Page:The New Monthly Magazine - Volume 039.djvu/457

Rh commercial country, independent of the unseen fact that an exclusive taxation of luxuries would be merely an indirect tax on property, with the attendant disadvantages of inequality; for the miser would escape "scot free," while the generous and hospitable parent would be amerced in proportion to the extent in which he exercised the noblest qualities. Either, therefore, of the foregoing plans (the first being a direct, and the second an indirect tax on property) of finance, as a sole resource for the Chancellor of the Exchequer, need not consideration.

We now come to the third exclusive source, viz. — a tax on the necessaries of the bulk of the people. It is evident that, from twenty-five million mouths, possessed of the comforts of life appertaining to a tolerable degree of civilization, fifty million pounds, or ninepence-farthing a-week might more readily be raised than on either of the two foregoing plans. But, independent of the unjustness of endeavouring to make the noble and the peasant pay alike, it may be surmised that such a tax would prove, in the long run, grievously oppressive to the industry of the country. Now, although each system, taken separately, would be unjust, it is evident that a combination of them, judiciously managed, might be made advantageous to the prosperity of the country, the stability of the governing, and the tranquillity of the governed.

That some approximation should be made to the rational doctrine laid down by Lord Althorp (that a man should be taxed according to the amount of his property for the protection afforded him by Government) is now pretty generally admitted. This, however, could not be accomplished by a mere tax on luxuries; for the man with a million of money might, and does often, consume less luxuries than the man with little more than a bare competency. Hence the necessity of taxing wealth to a moderate extent, either by a per centage, by stamps on transfers, by legacy and probate duties, by settlements, or by a licensing tax, if it could be equally assessed.

Luxuries of every description are also fair objects of revenue, and subject to the highest rate of assessment which can be levied consistent with the interests of commerce, the prevention of smuggling, and the advantage of the Exchequer.

Necessaries of life must also pay a proportion of the taxes to the Exchequer, because every labouring man, every artizan, whose sole capital is his skill and industry, must contribute something for the preservation of internal peace, and for defence from foreign aggression, for it is on these contingents he is enabled to exercise profitably his labour and ingenuity.

This detail will make it apparent, that if the rich man is to be compelled, in a social community, to contribute to the state for the preservation of his property, so also is the poor man for the tranquillity necessary to the beneficial prosecution of his labour: the difficulty lies in proportioning the distribution between the different classes of society. At the present moment the lowest, or hand-to-mouth class, bear, in proportion to their means, the largest share of taxation; and the internal and maritime community of the country is grievously shackled by the duties now imposed on articles of home or colonial produce, (such as malt or sugar,) that enter largely into the diet and use of the mass of the people. This fact is thus exemplified: —