last I heard of Sir Alexander Y. Spearman was 
 
156 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBE. 
 
 that he had fallen ill again. Probably, therefore, he is 
 to receive another appointment ; and indeed it wonld be 
 an interesting experiment for a Government to try how 
 many pensions and how many sinecures can possibly 
 be piled on the shoulders of one man. Hitherto such 
 experiments have been eminently successful, as the 
 case of the Eev. Thomas Thurlow abundantly proves. 
 This fortunate clergyman, a nephew of Lord Chancellor 
 Thurlow — or "thorough low" as he was nicknamed — 
 was appointed at an early age to the office of Protho- 
 notary of the Court of Durham, to the see of which 
 his ' father had been appointed by the same dispenser 
 of good gifts. The nephew was also made a Hanaper* 
 Keeper ; and a third office, that of Patentee of Bank- 
 rupts, was also given him. The reverend gentleman 
 has at this day a compensation allowance for all these 
 offices. The amount of that compensation is now 
 ^11,779 5s. 5d. per annum, and the veteran preacher 
 of the Gospel has drawn most of it for upwards of 
 forty years. This lucky Christian had other offices 
 which are now abolished ; but taking those from which 
 he still derives an income, he has already received 
 £402,788 13s. of the public money for which he has 
 done no work whatever, beyond signing a receipt for 
 the money which has been given him. 
 
 * Waste paper basket. 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 157 
 
 The Pension List onght to be reduced at once by at 
 least one million ; and the whole system ought to 
 be gradnaUy abolished. It is foolish to speak of vested 
 interests. We axe not bound by what was done in 
 Queen Anne's reign, or in that of Geoige II. ; and as 
 some pensions and sinecures haye been abolished, or 
 commuted, or altered in some way or other, there are 
 precedents ^or the reform I am adyocating. We are 
 not called upon to support Boyal bastards to the fifth 
 and sixth generation, nor to pay pensions for we know 
 not what. Let a searching enquiry be made into the 
 foUy ' of continuing these parasitical growths which 
 are gradually spreading themselyes more and more over 
 the departments of the State. Perhaps, if enquiries 
 were made, some of the recipients of these pensions 
 would be so conscience-stricken that they would refuse 
 them. Such a thing has been known. Some time ago 
 it was decided that certain ladies receiving pensions 
 should state the grounds of their claim. Several of 
 them declined to do so, thus preferring to lose their 
 pulsions, rather than put in writing the true position 
 they held. There is a limit even to the impudence of 
 shameless claimants. I say that in reducing these 
 pensions the pruning knife should not be spared. The 
 exact amount of them it is difficult to ascertain in the 
 
158 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 present jumbled state of the national accounts ; and I 
 am quite sure it is beyond the ability of the blundering 
 Audit Office to find out what we waste in this respect. 
 Mr. Lowe puts it down at about £5,000,000 a year; 
 and Mr. Rylands has pointed out that the pensions to 
 the persons who have been in the Civil Service alone 
 are more than the rental of the great town of Birming- 
 ham. Let the people of Ipswich remember that it takes 
 more than they pay in income-tax to pay the pensions 
 of the Kev. Thomas Thurlow alone. Ipswich has 
 representatives in Parliament; let them see to it. 
 Nearly the whole of the amount paid in income-tax by 
 the city of Hereford is required for the hereditary pen- 
 sion to the Duke of Marlborough. Hereford is well 
 represented in the House ; let its members see to it. 
 And so on with other places. If a lot of the moderate 
 sized tovras, like Kendal, Buckingham, Bedford, Dor- 
 chester, and a great many others which return members 
 to Parliament, would only remember that the whole of 
 the amount paid by them respectively in income-tax 
 goes to support a pensioner, and if they would then 
 impress the great fact upon their representatives in the 
 House of Commons, the system I have spoken of, and 
 which I characterise as venal, corrupt, dishonest, cruel, 
 and disgraceful, would not last very long. 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENVITTmE. 159 
 
 This is not the place to weary you with long and 
 tfidions accounts of the incapacity of almost each 
 department to do its hnsiness. I must refer you to the 
 TEiious Blue Books on the subject which have been 
 published, aU of which show that a system of reckless 
 extraTagance prevails in eveiy kind of transaction, &om 
 those of the greatest amount to those of the least. It 
 may be surprising to some persons to learn that when 
 they go to law 'they pay for it in taxes, as well as 
 by fees, and that when they do not go to law they pay a 
 share of the expenses of those who do, however prirate 
 may be the quarrel. I am not speaking of the Crimi- 
 nal Courts. Of course, we must all contribute to the 
 cost of the means taken for the prevention of crime. I 
 am speaking of those Courts in whidr private squabbles 
 are settled. "Why should the public pay the expei^es 
 of a woman obtaining a divorce from her husband, or 
 of a man recovering a debt, or of the litigation which 
 follows a carelessly worded contract ? I am aware that 
 some people have such a strong affection for the feudal 
 system — under which every freeman, if not a judge, was 
 at any rate obliged to go bail for his neighbours — ^that 
 they hold Hiat we are all interested in and protected by 
 the decisions of the Courts of Law, and ought there- 
 fore to pay our share of the e^teilses of these Courts. 
 
160 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 I maintain, however, that we are only interested to the 
 same extent that we are interested in the health of our 
 citizens, and while, doubtless, all ought to bear the 
 burdens of the suppression of violence and crime, and 
 the prevention of epidemics, yet only the parties con- 
 cerned are interested in the recovery from sickness, or 
 the interpretation of a deed. We ought no more to pay 
 a portion of the expenses of A for the recovery of his 
 debt from B, than we ought to contribute to the fees of 
 Dr. C. for the cure he has effected on D. We are, how- 
 ever, . taxed heavily for law. That is to say, our Courts 
 of Law are not self-supporting. Thus the deficiency 
 in the Common Law Courts in 1871-72 was £86,000, 
 which includes £13,000 on account of sinecure offices 
 abolished in 1838, liiid another large item is on account 
 of pensions. These figures are exclusive of the salaries 
 and pensions of the judges and masters. So with 
 regard to the other Courts. The Courts of Bankruptcy 
 cost the country £75,000 a year ; the County Courts, 
 £195,000 ; the Court of Probate and Divorce £60,000, 
 and so on through all the Courts, the climax being 
 reached at the Land Registry Court, the expenses 
 of which are ten times its fees, though it is very clear 
 that those who derive advantage from the existence of 
 the Court ought to pay, for it, not the masses of tax- 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 161 
 
 payers who have not an inch of land to claim, hold, or 
 defend. All this is exclusive of judges' salai-ies, pen- 
 sions, etc., and the loss upon the courts in Scotland and 
 Ireland. A Committee of the House of Commons has 
 decided that an expenditure of £1,750,000 in connection 
 with the Law Courts requires "a searching investiga- 
 tion ;" and I have it on good authority that a loss of 
 £1,351,000 a year might he avoided. Now this is 
 more than Manchester, Salford, Birmingham, London 
 (city). Bury, Bochdale, Stockport, Ashton-under-Lyne, 
 Oldham, Wigan, and "Warrington combined pay in 
 income-tax; and I must confess tiiat I think it an 
 unfair thing that taxes to such an enormous amount 
 should be levied, not for the prevention of crime, 
 or for the protection of the person, but for the 
 settlement of what are to all intents and purposes 
 private disputes. This is the more apparent when it 
 is remembered that while the cost of the Admiralty 
 Court in London is between twice and three times its 
 receipts, that in Liverpool is self-supporting. 
 
 When I find that the British taxpayer paid £68 for 
 the conveyance of Prince Christian from Dover to 
 Calais — and I only take this as a case representing 
 a great many similar ones — ; that we were nearly saddled 
 with an additional £11,000 on account of the Zanzi- 
 
 ii 
 
162 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 bar "job"; tbat a subordinate at South Kensington 
 Museum can steal ii8,000 before be is found out, and 
 still more recently a clerk in a police ofiSce several thou- 
 sands before he is discovered ; that to a great extent 
 compensations, superannuations, etc., follow no fixed 
 rule, and are not regulated by statute, but depend on 
 the whim of an individual ; that judges have the power 
 of making appointments and fixing salaries, without 
 end, as far as I can gather from official reports ; that 
 . some Courts cost three times their receipts, and yet no 
 .attempt has been made to revise them ; that there are 
 two judges where one would be sufficient ; and a whole 
 host of other things which mean jobbery, extravagance, 
 and iniquity ; I am not surprised that a Committee of 
 the House of Commons recommends that a " searching 
 investigation " should be made, and clothes its recom- 
 mendation in such terms that it means "jobbery"^ is 
 the order of the day. I agree, also, that it should 
 be seen "whether and in what manner the large 
 number of persons formerly connected with Courts of 
 Justice, who are in receipt of compensation on abolition 
 of office, might be utilised by being appointed to other 
 offices in these establishments." But, above all things, 
 I am glad to see that so strongly is the Committee 
 referred to impressed with the iniquitous state of affairs 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 163 
 
 at present that, mth trne and manly conrage, it has 
 recommended that, pending legislation, " no vacancy in 
 a salaried office in any of these estahUshments he per- 
 manently filled np, vnthout the previoiis consent in 
 writing of the First Lord of the Treasury ; " and "that 
 every person so appointed should take office suhject to 
 snch alterations as to its duties, salaries and pensions 
 (whether on saperannnation or ahoHtion) as may he 
 determined hy Parliament." In the former part of this 
 address I pointed out what were the duties of the 
 Government " Whip." Let me teU you that his title is 
 an appropriate one. It is " Patronage Secretary to the 
 Treasury," for which he gets a salary of £2,000. It is 
 a disgraceful thing that our Governments have to 
 indulge in what is nothing else than wholesale bribery; 
 but it is infinitely more disgraceful that £2,000 a year 
 should be taken &om the people's exchequer to pay for 
 services which, to say the least of them, are of a doubt- 
 ful character. 
 
 If further evidence of the state of our Departments 
 be required, there are the utterances of Mr. W. E. 
 Baxter, who, when in office, made praiseworthy 
 attempts to conduct the work of the State in a 
 business-like and common-sense fashion. One of the 
 greatest evils imagiuable is, "voting money on 
 
164 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 account" before the estimates are presented. Ton 
 may be sure that it is all spent, and the estimates are 
 framed accordingly. The money is spent first, and 
 then asked for afterwards. Mr. Baxter himself, when 
 a member of the Government, has been obliged to con- 
 fess in the House of Commons that such was the case. 
 It appears that " the Treasury claims the right to 
 judge every measure increasing or tending to increase " 
 the civil expenditure. The Treasury, however, does 
 not seem to care much about this power of supervision, 
 and seldom uses it, except when there is an application 
 made for additional clerks or advanced salaries ; so 
 that a whole office may be idle — as is indeed the case 
 vrith the Board of Trade — because the Treasury is too 
 lazy or too unwilling to review the Departments. I 
 repeat that it must not be forgotten, however, as Mr. 
 Baxter stated in his evidence, that when a Government 
 is weak, or is about to retire, it has its hands to 
 strengthen, audits friends to reward. The Government 
 then soon finds out that departments want revising, 
 and the result is that a large number of additional 
 appointments are made. This is mildly expressed by 
 the Committee, whose report I have often quoted, as 
 follows: — "When legislation affects the business of a 
 particular department, the occasion is sometimes taken 
 
THE SATIONAL EXPENDITURE. i65 
 
 to iBTise its strength; and inquiries of this kind are 
 also from time to time instituted at the snggestion of 
 the political heads of the Treasury." 
 
 I ask any sensible man. Can the departments of 
 the State be in an ef&cient condition when such things 
 are practised? Again, look at the Scudamore a£^. 
 Mr. Scudamore, jou may remember, is the officer of 
 the Post Office who intercepted and delayed telegrams 
 sent &om one person to another, — a transaction which 
 has neyer been equalled since the opening of letters by 
 Sir James Graham.^ He was justly censured for this ; 
 but we had scarcely got over our surprise at his conduct, 
 when we were startled by the announcement that he 
 had misappropriated the Savings Banks' deposits. The 
 Post Office Scandal, as it has been called, briefly 
 comes to this. Mr. Scudamore, a clerk in the Post 
 Office Department, applied Post Office revenues and 
 Savings Banks' deposits to purposes useful and neces- 
 sary, ho doubt, but for which Parliamentary provision 
 ought to have been made. This had been going on for 
 three or four years, to such an extent that a sum of 
 jE800,000 had been thus misappropriated. This was 
 done without let or hindrance from Postmaster General, 
 Audit Board, Lords of the Treasury, or National 
 Debt Commissioners, whose duty it was to see to the 
 
166 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBE. 
 
 proper investment of the Savings Banks' deposits. 
 Of conrse, Mr. Scudamore received no personal 
 benefit &oiu this loose method of doing business, as the 
 money was devoted to the public service. But, sup- 
 posing that some one with the same power had been 
 dishonest, and instead of devoting the Savings Banks', 
 deposits to the pubhc good, had taken them himisel^ 
 and lived in splendid retirement in some luxurious 
 country with which we have an imperfect extradition 
 treaty, he could have done so as easily as Mr. Scuda- 
 more. exceeded his duty. All this in spite of an 
 Audit Office, consisting of a Comptroller, at £2,000 
 a-year; an Assistant-Comptroller, at £1,000 a-year; 
 a Secretary, and a large staff, the whole costing 
 £42,000 a-year; the special business of the depart- 
 ment being to see that the other departments keep 
 within their tether, and that the special sums voted by 
 Parliament shall be appropriated to the ptirposes for 
 which they were voted. I am speaking on good autho- 
 rity when I say that there are several officers in the 
 various departments of the Civil Service, who, if" they 
 want money for a few days, can draw a cheque for any 
 reasonable sum they please. Indeed, the words of 
 Mr. Gladstone, when applied to the departments, some 
 years ago, apply with only slightly diminished force to 
 
THE XATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 167 
 
 the state of things now. " TacciUation," he said, 
 " nncertainty, costliness, extravagance, meanness, and 
 all the -vices that can he ennmerated are nnited in oar 
 present system. The money of the oonntry is wasted ; 
 and, I believe, snch are the evils of the system, that 
 nothing short of a rcTolotionary reform will ever bring 
 them to an end." 
 
 There are other considerations besides the mere one 
 of economy, important as that is. " The Services " 
 are discontented. This is very natural. Those who 
 v<H-k hard for little pay, are naturally displeased at 
 seeing lisping, foppish sinecniists loitering about the 
 offices on big salaries. Wben an unMr appointment is 
 made, it naturally offends those who have been thereby, 
 1^ it were, thrust out of their turn. When a gentle- 
 man is put into an office, because he has an uncle or a 
 cousin in the Gabiaet, and for no other reason, it is 
 not highly satisfactory to those vdio have been toiling 
 and moiling — in the way that many in the CSvil 
 Service do toil and moil — for several years, in the, 
 hope of getting that appointment ; when appointments 
 are made, not because they are wanted, but to please 
 Lord Privyseal, or to fulfil the promises of the 
 Government Whip, there is the usual grumble, "no 
 ciiance of promotion in an overstocked department." 
 
168 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 Of course, things mended a little when the Civil 
 Service Examinations were instituted, but even yet 
 influence can get over these ; and recently a candidate 
 who was " plucked " received an appointment over the 
 heads of those who had been years in office, and who, 
 of course, looked upon it as a piece of favouritism. 
 Indeed, I cannot better illustrate the discontent 
 which prevails in the Civil Service than by stating that 
 ihey issue an ably-conducted weekly magazine of six- 
 teen pages, at threepence each number, called the 
 Civilian, which has now. passed its two hundred and 
 fiftieth number, and is in its seventh volume, and 
 nearly the whole of its pages are filled with one waU 
 of complaint and lamenta,tion against the way in which 
 the Civil departments of the State are conducted. 
 Here, then, is the testimony of the Civil servants 
 themselves, and I am sure it will be acknowledged 
 that a minimum of work only can be got out of men in 
 a state of chronic discontent. 
 
 There is a still higher question. I will not com- 
 plain — though in my heart I do — of rich and powerful 
 Ministers of State receiving large pensions for life when 
 they have only been a short time in office ; but I do 
 feel ashamed that men, rich and powerful men, whom 
 the people call, and probably think, " right honourable," 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 189 
 
 should declare that it is their " poverty and not their 
 /will consents." It is not generally known, that hy an 
 Act passed in the>reign of William IV„ an ex-minister, 
 to receive his pension, must declare that without it he is 
 unable to maintain his positicm. How many noblemen 
 and " right honourables," now alive, have made that 
 declaration, knowing it to be entirely false ! Even the 
 Govei-nment itself violates the spirit if not the letter 
 of the law, by interfering (through clubs, of course,) 
 with the elections;* sometimes fooUshly, as in a 
 case I know of, when the Reform Club man went 
 to the . Tory agent, by mistake, to bring out a 
 Liberal whom the Government wanted in the House. 
 The plucky little borough, however, wouldn't stand 
 it, and, rejecting the Government Liberal, sent 
 one of its own. When in these high quarters 
 the things I have mentioned take place day after 
 day, and you find them prevailing through chief 
 clerks, second clerks, messengers, and, I dare say, 
 
 * In 1779, the House of Conunons resolved:—" Tliat it is highly criminal 
 for any minister or ministers, or any other servant of the crown of Great 
 Britain, directly or indirectly, to make n£e of the power of his office, in 
 order to inflnence the election of memhers of Parliament, and that an 
 attempt to exercise that influence is an attack upon the dignity, the honour, 
 and the independence of Parliament, an infringement of the rights and the 
 liberties of the people, and an attempt to sap the basis of our free and 
 happy constitution." 
 
170 , THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 down to the very oflSce cleaners ; and when you remem- 
 ber also that the Army and Navy are tarred with the 
 same brush, you will easily see that from the top to 
 the bottom neatly every one has his eye open to his 
 own interests at the. cost of the taxpayers. It is the 
 Five Alls over again. "I rule all," said the king; 
 " I pray for all," said the parson ; " I plead for aU," 
 said the lawyer ; " I fight for all," said the soldier ; 
 .and " I pay for all," said the labourer. How much 
 lower this tainting influence will go, I don't know; 
 but it has already reached the recruiting sergeant. 
 Supposing a sergeant enlists a man, — a half-intoxicated 
 man, — the chances are that in a few hours the man 
 will repent and wish himself free again. The 
 sergeant tells him that if he can raise what is called the 
 "smart-money," say twenty-one shilUngs, before the day 
 after to-morrow, he can be freed. The man does so, 
 and hands it to the sergeant. Now, notice. If no one 
 knows of the transaction, and the sergeant generally 
 takes care that nobody does, he pockets the guinea. If 
 the man cannot raise the money, the sergeant still gets 
 something for enlisting him ; and if the poor fellow 
 raises the " smart-money," and others do know of it, the 
 sergeant gets a share of it. So that any way the 
 sergeant " stands to win," as the betting men say. To 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBB. 171 
 
 wbjat extent this practice exists I don't know, bnt that 
 it does exist I know very well. You cannot blame 
 the sergeant very much. It is in the nature of man 
 to copy his betters ; and, after all, it is only carrying 
 oat the poUcy which is winked at, if not initiated, at 
 head quarters. 
 
 Well, gentlemen, there is one more item on which I 
 will touch.. Besides the numerous sinecure appoint- 
 ments held by the members of the Eoyal Family, we 
 give the Princess Boyal £8,000 a-year ; the Prince of 
 Wales a£40,000 a-year ; the Princess of Wales 
 £10,000 a-year'; Prince Alfred £15,000 a-year;* 
 Prince Arthur £15,000 a-year; the Princesses Alice, 
 Helena, and Louise £6,000 a-year each; and handsome 
 sums to other princes and princesses of the blood-royal. 
 In addition to thes^, we give to Her Majesty an annual 
 sum of £385,000 a-year. Now, I am saying nothing 
 against all this. If the people of this country like such 
 expensive things as an Army and Navy and a Boyal 
 Family, they must pay for them ; but I do object to 
 the absurd and unbecoming way in which the Queen is 
 obliged — I say obliged, because she has no control 
 over it — to spend the money which the people of this 
 country think is given to her. I am not now finding 
 
 * To wliieh most now be added £10,000, on his msraiage. 
 
172 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 fault with a cook at £700 a-year, and a poet at £100. 
 But I do object to a lot of political sinecurists, changing 
 with the Ministry, who draw away a large portion of 
 the sum voted to het. There is a Lord Steward who 
 gets £2,000 a-year for doing nothing, and there is a 
 Treasurer who gets £904 per annum to help him. 
 A Comptroller with ihe same salary is equally a 
 sinecurist. The Lord Chamberlain, at £2,000 a-year, 
 and the Tice-Chamberlain, at £924, may both be 
 dispensed with to the advantage of everybody ; while, 
 I am sure, the eight sergeants-at-arms, whose 
 duties are " to hold watch outside the royal tent, 
 in complete armour, with bow, arrows, sword, and 
 mace of office, and to captui-e any traitor about the 
 Court," ought now to be relegated to the British 
 Mjiseum ; and as the Queen does jiot indulge in the 
 pastime of hawking, I do not see^ vhy she is called 
 upon to pay £1,200 a-year to an Hereditary Grand 
 Falconer ; to say nothing of the Master of the Buck- 
 hounds (a jiolitical sinecure), £1,700 a-year ; the 
 Master of the Horse> £2,500 a-year ; Pages of the Back 
 Stairs, Ladies of the Bed-chamber, Women of the Bed- 
 chamber, Gentlemen of the Wine and Beer Cellar, Clerk 
 of the Kitchen, Maids of Honour, and a host of others. 
 I suppose all those officers are supposed to add to the 
 
TBE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 173 
 
 honour and dignity of the Crown. At any rate, the 
 appointinents are generally given to persons selected 
 from that class Which is continually prating about the 
 honour and dignity of the throne. I think it would 
 be more becoming on their part,- — would better show 
 their attachment to the throne and loyalty to the 
 monarch, — if they were content with the honour and 
 privilege of living within the splendid glitter of a Court 
 for nothing, instead of receiving large salaries for now 
 and again having the privilege of loitering within the 
 precincts of Eoyalty. Their rapacity knows no boimds. 
 , E. Gr,, writing to the Daily News, says : " When the 
 Sultan visited this country he incurred a serious 
 expense by giving snuff-boxes, covered with diamonds, 
 to the officials of the Court. One noble lord, who had a 
 situation about the,Palace, bitterly complained that he 
 had been left out of the distribution, and actually, like 
 a sturdy beggar, whined and begged to the Grand 
 Yizier un^il he got' his snuff-box. Many suggestions 
 have been made respecting' the best method of receiving 
 the Shah of Persia, so as to give him a befitting idea of 
 our national characteristics. I would suggest that all 
 persons who receive salary from the State be absolutely 
 forbidden to levy black mail on him. This, after" the 
 experience, through which he is passing, of the rapacity 
 
174 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 of Continental countries, will agreeably surprise him, 
 and prove to him that there is some difference between 
 us and our neighbours. When an Oriental Potentate 
 makes a present to one of our East Indian officials, the 
 present is handed over to the public treasury, and he 
 receives in return a gift exactly equal in value. Our 
 diplomatists are allowed to receive neither decorations 
 nor presents. Why should not this rule be extended 
 to courtiers ? Some strong measure ought to be taken 
 to prevent the unblushing greed of these gentry ^pro- 
 ducing upon our Persian guests the same feeling of 
 disgust that was produced by a similar exhibition of 
 rapacity on the minds of the Ministers of the Sultan. 
 The 'no fees to servants,' which is inscribed on the 
 walls of some places of public amusement, ought to be 
 prominently inscribed over Suckingham Palace and 
 Windsor Castle. I trust that before the arrival of the 
 Shah some member of the House of Commons will 
 obtain a distinct assurance that neither directly nor 
 indirectly will he have to pay for his lodgings in Buck- 
 ingham Palace. Courtiers receive handsome salaries 
 for doing very little. It is insufferable that our hospi- 
 tality should be marred by their pretensions to be paid 
 for it." If appointments without work were also 
 without pay, I believe there would be crowds of lords 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 175 
 
 and ladles only too happy to do for nothing that which is 
 now so well paid for. Perhaps then there might he 
 something saved ont of the Boyal Household expenses 
 towards providing a dowry whenever a royal marriage 
 takes place, without the painful operation of screwing 
 it out of John Bull, who, it seems, is not now 
 inclined to pay without a grumble. Of course, I am 
 aware that the present system is fixed by Act of 
 Parliament ; but I have yet to learn that our laws are 
 so perfect that they cannot be altered, or that an Act 
 passed in the dark ages cannot be repealed now. 
 
 I think, gentlemen, that I have now shown you that 
 our expenditure is recklessly extravagant, and so long 
 as the present ^tem exists must be so. If I were 
 asked how I would reduce the vast expenditure of this 
 country, my answer would be that I would consult 
 the permanent Heads of the Departments. I would 
 go, for instance, to the Duke of Cambridge, and I 
 would say to him, " Your Koyal Highness receives 
 £16 a day as a Field Marshal; as General Com- 
 manding-in-Chief, £7 per diem ; as three Colonels 
 roUed into one, viz., as Colonel of the Artillery, as 
 Colonel of the Engineers, and as Colonel of the 
 Grenadier Guards, at least £2,000 a year ; and your 
 Boyal Highness must not forget the pension of 
 
176 TUP NATIONAL EXPENDITVBE. 
 
 £12,000 a year which you receive ; making a total of 
 £22,395 per annum, which is more, your Royal High- 
 ness, than the gentry and trading community of the 
 city of Norwich pay in Income Tax;" and then I 
 would add, " So that I think your Royal Highness 
 knows, if you be honest, where to recommend a reduc- 
 tion in the army estimates." Could not the Horse 
 Guards and the War Office between them, think you, 
 find out where the estimates might be reduced two 
 and-a-half millions ? Could not the Admiralty, if they 
 wished, find out where a similar sum might be ' 
 saved ?, Then, if the Pension List be reduced by two 
 millions, and a saving effected in Law Courts of one 
 million by the introduction of the system of the fees 
 covering the expenses, and two millions knocked off the 
 Civil Service expenditure, there would be a saving of 
 ten millions. How much do the English people cost 
 gbverning ? Why, one-fifth of the amount expended. 
 I would have you remember that more than two-fifths 
 of the expenditure are on behalf of the National Debt ; 
 other two-fifths are for National Defences, and only one- 
 fifth is required for the actual government of the 
 country. If the Heads of the Departments think that 
 the reductions I have mentioned cannot safely be 
 effected, let a Finance Committee of the House of 
 
THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 177 
 
 (Jommons try its hand. Every other public body in 
 the kihgdom, town council, parigh vestry, railway board, 
 and even chapels have found it indispensable to have 
 a Finance Committee. Only the House of. CommonSj 
 in its wisdom, which passeth all understanding, sees 
 that it matters little- how much business it under- 
 takes, — matters still less what affairs it meddles with,-— 
 and matters nothing at all how many millions it spends. , 
 Inasmuch as the public expenditure and taxation 
 are national and not party questions, members of both 
 sides of the House ought to sit on that committee. It 
 should be formed of the most capable men of business. 
 The committee should be appointed permanently for 
 the duration of the House, appointing it ; and it should 
 sit more or less day by day during the session, and 
 should have the power to sit during the recess. A 
 committee like this, with its powers well defined, would 
 not only have a great tendency to economise the 
 expenditure, but it would relieve the House of Com- 
 mons from a deal of work which now impedes necessary 
 reforms. 
 
 But, after all, gentlemen, it is a question for the 
 constituencies, and that is why Direct Taxation would 
 be such a good thing. It would make the consti- 
 tuencies feel they were taxpayers. The representatives 
 
 M 
 
178 TSE NATIONAL EXPENDITUBB. 
 
 would tlien soon become economisers. The inflnence 
 of a constituency over its members is very great. Even 
 a good liberal like Mr. Walter Morrison is not 
 beyond this influence. I remember hearing him say, 
 at Plymouth, in 1872, that his constituency pre- 
 ferred an extravagant Government. Of course, Ply- 
 mouth is a peculiar town, being a garrison town and 
 close to a dockyard, so that what is sport for Plymouth 
 is death for the taxpayer. " During the eleven years," 
 said Mr. Morrison, "that I have had the honour of 
 representing Plymouth, I have only received a single 
 letter pointing out a mode of reducing the expenditure 
 of the State, and that letter was from Sir WiUiam 
 Hamilton ; but within the same period hundreds of 
 letters have come to me pressing for a larger expendi- 
 ture on the part of the Government." When influence 
 like this is brought to bear on so sound a pohtician 
 as Mr. Morrison, I think it is high time to enlighten 
 those people who have eyes and yet do not see, but who 
 vote at parliamentary elections. 
 
 Gentlemen, I have spoken of a reduction in the 
 expenditure of £10,(K)0,000. I have fixed upon that sum 
 because those well able to judge — John Bright on the 
 one hand, Lord Derby on the other — have stated that 
 the expenditure ought to be reduced by that amount. 
 
TSE NATIONAL BXPENJ)ITDIi£. 179 
 
 Have you ever asked yourselves what an enormous sum 
 ten millions is? Have you ever calculated the good 
 it might do? It would pay £1 a week for twelve 
 mouths to every ahle-bodied pauper in England and 
 Wales, and to 50,000 men besides. Can anyone 
 doubt that if the £10,000,000 now withdrawn from 
 production, and wasted, were productively employed, 
 they would enable a great number of persons to work 
 who are now idle, and increase to an [enormous amount 
 the material prosperity of the empire. Sir Charles 
 Dilke has well said, "Bather than help the next 
 generation to fight, I would prefer to so leave taxation 
 as to make it hard for them to do so." Give a Govern- 
 ment only as much as is necessary for carrying 
 on the afiairs of the nation, leaving the rest — the ten 
 millions we are speaking of — to be employed produc- 
 tively, and such a stimulus wiU be given to trade, so 
 many more men will be employed, and the difficulty of 
 finding soldiers will be so great, that a great incentive 
 to fighting will be removed. It is a well established 
 fact, that in prosperous times, recruits are difficult to 
 find. Men, instead of enlisting, obtain employment 
 and improve their condition. They seek comforts for 
 the inward and the outward man. They improve their 
 homes. It has been observed, "As the homes, so 
 
180 THE NATIONAL EXPENDITURE. 
 
 the people." There is no crime in happy homes, and 
 that statesman who will lift out from the depths of 
 vice, and misery, and idleness, those who now are 
 a standing reproach to the civilised age in which we 
 live, will receive thanks expressed with such a sincere 
 sense of gratitude from the country he has benefited, 
 compared to which the praises sung in honour of the 
 noblest achievements of the philanthropists, though 
 uttered with the tongues of men and of angels, will be 
 but as sounding brass and as tinkling cymbals. 
 
181 
 
 VI. 
 
 A Plau of DntECT Taxation. 
 
 No sooner had the Financial Befom^ Association 
 issued its programme in 1848 than the question was 
 raised on all hands, " What does the Association pro- 
 pose to substitute?" and from that day to this the 
 question has been repeated over and over again. The 
 Financial Beform Association has always, and, I think, 
 very wisely, declined to answer that question. It 
 started with a destructive policy, and it left, < and still 
 leaves, to others the task of pursuing a constructive 
 policy. " It is not easy to see," says Mr. J. Alun Jones, 
 "why the Association should be called upon to do what, 
 so &r as I know, has not been itequired from others. 
 I have never heard that the Anti-Corn Law League 
 were at any time called upon to propose duties in lieu 
 of the Com Tax they sought to abolish, or that the 
 advocates of the Permissive Bill are now asked to 
 suggest any taxes to fill up the alarming deficit that 
 
182 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 TTOuld be cansed by a sappression of the sale of intoxi- , 
 eating drinks. For myself, I think it will be soon 
 enough to propound a scheme when the principles of 
 the Association are adopted, and that the council, 
 like doctors, need not prescribe nntil they are called 
 in." When an unjust, an anomalous, and a clumsy 
 system of raising the revenue exists, there is a definite 
 task in accomplishing its downfall and pointing out 
 the principle of the remedy, without going into details. 
 A great many persons may agree that a system is 
 wrong, and may all unite for its overthrow, but they 
 may all differ as to what is to take its place, and when 
 the task of reconstruction begins they may range them- 
 selves on different sides. In the following remarks, 
 thereforCj it must be understood that I am speaking 
 independently, and I do not commit the Association I 
 represent. Nor, indeed, do I pin my faith to any 
 scheme yet proposed. It is the duty of the Govern- 
 ment to discover a plan. The Chancellor of the 
 Exchequer is paid iG5,000 a year to find out how to raise 
 the money. All I have endeavoured to do has been to 
 point out the gross injustice and the great improvidence 
 of the existing scheme, and for the plan which I shall 
 place before you I claim no merit. I am not the 
 author of it. Indeed, it is not a new one, but it seems 
 
A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 183 
 
 to me to be the best which has yet been sn^ested, and 
 I therefore snbmit it to yoor consideration. I will 
 willingly desert it for a better. However it may fall 
 short of perfection, I am sure of one thing, that no 
 system can be perfect which is not purely and entirely 
 a direct system. I cannot accept the dogma — for, it is 
 nothing but a dogma — that a thing may be right in 
 theory, bat wrong in practice. If a thing be theoreti- 
 cally right, it cannot be practically wrong. First satisfy 
 yourself that your theory is right, and then diligently, 
 though perhaps slowly, and minutely, yet comprehen- 
 sively, work out your theory to its utmost limit, and its 
 practicability wiU soon display itself. If a man were 
 going to propose a new scheme, and had the two plans 
 before him, would he, think you, select the indirect 
 method? We collect our local rates on the direct 
 system, and it works well. " Is there," asks Mr. C. E. 
 Macqueen, "one sane man within the four seas of 
 Britain who, knowing the operation and effects of the 
 two systems of Taxation, would wish to see our Direct 
 mode of providing for local exigencies exdianged for 
 the Indirect one? We greatly doubt it." Parishes, 
 local board districts, boroughs, and counties raise all 
 the rates by direct imposts. There may be complaints 
 of the amount of the rates, and of the assessment of 
 
184 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 the houses, but there is no grumbling at the way it is 
 collected ; and the British ratepayer would stand aghast 
 if it were proposed to tax his food and his comforts by 
 a sort of octroi dues, in order that the streets might be 
 lighted, the roads paved, and the poor fed- 
 
 I am not exaggerating when I say that there have 
 been scores of plans proposed as substitutes for the 
 present method of raising the revenue. So far as most 
 of them are concerned, however, the mere mention of 
 them is sufficient to ensure their condemnation, and it 
 serves to show how miserably defective the existing 
 system must be when the merest crotchets can find 
 supporters, not because the plans have any intrinsic 
 merit, but because it is believed that any method what- 
 ever must be better than the one we have at present, 
 than which nothing can be worse. An export duty on 
 coal is seriously proposed and advocated, as if the 
 country was so steeped in stupidity that it would return 
 to the flint rifle and wooden ships — for there is just as 
 much sense in the one proposal as the other. Some 
 propose a license on every trade, according to its status, 
 which would be "harassing every trade and worrying 
 every profession " with a vengeance, while others, with 
 equal acumen, gravely suggest a poll tax, to be levied, 
 heaven knows how, and collected by the Lord Nozoo. 
 
A PLAN OF, DIRECT TAXATION. 185 
 
 i ' 
 
 We have a tax on income, and there can he no doubt 
 that an Income Tax would he the fairest, the most just, 
 and the most equitable way of raising the entire reve- 
 nue — if all men were honest, and were known to be 
 honest. But men, unfortunately, are rather otherwise 
 than honest, and in that state of affairs a just Income 
 Tax, or a tax on capitalised incomes or on capitalised 
 property (both of which are' proposed) is impossible, in 
 spite of Mr. Muntz's suggestion, that the State should 
 have the right of pre-emption, A tax on expenditure 
 is open to the same objections ; while a tax upon wages 
 is simply impossible. Mr. Samuel Hand, of Wolver- 
 hampton, suggests, as a substitute for the Income 
 Tax, that the present receipt stamp of one penny value 
 should be imperative in all transactions involving 
 the payment of from two pounds to ten pounds ; and 
 that every additional ten pounds or fraction of ten 
 pounds should require a further penny stamp. This 
 system would, he asserts, realise a larger sum than 
 the present Income Tax, at the same time that it 
 would be less felt, would be unerring in its appli- 
 cation, and would dispense vnth returns of incomes 
 having to be made. Mr. Hand is evidently one of 
 those who believe that a tax, however levied, ulti- 
 mately falls on profits, and he thinks, therefore, that 
 
186 A PLAN OF BISECT TAXATION. 
 
 the best pkn is to tax profits at once. The proposal, 
 however, is open to the objections which are urged 
 against all stamps ; and, however nsefal as a substitute 
 " until something better turns lip," will never be made 
 the means of raising by far the largest amount of our 
 revenue, which is what we want at present. Some 
 gentlemen imagine that, as the National Debt was 
 incurred by the propertied classes and for the pro- 
 pertied classes, therefore property should at any rate 
 pay the whole of the interest of that debt ; while there 
 are others who think that property ought to bear the 
 entire revenue of the country. 
 
 The last-mentioned scheme is propounded by the 
 very highest authorities, — Locke, Turgot, and Dr. 
 Chalmers. " If," says Chalmers, " the whole of our 
 public revenue were raised by means of a territorial 
 impost, it would ultimately add nothing to the burden 
 which now lies on the proprietors of the land, for they, 
 when fighting against such a commutation, are fighting 
 in defence of an imaginary interest." The upholders 
 of this principle, as far as I can make them out, belong 
 to two classes ; those who, like Locke, maintain that all 
 taxes, however levied, fall on the land at last, and may 
 therefpre just as well be laid there at first ; and 
 another class, whose name is Legion, who believe that a 
 
A PLAN OF BISECT TAXATION. 187 
 
 tax on land has the veiy mteresidng, peculiar, and 
 desirable qnality of not falling npon anybody's shoulders 
 at all. Another proposal is, that all property whatso- 
 ever, castles, mills, houses, chairs, tables and sauce- 
 pans should be valued and taxed. The aggregate value 
 of all these things, it is said, is £14,000,000.000, of 
 which £10,000,000,000 could be rated at, say, IJd., 
 which at once produces a revenue of £63,000,000, 
 ^lich, with what is got &om the Post Office, is all 
 that is required. 
 
 There seems to be a lingering desire in this country 
 to tax dull, inanimate property. The existence of the 
 Probate Duties shows it. But if property, rather than 
 the man who owns it, is to bear the tax, by all means 
 tax it when it is realised, not while it is being acquired. 
 "As every tax must necessarily abstract a positive 
 quantity of existent capital from private use for public 
 benefit, the taking of that quantity from the growth 
 leaves the power of reproduction untouched and unim- 
 paired. The fruit, not the tree ; the milk, not the cow ; 
 the £ture, not the cab ; the hire, not the horse, is what 
 ought to be subject to taxation." Let us tax wealth 
 when it is made, not the process of making wealth. 
 It may be objected that such an impost would be a tax • 
 on providence, and would induce people not to save. 
 
188 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 That, however, seems to me very mnch like saying that 
 a man would object to receive payment of money due to 
 him because he would hav3 to buy a receipt stamp. At 
 present land pays almost 'nothing to the imperial 
 revenue, beyond what its owners pay as Income Tax ; 
 and although land constantly increases in value, with- 
 out any exertion on the part of the owners, while they 
 sleep, as Mr. Mill puts it, yet that increase gives 
 no corresponding contributions towards the public 
 expenditure. There can be no doubt it would be a 
 very good thing to tax the land, if only to make the 
 owners cultivate it, and so provide more, and conse- 
 quently .cheaper, food for the people of this country. 
 Of the seventy-four million acres which the British 
 Islands contain, only about forty-two millions are laid 
 out as arable land or good pasture ; while about thirty 
 millions of these acres are almost unenclosed, and 
 scarcely redeemed from their natural condition. Of 
 this vast surface some portions, of course, are barren 
 mountain or deep bog; but the aggregate of these 
 descriptions would certainly not amount to five millions 
 of acres. There remain, at all events, twenty-five 
 millions of acres which present no insuperable physical 
 difficulties to the work of cultivation ; and which, if 
 they could be cultivated successfully, would increase by 
 
A PLAN OP DIRECT TAXATION. 189 
 
 more than half, the present power of this kingdom to 
 support its teeming population. Add to this the fact, 
 as the Earl of Derby stated, that the land might pro- 
 duce twice as much as it does — and it would, I main- 
 tain, if it were taxed — and we find that three times as 
 much food ought to be produced in this country as is 
 produced at present. 
 
 I do not, however, think it wise to consider pro- 
 perty, which, under our political system is after all a 
 commodity, as a something to be taxed. It may be 
 taken as a standard or a criterion of a man's ability to 
 pay a certain amount, but it is unwise to speak of 
 taxing it. The proper thing to tax is neither land, nor 
 wages, nor profits, but the Man, the Citizen. Tet the 
 principle of taxing property is acknowledged — ^in the 
 Probate Duties, for instance. "Why should an additional 
 tax be imposed because the owner of a property is dead. 
 The man when living paid his taxes, and the successor 
 to his estates will also pay, and why the State should 
 step in and take out a sort of " soke " simply because 
 the estate is changing hands, is neiti^er reasonable nor 
 equitable. There is another injustice also in connec- 
 tion \nth this, ^ which,' although not bearing directly on 
 my present argument, is yet a branch of " Financial 
 Reform " that ought not to be forgotten. As you are 
 
190 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 probablyaware, there is great, inequality in the method 
 by which Probate and Succession Duties are levied. 
 In the first place, not only does real estate escape, 
 as a rule, while personal property is heavily mulcted, 
 but large estates are assessed for Probate Duty at 
 a less rate than «mall ones. Thus £1,000 has to 
 pay at the rate of three per cent. ; £10,000 at the 
 rate of two per cent. ; and £50,000 at the rate of 
 one and a half per cent. The heaviest burdens are 
 thus imposed upon those who have the least 
 means. The extension of the Probate Duty, too, 
 to real property would, if the duties are to exist at all, 
 bring in a very large sum of money to the exchequer 
 compared to what is now the case. Let me give a few 
 instances. Supposing a real estate of £70,000 passes 
 to a nephew, aged twenty-five years, he would have to 
 pay £810 ; but if a personal estate of £70,000 passes 
 to a brother and sister, aged respectively sixty-five and 
 seventy-five, they would have to pay no less than 
 £3,390, while if the nephew in the former case had 
 been of the same age as either of the others, he would 
 only have had to pay £300. The tax is even more 
 oppressive to the poorer classes. If a poor man leaves 
 £200 to his family, they have to pay Probate Duty £8, 
 Succession Duty £2, and legal expenses £4 12s., 
 
A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 191 
 
 makmg a total of £14 12s., which is at the rate of 
 £7 6s. per cent. . Is not this, therefore, a tax pressing 
 with nndne severity upon the widow and the father- 
 less ? In 1871 two wills were proved, each of them 
 relating to property worth more than a million, viz., 
 those of Mr. Thornton, in England, and Mr. Baird, in 
 Scotland. Had the property heen personal property, 
 the prohate duty on each would have heen £15,000 or 
 thereabouts; hut, being real' property, not a penny 
 found its way into the national exchequer. In 
 1859, Mr. Bright put this injustice very plainly 
 before the House of Commons. He said, "I was 
 fortunate enough to have a small property left to me by 
 a person of whom I had no knowledge. I never saw 
 him. He was an old gentleman, a great friend of 
 peace, and opposed to the Eussian war; and seeing 
 that my honourable friend, the member for Rochdale, 
 and myself were very strenuous in our opposition to 
 that war, he did what was in his power to mark his 
 opinion of the course we had taken. I sold the pro- 
 perty for £1,400 or £1,500 ; and when I came to pay 
 my Legacy Duty— -that is, the Succession Tax-71 was 
 greatly astonished at the smaU sum I had to pay. My 
 age was taken, an estimate of the annual value of the 
 property was made, and I was told that I had to 
 
192 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 pay something like £iO or ^650. If the property had 
 
 been in the Funds, or invested in any other of the 
 
 modes to which I have referred, I should have had to 
 
 pay dE140 at least. Take the case of an honourable 
 
 gentleman on ihis side the House, who has been more 
 
 fortunate than njyself. A property worth iG32,000 was 
 
 left to him by a person who was not a blood relation. 
 
 If it had been in the Funds, or in ships, or in railways, 
 
 or eniployed in trade, the Succession Duty would have 
 
 I 
 amounted to £3,200. What did he pay ? He is not 
 
 an old man — probably younger than the average of 
 
 members 'in this House— rand yet, upon the property 
 
 being valued, and a calculation made of the number of 
 
 years he might live, he found that he had to pay, not 
 
 £3,200, but £700." 
 
 Pardon this digression. I will now proceed with 
 
 the argument. Having laid down the rule that the 
 
 citizen and nothing else should be taxed, let us see 
 
 by what criteria we can ascertain how much he ought 
 
 to pay. What are the rules which should regulate 
 
 taxation ? 
 
 1st. There should be " equality of taxation." 
 
 Every man should pay his share in proportion to 
 
 the . protection he receives, that is, according to 
 
 his means, l^his is sometimes called making an 
 
A PLAN OF DIBECT TAXATION. 103 
 
 "equal sacrifice," which means that the rich 
 man — however wealthy he may be — should be 
 taxed to such an amount that he will feel the 
 pressure just as much as the poor man feels the 
 fe^w shillings or pounds that' are wrung from his 
 meagre earnings. 
 
 2nd. The tax which each individual should be 
 called upon to pay ought to be certain, and 
 not arbitrary or voluntary. 
 
 3rd. The time when taxes are to be collected 
 ought to be well known. 
 
 4th. Every tax ought to be so contrived as both to 
 take out and keep out of the pockets of the 
 people as little as possible over and above what 
 it brings into the Treasury of the State. 
 
 5th. No tax should prevent the increase of the 
 fund from which the taxes are paid, nor should 
 it deny to any man his natural right to the 
 free exchange of the fruits of his labour. 
 
 6th. The standard of valuation and assessment 
 ought to be certain, visible, and tangible; not 
 invisible, incorporeal, and intangible. 
 
 7th. Persons with barely sufficient means to pro- 
 vide the necessaries of life, and nO more, should 
 not be taxed at all, 
 
 N 
 
194 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 I have on other occasions treated of the fii*st five. 
 I propose now to say a few words on the -fifth and 
 sixth. 
 
 Now, what is there on the very outset which occurs 
 to one as being certain, visible, and tangible in regard^ 
 to a man's ability to pay a tax ? Not his income, for 
 that often fluctuates ; it is therefore uncertain : there 
 are no means of ascertaining it; it is therefore 
 invisible. A man's property is the best criterion of his 
 abiHty to pay a tax for the protection of that property. 
 I do not mean his land only. I mean all realised pro- 
 perty, such as railway shares, bank shares, canal shares, 
 and all other shares, as well as, perhaps, ships. A 
 tax on persons owning property in proportion to the 
 property they possess could not be oppressive if 
 . £30,000,000 were raised from them. I hope I shall hear 
 nothing about the increased burdens on land. If the 
 landowners of this country wish the question to be 
 enquired into, they will find it bad for the view they 
 take of the question. I am anxious to avoid any dis- 
 cussion that might seem tinctured with too strong an 
 opinion of the past conduct of the aristocracy. The 
 landowners of to-day are not responsible for the vricked- 
 ness and. the crimes of their ancestors, any more than 
 the other classes of society can be blamed for the folliBS 
 
A FLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 195 
 
 of their progenitors. It is only, therefore, when I hear 
 the "rights of property" talked of hy those who have 
 no "rights" at all, except possession gained by might, 
 that I am induced to remind them of Cobden's 
 words, "I warn the aristocracy not to force the 
 people to look into the subject of Taxation — ^not to 
 force them to see how they have been robbed, 
 plundered, and bamboozled for ages by them." Why 
 should the landholders oppose such a scheme? I 
 have pointed out the immense material advantages 
 which would foUow the adoption of Free Trade. Land 
 would be the first thing to rise in value. If its value 
 were only increased by one-fifth, how much would the 
 landholder with £2Q,000 a year lose by a tax of 4s. in 
 the pound? Say rather. How much would he gain? 
 Let him work out this simple sum, and he will become 
 a Free Trader. The tax, however, would not be any- 
 thing like so much as that, because I am not proposing 
 that landowners should be the only persons taxed, but 
 that the owners of other sorts of realised property 
 whatsoever shfiuld bear their share. 
 
 There is, then, a simple way of re^hing all those 
 persons who have property. But there are several per- 
 sons who have no property. By far the greater number 
 of these, however, are householders ; and here again we 
 
196 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 have something " certain, tangible, and visible " npon 
 which to base a tax. The value of a house is always 
 known, and the rent is, as a rale, a fair criterion of the 
 amount of taxation a man is able to bear. Some 
 people may think that an Inhabited House Duty, as it 
 is improperly called, would be a tax upon rent, and 
 would fall upon the owner. I cannot admit that. Why 
 is not the same assertion made with regard to local 
 rates ? If the owners of empty houses had to pay, it 
 might then be said the tax fell upon rental; or if 
 a house duty in addition to the present taxes were 
 imposed, perhaps rents might be affected. But I am 
 not proposing an additional tax. I am proposing a 
 small 'and cheaply collected tax, as a substitute for a 
 lapge and expensively collected one. The taxpayer 
 would derive a benefit by the change, and if he made 
 any move at all, it would be to a better and a larger 
 house, and thus rents would be beneficially affected. 
 Nothing can be more certain than that the tenant pays 
 the rent. It is equally certain he wouli pay the tax. 
 For my own part, I cannot see that if a man pays a 
 tax of i>2 because he lives in a house of £30 a year 
 rent, that is a tax upon his house, or is paid by his 
 landlord, any more than if, hving in that house, he 
 pays an Income Tax of £2 because his income is £250 
 
A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 197 
 
 a year. A tax on persons liying in houses is merely 
 saying to a man, " You live in a honse of snch a rent, 
 therefore you can afford to pay so much tax." The in- 
 cidence of the tax is upon the tenant alone, and can no 
 more be said to be a tax upon the owner, or upon the 
 rent, than the rise in the price of coal and meat, or the 
 increase of a man's famUy with no increase of income, 
 thus obliging bim to remove to a cheaper house, causing 
 rents to fell, can be said to be a tax upon the owner. 
 
 There are in England and Wales and Scotland 
 4,976,074 inhabited houses ; to these have to be added 
 those in Ireland and the smaller islands ; and I think 
 there can be no doubt that, without any oppression^ 
 £28,000,000 might be raised from their occupants, 
 which, added to the ^£30,000,000 from the 'land, and 
 to the amount obtained from the Post Office, Tele- 
 graphs, Crown Lands, etc., makes the total of what 
 ought to be raised for the government of the country. 
 Let us put down the inhabited houses in Great 
 Britain and Ireland at 6,000,000 (which is under 
 the mark); then, roughly speaking, the annual tax 
 upon persons living in 
 
 200,000 houses under £5 rent would be 10s. each = £100,000 
 300,000 „ . 10 . , 20«. . = 300,000 
 
 400,000 . . 20 . . 40s. . = 800,000 
 
198 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 500,000 houses under £40 rent would be 60s. each 
 
 = 1,500,000 
 
 1,000,000 
 
 „ 
 
 „ 
 
 60 „ 
 
 w 
 
 80«. 
 
 n 
 
 = 4,000,000 
 
 1,300,000 
 
 M 
 
 H 
 
 80 „ 
 
 . 
 
 100«! 
 
 m 
 
 = 6,500,000 
 
 1,200,000 
 
 . 
 
 „ 
 
 100 . 
 
 „ 
 
 120«. 
 
 „ 
 
 = 6,000,000 
 
 700,000 
 
 „ 
 
 „ 
 
 200 „ 
 
 , 
 
 160«. 
 
 „ 
 
 = 5,600,000 
 
 300,000 
 
 ,. 
 
 „ 
 
 300 „ 
 
 „ 
 
 180g. 
 
 » 
 
 = 2,700,000 
 
 100,000 houses above 300 „ 
 
 •■ 
 
 200». 
 
 u 
 
 = 1,000,000 
 
 £28,500,000 
 Now, I ask any man living in a £20 house whether 
 he would not prefer to pay £2 per annum direct, 
 rather than the much larger sum that is now obtained 
 from him by the present indirect method ? I ask 
 the tenants of other houses a similar question? It 
 is sometimes said that it would be impossible to 
 collect such a tax from the homes of the very poor. 
 The rents, however, are collected, and I venture to 
 think that Government would be able to collect the 
 Queen's taxes just as well as the rent collector gets his 
 master's rents. The tenants, it is true, might not 
 like the process at first, but " use doth breed a habit in 
 a man," and the people would soon find out that what 
 cannot be cured must be endured, and that they would 
 be paying less by this method than they had previously 
 paid. 
 
 Again, there ai-e four and a half millions of inhabited 
 houses in England and Wales. The number of mar- 
 
A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 199 
 
 ried men in England and Wales was, at the time of 
 the Census, 3,883,363; so that a tax on those who 
 live in houses would inelnde a lai^e nmnher of 
 bachelors; and a great many of the poorer class 
 wonid he reached hy a tax on those who liye in 
 flats or tenements, which wonld be regulated by 
 their rent, jnst as if they liyed ia honses. There is, 
 of course, a balance left of those who seemingly escape 
 taxation. Some of them, however, are properly 
 owners, and pay that way; others are very poor, and 
 are entitled to escape under the fifth of the roles I 
 hud down; while the rest, who of course must be 
 lodgers, would pay iadiiectly through their " landlord," 
 as he is called, in the rent ihey pay him. I acknow- 
 ledge that so &r as these are concerned, this is the weak 
 porut of the system I advocate, because an indirect tax of 
 such a nature has. at le^i one-ha^ of the disadvtmtages 
 of a tax on commodities. 1 have Uttle doubt that the 
 wisdom of the Legislature can find out some direct 
 method of reaching them. 'Whether or not, I would 
 much rather that a few should escape, in order that the 
 great mass may be fairly taxed, rather than that a great 
 number of the poor should be heavily oppressed, in 
 order that all may be reached. I do not know what 
 mav be the opinion of l^islators and statesmen, but 
 
200 A PLAN OF BISECT TAXATION. 
 
 the opinion I hold is this, that it would be, much better 
 to have a less taxed and more comfortable residuum of 
 people, even if their wealthier brethren had to pay a 
 little more than their share, than a class of poor, as at 
 present, more highly taxed in proportion to their 
 means than the richest noble in the land, and the land- 
 owners of the country paying as little as they possibly 
 can. I am not sure, either, that more would escape 
 under the proposed plan than at present. The num- 
 ber of males in England and Wales above 25 years 
 of age (less paupers, prisoners, soldiers, and others 
 who don't pay taxes) was at the last Census 4,578,882. 
 The number of inhabited houses in the same year 
 was 4,259,117. I should like to know how many 
 teetotallers the Temperance societies claim for that year. 
 I am sure there are more than 319,765 teetotallers, 
 males of full age,' ip England, and yet not all that 
 
 nuinber would"^^ escape a^^x.on householders. I venture 
 
 ■ \ '■ ^' 
 to think that, tbofee figures show that more persons 
 
 escape < their ^ s|hate fii *ax»tion by abstaining from 
 
 intoxicating idrihks,.- un4er the present system, than 
 
 would escape , pfider, th6 system of which I am 
 
 speaking. r 
 
 Another advantage in the system I am advocating 
 
 would be the cheapness of collecting. There would 
 
A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 201 
 
 be no other expense but that of actual collection. 
 The Hon. D. Wells, the great American financier, 
 has pointed ont, too, that in the case of persons who 
 are both owners and occupiers, one assessment would 
 do for both taxes. Thus — ' 
 
 Value of place of business .... £10,000 
 Three times rent of building (£1,000) 
 
 as basis of tax as occupier . . 3,000 
 
 Total valuation for assessment . . £13,000 
 
 It may be said that this proposal is one for too 
 great a change to be accomplished at once. To that 
 objeetion I reply that my friend, Mr. J. Alun Jones, of 
 Liverpool, who has paid gi-eat attention to the 
 whole subject, has prepared a " draft budget," which, 
 to my mind, might be accomplished to-morrow. 
 Mr. Jones does not, of course, intend his scheme to be 
 a final one, and he is quite open to consider any 
 amendments. His budget, however, if I may be 
 allowed to call it one, includes an entire substitution of 
 direct for indirect taxation. He proposes to abolish all 
 duties of Customs and Excise and Stamps, to sweep 
 away the Custom-houses, thus saving a great deal of 
 the cost of collection, and allowing the free develop- 
 ment of the trade of the countiy by unrestricted 
 
202 A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 commerce, thus caiTying out the principle contained in 
 the Magna Gharta.* Camilla, we are told, could glide 
 over a field of com without bending a stem; thus 
 lightly, says M. Bureau, should taxation fall on all 
 that pertains to industry. Mr. Jones' "budget" would 
 do this, and I recommend it as a great stride in the 
 direction of the policy I am advocating, t 
 
 Although, then, this scheme which I advocate is 
 very imperfect, it is infinitely nearer perfection than 
 the present system. True, it would allow some to 
 escape taxation who could well afford to pay their fair 
 share, but is not that better than highly to tax every- 
 body in order that the poorest may be reached ? What- 
 ever may be the disadvantages of the proposal, it is 
 fraught with such advantages as ought to commend 
 it to all who have the welfare of their country at 
 heart. Such a system would prevent no man from 
 getting an honest living, as indirect taxes always must ; 
 it would allow the production and the distribution of 
 wealth to proceed according to natural laws, untram- 
 melled on the one hand, stimulated on the other ; 
 
 > All merchanta shall haTe safe and secure conduct to go ont of, and 
 to come into England, and to stay there, and to pass as well by land as 
 by trater, for buying and selling by the ancient and alloved customs, 
 without any evil tolls. Magna Charta. 
 
 f See. Appendix B. 
 
A PLAN OF DIRECT TAXATION. 
 
 industry would be free ; taxes would be cheaply col- 
 lected, and the material prosperity of this country 
 would be so immensely increased, that homes would 
 be happier, people more contented, and Tice and misery 
 diminished in such an enormous degree, that phil- 
 anthropists and statesmen would think they had found 
 a panacea for all the squalor and wretchedness which 
 are now seen in such close proximity to wealth and 
 luxury. 
 
204 
 
 APPENDIX A. 
 
 While these pages were in the press, Sir Stafford Northcote 
 introduced his Budget, abolishing the sugar duties. Many of 
 the arguments used in the text were used during the debates on 
 that policy as well as in the public prints. On the morning of 
 the very day the Budget was introduced into the^ Committee 
 (April 16th, 1873), the Daily News laid great stress upon the 
 annoyance to various trades, as pointed out in the text at 
 page 36, by stating that, " Ever since the advent of the new 
 Government became certain, particular trades have been kept 
 almost in a state of stagnation, waiting to learn what changes 
 would be made in the Customs. The sugar trade, in which 
 large stocks are necessarily held by merchants and refiners, 
 has been almost paralysed." What is alone surprising is that 
 obttiseness which acknowledges that the abolition of the sugar 
 duties is good for the country, and yet fails to see that a similar 
 policy in regard to tea or any other taxed commodity would be 
 equally beneficial. Mr. Gladstone described the increased 
 prosperity which has always followed the remission of a duty, 
 as " something approaching to magic ; " and he also spoke 
 favourably of there now being a chance of the cultivation of 
 sugar in this country from beet " and other commodities." The 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer, too. said that it was to be hoped 
 that the abolition of the sugar duties would not only be followed 
 by an increase in the consumption of sugar, but that there would 
 be " elasticity in tea, coffee, and other articles of consumption." 
 AH this supports the views propounded in this book, while the 
 
205 
 
 foUowing anecdote from Sir Stafford Northcote's speech shows 
 how easily the frauds by Castam-honse officers, as mentioned on 
 page 3S, can be carried on. The right hon. gentieman said — 
 " I win mention a story which I heard a few days ago. I was 
 told by a friend of mine that he met a genfleman who said to 
 him, ' I have a caigo of si^ar at this moment coming to this 
 country. It depends npon the decision of an officer of the 
 Chistoms, who knows nothing about it, whether it should be put 
 in one dass or another, and according as it is put in one class 
 or another I will either make or lose by the cargo, Jl,200.' " 
 I will merely add that I have been informed that the aboH- 
 tion of the sugar duties will enable the staff at the laverpool 
 Cnstom-honse alone to be reduced by sixty derks. to say 
 no&ing of other officials, and the clerks which every merchant 
 in the trade has to keep on purpose to transact Custom-house 
 business. 
 
 I would like to refer to Mr. Sathbone's speech on Mr. Cross's 
 licensing Bill, as strengthening the arguments on the liquor 
 question used in the first chapter of this book. The Hon. 
 Member points out tbat when there was virtually Free Trade 
 in liquor in the town he represents (1862 to 1866), drunkenness 
 greatly decreased ; and that when the policy was departed fix>m 
 the number of convicticais for that offence at once increased ten 
 per cent 
 
206 
 
 APPENDIX B, 
 
 By J. ALUN JONES, Esq., 
 
 BABBISTEB-AT-LAW, LITEBFOOL. 
 
 I HERE submit what I may call a draft budget, embodying 
 the principles of Free Trade, and showing how they would, if 
 applied, have affected the finances of a given year. I have 
 selected 1867, not because there are any special features in the 
 accounts of that year that make them exceptionally easy to deal 
 with, but because Mr. Dudley Baxter's work on the income of 
 the nation gives the figures for that year, and also because there 
 is no subsequent year of the financial history of which so much 
 can be ascertained on Government authority. 
 
 A few words of explanation may be needful as to the mode 
 in which this sketch has been drawn up. The first column, 
 headed " Actual," contaias the figures of the finance accounts 
 for 1867, as prepared by Mr. Henry Lloyd Morgan, and pub- 
 lished in the Financial Reform Almanack. The second ccdumn, 
 headed " Proposed," shows how the various items would have 
 been altered or have disappeared, and a substitute provided in a 
 direct taxation budget. 
 
 The first to be noticed is the income side of the sheet. In 
 this the sources of revenue, ' headed respectively Customs, 
 Excise, Stamps and Assessed Taxes, disappear, while the Post 
 Office, Crown Lands, and Miscellaneous are, of course, retained. 
 The Land Tax is merged in the first class of taxes on income 
 from .capital (Schedule A.) The amount of the tax, four shillings 
 
207 
 
 in the pound, is simply that fixed by the Acts of 1692, and so 
 shamelessly nullified a few years afterwards by the Landloids' 
 Parliament of that time. The basis of the calculation is taken 
 £rom Mr. Dudley Baxter's work, which puts the income of tlie 
 nation from those sources that come under Schedule A (land, 
 houses, mines, etc.,) at ^£162,500,000. This, at four shillings in 
 the pound, gi\es £.32,500,000, as stated. 
 
 The next class. Schedule C (incomes feom the public funds), 
 is fixed by the same authoritr at thirty-four miUions. This tax 
 is objected to by many, on the ground that it is nn£ur to tax the 
 public creditor, but as the regularity and certainty of payment of 
 interest' on a national debt depend on the stability and good 
 administration of Government, it certainly seems to me quite 
 just to require some small contribution from fimdholders towards 
 securing such advantages. The same reasons apply with even 
 greater force to the holders of offices and pensions, who come 
 under Schedule £, tax they, without any investment of capital at 
 aU, receive a sure and r^ular income firom the nation, and, so 
 far as the advantages enjoyed are concerned, they are in almost 
 as good a positian as persons deriving an income from land, the 
 main difference in effect on theoaselves being that they do not, 
 like landowners, share the benefit of increasing incomes as a 
 result of growing national wealth and prosperity. I should add 
 that the figor^ on which the calculation for Schedule £ is based 
 have been taken from the Statistical Abstract, No. xviiL, page 16. 
 
 I now come to the last dass of taxes, taxes on occupation. 
 I may be permitted to cite the opinion of Mr. Wells, the 
 eminent American financier, who states in his Report on Taxa- 
 tion in the State of Xeic York, that rental is by to the surest 
 indication of the wealth of individuals, and of their relative 
 ability to pay taxes. There is much difficulty in getting at 
 reliable fignrfs wheteon to base an estimate for this tax. I 
 have calculated ^145,536,081 to be the gross rental of the 
 United Kingdom, by taking first the gross estimated rental 
 
208 
 
 of England [Financial Reform Almanach, 1870, p. 43), in 1867, 
 £118,334,081, and then the national income of Scotland and 
 Ireland as compared with that of England, as the basis of a 
 simple proportion sum by which to find the proportionate rental 
 of those comitries. i The results, added to the rental of England, 
 give the above figures. The rate, if an honest assessment were 
 made, might be much less, for as is well known, a large number 
 of country houses, especially those of our county magnates, are 
 rated at sums absurdly small compa,red with their real value. 
 
 In Sealing with the expenditure, every item not connected 
 with disbursements on account of indiirect taxation is retained, 
 the subject of economical administration being one into which I 
 cannot now enter. The cost of the Army and Navy in the 
 " Proposed " |Colnmn is lessened by £739,000, the expense of the 
 Coastguard fleet and service, which are included in the Navy 
 estimates for the obvious purpose of hoodfrihking the public as 
 to the real cost of the Custom-house system. The cost of 
 collecting and managing the Customs disappears, and that of the 
 Inland Kevenue is reduced by a million, £310,000 being amply 
 snf&cient for the collection of direct taxes, which might very 
 easily be entrusted to the collectors of local rates. A sum not 
 ascertainable should be deducted from the amount paid for 
 superannuation, some of which certainly goes to retifed revenue 
 of&cials. In the same way, deductions should be made from the 
 cost of Public works and buildings, which includes Custom- 
 houses that would no longer be needful ; and from the charge for 
 law and justice on account of prosecuting and punishing 
 oflfenders against the revenue laws. There are, also, other 
 savings that could be pointed out as certain to accrue from the 
 abolition of our Customs and Excise system ; for instance, a loss 
 of £852,000, which arises from the collection of revenue in 71 of 
 our ports, would be avoided. The restoration of many thousand 
 men employed by the Customs and Revenue departments to pro- 
 ductive industry should also be taken into account. 
 
209 
 
 One word as to the geneial resnits of this sketched bndget 
 It m^tns that, \rith saeh a mode of isxaiioa as that 
 asked for hy the Fmancial Befoim, Association, the eomitiy 
 would in 1867 have obtained for ^'72,381,560 what, under 
 the present system, cost no I^s than ^4,908,606, being 
 a saTing of two millions and a hall Add to this the enor- 
 mous advantages of a complete liberation of trade from 
 eTery trammel, and the &ir distribotion of the bnrden over all, 
 not tsarina Hie poor man according to his wants, while letting 
 the rich off with an infinitely lighter load, but calling on all 
 according to their ability and to the benefits they derive from 
 well-ordered government to pay fi>r it; and above all, the price- 
 less moral benefit of spreading among the masses a conviction 
 that the Government is dealing jnstly by them, a conviction 
 idiich wonld be a stronger safi^nard against revolution than 
 any other poUcy that can be conceived. 
 
210 
 
 FINANCE ACCOUNTS. ENDING MAKCH aisT, 1868, AS 
 THEY WERE AND AS THEY MIGHT HAVE BEEN. 
 INCOME. 
 Balances and Bills outstanding, and 
 Advances repayable 
 
 1. Customs 
 
 2. Excise 
 
 3. Stamps 
 
 4. Land Tax 
 
 6. Assessed Taxes 
 
 6. Income Tax , 
 
 7. Post Office 
 
 8. Crown Lands 
 
 9. Miscellaneons 
 
 Taxes on Income from Capital : — 
 
 4s. in the & on Schednle A. (Lands, 
 &c.) 
 
 Is. in the & on Schedtde C (Annui- 
 ties, &c.) 
 
 3s. in the & on Schedule E. (Officers 
 
 and Pensions) 
 
 Tax on Occupation 8s. 3d. in the & on 
 
 Rental '. 
 
 3,180,497 
 
 3,180,497 
 
 22,664,980 
 
 NiL 
 
 20,190,338 
 
 NiL 
 
 9,475,177 
 
 NiL 
 
 1,092,695 
 
 See below. 
 
 2,360,301 
 
 NiL 
 
 6,184,166 
 
 See below. 
 
 4,558,962 
 
 4,558,962 
 
 449,252 
 
 449,252 
 
 2,586,218 
 
 2,586,218 
 
 72,742,586 
 Excess of Expenditure over Income 2,166,020 
 
 32,500,000 
 1,700,000 
 3,593,012 
 
 23,748,363 
 
 72,316,304 
 66,266 
 
 74,908,606 72,381,560 
 
2U 
 
 FINANCE ACCOUNTS, ENDING MARCH 31st, 1868, AS 
 THEY WERE AND AS THEY MIGHT HAVE BEEN. 
 EXPENDITUEE. 
 
 10. Interest and Management of Na- 
 tional Debt 
 
 11. Army and Navy (cost of Customs, 
 Fleet, and Service ^£739,000) 
 
 12. Cost of Collection and Manage- 
 ment of Revenue Departments : — 
 
 Cnstoms i 
 
 Inland Beveane ; ... 
 
 Post Office 
 
 Snpeiannnations 
 
 Packet Service 
 
 Crown Lands 
 
 13. Public Works and Bmldings 
 
 14. Salaries and Expenses of Public 
 Departments , 
 
 la. Law and Justice 
 
 16. Education, Science, and Art 
 
 17. Colonial and Consnlar 
 
 18. Snpeiannnations, &e. 
 
 19. Miscellaneoiis 
 
 20. Deficiency of Grants 
 
 21. Supplemental 
 
 22. Civil list 
 
 23. Annuities and Pensions 
 
 24. Interest on Loans, Secret Service, 
 
 25. Fortifications 
 
 Balances, &c., outstanding, and Repay- 
 able Votes 
 
 Actual. 
 
 Fboposes. 
 
 26,571,750 
 
 26,571,750 
 
 28,587,530 
 
 ^7,848,630 
 
 788,046 
 
 NiL 
 
 1,310,026 
 
 310,026 
 
 2,327,883 
 
 2,327,883 
 
 457,247 
 
 457,247 
 
 808,617 
 
 808,517 
 
 95,780 
 
 95,780 
 
 722,393 
 
 722,393 
 
 1,846,670 
 
 1,846,670 
 
 3,769,327 
 
 3,769,327 
 
 1,595,447 
 
 1,595,447 
 
 718,777 
 
 718,777 
 
 372,946 
 
 372,946 
 
 216,982 
 
 216,982 
 
 79,829 
 
 79,829 
 
 159,000 
 
 159,000 
 
 405,721 
 
 405,721 
 
 286,839 
 
 286,839 
 
 211,305 
 
 211,305 
 
 530,000 
 
 530,000 
 
 71,862,015 
 
 69,334,969 
 
 3,046,59] 
 
 3,046,591 
 
 74,908,606 
 
 72,881,560 
 
213 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Abolition of the Com Laws, 6. 
 Admiiali;, Jobbery at the, 135. 
 Aldemey, Fortifications of, 141. 
 Appendix A, 204. 
 Do. B, 206. 
 Army and Navy Espenditnie, 
 
 126. 
 Antnmn HanoenTres, 139. 
 
 Balance Sheet, National, 119. 
 
 Beer, Tax on, 3. 
 
 Beetroot, cultivation of, 32. 
 
 Blackstone on Excise Duties, 2.. 
 
 Bookkeeping, National, 120, 166. 
 
 Bribeiy of Members of Parlia- 
 ment, 115. 
 
 Bright, 3., on Drmikenness, 16. 
 the National Stewards, 148. 
 Expenditure, 113. 
 Sneoession Dnties, 191. 
 
 Budget, Draft of, 206. 
 
 Carey, H. C, on Protection, 97. 
 
 Cheap Wines a cause of tem- 
 perance, 28. 
 
 Chicory, cnltiyation of, 84. 
 
 Circumlocution, 144. 
 
 Civil Service, discontent in, 167. 
 examinations, 168. 
 expenditure, 143. 
 
 Class Legislation, 8. 
 
 Coleridge, Lord, on Dmnken- 
 
 n6ss, 16. 
 Committee of Supply, 114. 
 Cope, Bros., on Indirect Taxa- 
 tion, 8. 
 Com Laws, Abolition of, 6. 
 Criteria of Taxation, 192. 
 Custom House, 82, 88. 
 
 OfScers, frauds by, 38, 205. 
 Customs abolished by Edward 
 n., 2. 
 
 curiosities of, 51. 
 
 introduced by Edward L, 2. 
 
 origin of, 3. 
 
 prevent invention, 107. 
 
 Strabo on, 2. 
 
 Derby, Earl of, on Beduction of 
 
 Expenditure, 113. 
 Dilke, Sir C, on Incidence of 
 Taxation, 61. 
 
 Patronage, 117. 
 
 War expenditure, 179. 
 Direct Taxation, 41, 177. 
 
 advantages of, 41. 
 
 check upon extravagance, 47. 
 
 incidence of, 49. 
 
 Macaulay, Lord, on, 41. 
 
 no National Debt with, 43. 
 
 plans of, 184. 
 
 prevents war, 42. 
 
214 
 
 Discontent in the Civil Service, 
 167. 
 
 Distress cansed by Indirect Tax- 
 ation, 5. 
 
 Dockyard Sales, 137. 
 
 Donnell, Bobert, on Betaliatory 
 Duties, 24. 
 
 Dnmkard (the) Stmubling block 
 io Free Trade, 15. 
 
 Dmnkeness, J. Bright on, 16. 
 cannot be prevented by Taxes, 
 
 15. 
 Coleridge on, 16. 
 in France, Jersey, &c., 27. 
 
 Duties prevent invention, 33. 
 
 Effects of Indirect Taxation, 1. 
 Effects of Bemission of Duties, 6. 
 Elections, Governmental inter- 
 ference in, 169. 
 Emperor of China on taxing 
 
 intoxicants, 25. 
 Examinations, Civil Service, 
 
 168. 
 Excise Duties, Blackstone on, 
 2. 
 Johnson, Dr., on, 3. 
 prevent invention, 107. 
 Expenditure, Army and Navy, 
 126. 
 Civil Service, 143. 
 National, 112. 
 Beduction of, 178. 
 Expense of collecting Indirect 
 
 Taxes, 9. 
 Extravagance, National, 149. 
 
 Fielden, Joshua, M.P., on Malt 
 Tax, 29. 
 patronage, 116. 
 
 Finance Committee, 176. 
 Financial Beform Association, 
 
 policy of, 181. 
 " Five Alls," the, 170. 
 Fortifications of Aldemey, 141. 
 Free Exchange, 108. 
 Free Trade, 74. 
 
 advantages of, 100—109. 
 
 in America, 96. 
 
 in banking, 105. 
 
 in the Colonies, 101. 
 
 in land, 105. 
 
 not yet accomplished, 75. 
 
 Potter, E., on, 102. 
 
 prevents War, 110, 111. 
 
 WeUs, Hon. D., on, 97. 
 French Treaty, 100. 
 
 Gladstone, W. E., on the Ex- 
 penditure, 113. 
 on Free Trade, 76. 
 Governmental Patronage, 115. 
 
 Hand, Mr. S., plan of Taxation, 
 
 185. 
 Honorary Colonels, 132. ~ 
 Horses,' loss on sale of, 133. 
 Householders, tax on, 195. 
 
 Incidence of Direct Taxes, 49. 
 
 Taxation, 57. 
 Income Tax, 50, 185. 
 Increased consumption, benefits 
 
 6^78. 
 Indirect Taxation, 1. 
 
 a surreptitious mode, 7, 12. 
 
 Cope Bros, on, 8. 
 
 distress caused by, 5. 
 
 effects of, 1, 24. 
 
 expense of collecting, 9. 
 
215 
 
 Indirect Taxation t&Qs on oon- 
 
 someis, 9. 
 injores the piodneer, 12. 
 is voluntary, 13. 
 Inflnenoe of constituencies on 
 
 their members, 178. 
 Intosieaiits, taxes on, 14, 25. 
 Introdnctoiy, vii. 
 InTention prevented by duties, 
 
 33. 
 
 Jobbery at the Admiralty, 135. 
 
 Vanity Fair on, 150. 
 Johnson, Dr., on Excise, 3. 
 Jones, J. Alnn, Budget by, 206. 
 
 Iiam Courts, cost of, 159, 161. 
 Lawson, Sir W., on taxing 
 
 intoxicants, 26. 
 Legacy duty, 190. 
 L^Ue, T. E. Cliffe, on Indirect 
 
 Taxation, H. 
 Ideenses, 35. 
 
 Ijondon, central position of, 109. 
 Luxuries, taxes on, 31, 107. 
 
 MeCombie, M.F., on Patronage, 
 
 117. 
 Maequeen, C. E., 45. 
 
 on Direct Taxation, 183. 
 
 on War Expenditure, 46. 
 Malt Tax, 28. 
 Match Tax, 25. 
 Medway, sale of, 129. 
 Hozrison, Walter, on Extrav- 
 agence, 178. 
 
 National Balance Sheet, 119. 
 
 Book-keeping, 120, 126. 
 National Debt, 122. 
 
 National Expenditure, 112. 
 Stewards, 141. 
 
 Oath taken by pensioners, 168. 
 Officering of the Army, 132. 
 
 Navy, 134. 
 Origin of Customs, 2. 
 Osborne, Bemal, on National 
 
 stewards, 141. 
 
 Patronage, 115. 
 
 Secretary, 163. 
 Peace, 110. 
 Pelican, sale of, 129. 
 Pensions, 152. 
 
 Petition to H. of Conmions^ vii. 
 Plans of Direct Taxation, 184. 
 Post Office Scandal, 165. 
 Potter, E., on Free Trade, 102. 
 Premiums oSered for subj^ts 
 
 of taxation, 4. 
 Prince Christian's travelling 
 
 expenses, 161. 
 Probate Duties, 189. 
 Property owners, tax on, 194. 
 Protection, H. C. Carey on, 97, 
 
 Hon.D. Wells, on, 99. 
 
 Backing, 92. 
 
 Baper, 3. H., on Voluntary Tax- 
 ation, 13. 
 
 Becruiting, 170. 
 
 Bedi^ction of Expenditure, 113, 
 175. 
 
 Bemission of Duties, effects o^ 
 6. 
 
 Beorganisation of Office, 148, 
 164. 
 
 Betaliatory duties, 24. 
 
 Betrograde policy proposed, 94. 
 
216 
 
 nn>Bx. 
 
 Bewards by Oovemment, 164. 
 Bomilly Family, the, 152. 
 Boyal Family, the, 171. 
 Bnleg of Taction, 192. 
 
 Scndamore Scandal, 165. 
 Servants (DomeBtic) pay taxes, 
 
 70.. 
 Sineenres, 149. 
 
 Smith, Sidney, on Taxation, 4. 
 Smuggling, 37, 39. 
 Spirits, Taxes on, 14. 
 Stiabo on Customs, 2. 
 Succession Duties, 190. 
 Sugar duties, 32, 38, 204. 
 
 Tax on Beer, 3. 
 on householders, 195. 
 on imports, 103. 
 on property owners, 194. 
 on Spirits, 14, 25. 
 on Sugar, 32, 204. 
 
 Tax on Tea, 32, 101. 
 
 on Tobacco, 29. 
 Taxation, Criteria of, 192. 
 
 of Working Class, 60. 
 
 Middle Class, 67. 
 
 Bnles of, 192. 
 
 Voluntary, 54. 
 Taxes, obligatory, 64, 
 
 Tolnntoiy, 54. 
 
 Vanity Fair on Jobbery, 150. 
 Voluntary Taxation, 13 
 Voting Moiiey on Account, 163. 
 
 War, 42, 46, 179. 
 
 Wells, Hon. D., on Free Trade, 
 97. 
 
 "Whip," 163. 
 
 Wine Trade, 84, 93, 107. 
 
 Worcester, not a port, 85. 
 
 WorMng Men and direct Taxa- 
 tion, 62, 66. 
 
 D. Marples, Pbinter, 50b, Lobd Stbeet, Livebpool. 
 
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