PAMPHLETS ON THE FINANCE AND CORN QUESTION. NONE but perhaps
the authors are unreasonable enough to imagine that we can find room for reviewing one half of the pamphlets which flow in upon us weekly, though we record their arrival, for the benefit of those who take an interest in the subjects. This week, however, we select three from the crowd, as indicating the kind of questions to which the aspect of public affairs is directing present attention, and the legislative measures which may at no dis- tant day be established in consequence of the discussion provoked. 1. The Revenue; or What should the Chancellor Do? By Mr. Jaws
WILSON.
Mr. Wu-sores brochure grapples with the subject of general finance. In this, as in a previous publication, Mr. WILSON shows himself capable of taking a comprehensive view of economical questions, as well as of discussing each on its own separate merits. He treats the question " What should the Chancellor do?" in a clear, succinct, and business-like manner. He states at the outset, that his object is " not to inquire whether our mode of distributing taxation is either the wisest or fairest, but to consider how it may be best managed and dealt with as it is." And he arrives by a process of arithmetical demonstration at the con- clusion, that the difficulties of the country may be retrieved by steadily following up the policy of HUSRISSON. Incidentally, how- ever, he throws out some hints, pregnant with meaning, about the comparative merits of direct and indirect taxation. He shows that the portion of the revenue raised by direct or quasi direct taxation, in this country, is to that raised by taxes on consumption as in the ratio of 8 per cent, while in France it is 33 per cent. He reminds the reader, that on an average, a person spending 5001. per annum does not pay more than 121. of direct taxes at the outside; that he who spends 1,0001. does not pay more than 201.; and that he who spends 3,0001. does not pay more than 501. On this ground he argues, that had the Chancellor of the Exchequer last year added. 50 per cent. to the Assessed Taxes, the additional 61., 101., and 251. per annum, would have been comparatively little felt by the in- dividuals of those three classes ; would not have materially di- minished their expenditure ; and, while it was efficient for its pur- pose, would only have increased our direct taxes to 12 per cent. on the whole revenue. On the other hand, he shows that the income of 1839-40 (preceding the imposition of an additional 5 per cent. on duties) indicates a consumption of 106,803,333/. ; whereas the consumption of 1840-41 (under the operation of the additional 5 per cent.) shows a consumption of only 102,298,8331. The experiment of the 5 per cent. on duties has deprived the public of enjoyments of the value of 5,504,4001.; to which must be added, that this sacrifice has been attended by no increase in the returns of the consumption-taxes. As bearing upon these views, the fol- lowing table, contrasting the actual produce of the Customs and Excise duties for the last four years with what it would have been had not consumption decreased as population increased, under the influence of our present system of taxation, is instructive.
Net Produce : Customs Actually pro- Population. and Excise Tax. £36,392,472 doted. 1836 26,15%524 gave
1837 26,518,885 should give... 36,938,363
1838 £33,958,421 26,879,246 should give... 37.484,254 34,478,417 1839 27,239,607 should give... 38,030,145 35,093,633 1840 27,599,963 should give... 38,567,036 '35,536,469 With the additional 5 per cent. imposed last year
Under existing circumstances, these suggestions will not have been dropped on barren ground.
2. Statements illustrative of the Policy and Consequences of the Repeal of Corn-laws and the Imposition of a Moderate Fired Duty. A pamphlet published avowedly for the purpose of strengthen- ing the hands of Ministers in their attempt to deal with the Corn-laws: but an advertisement on the back of the title- page tells us, that " to prevent misconception, it may be as well perhaps to state, that this tract has not been written with the knowledge or at the desire of the Government." We will be bound it has not : the author demonstrates that five shillings per quarter ought to be the rate of duty on wheat ; and Lord JOHN RUSSELL, with his eight-shilling duty in petto, could scarcely have desired him to advance such a position. The kind pamphleteer has endeavoured to do his friends in the Government a good turn without forewarning, and adds to the long catalogue of absurd situations into which the givers of agreeable surprises tumble.
But the cunning of the author is shown to almost greater advan- tage in the reasons he advances to prove that a moderate fixed duty ought to be accepted by the agriculturists and conceded by the other classes of society. He argues with the former, that they ought to be protected in this manner, because they need no pro- tection at all ; with the latter, that they ought to support Corn- law Repeal with moderation, because in reality it is not calculated to do them so much good as they expect. We are not exagger- ating. At page 16 he says—" The truth is, that the agriculturists have nothing to fear even from the total'and unconditional repeal of the Corn-laws. Such a measure would no doubt be partial and unjust, and should not therefore be entertained ; but it admits of demonstration that it could do them no real injury." The doc- trine that a measure which would do no harm to the agricul- turists and yet benefit every other class would be " partial and :unjust," transcends our comprehension. Again—" We are friendly to the imposition of a duty on foreign corn, not because we think it is required to protect agriculture, or that it can be of any material service to the agriculturists, but because they have a just right to demand it." No man can have a just right to demand any enactment in his favour which he does not need and which cannot be of material use to him, more especially when that measure must injure others. The writer has admitted that the Corn-laws pro tanto injure the consumers : such an argument as that last quoted is not likely to make them acquiesce even in a moderate duty. The truth is, that if the writer could have whis- pered in the ears of the Repealers—" Take a moderate fixed duty; you ask a great sacrifice from the agriculturists, and will not be so much benefited by it as you think"; and into the ears of the agri- culturists —" Compound with them for a moderate fixed duty ; they suffer materially from the Corn-laws, and you derive little or no advantage from them,"—each party, hearing only the statement made to itself, might have been convinced : but when each hears both stories, it sees clearly that one must be untrue, and resolves in dubio to listen to neither.
It is a pity that a person possessed of so much shrewdness and information, as a great part of the pamphlet shows its author to be, should mar his usefulness by a predilection for indirect courses—from want of ability to see that frankness and sin- cerity are the only passports to confidence and influence over the opinions of men. The statistical data and reasonings upon them by which the author arrives at the conclusion that 5s. per quarter on wheat is the highest fixed duty that can be borne by foreign grain, are conclusive. Mr. M'Cut,Locn, in one of his publi- cations, has shown that the average duty under the existing shift- ing scale is 6s. 8d. To reduce it Is. 8d. would be no exorbitant con- cession ; to raise it Is. 4d. might occasion serious suffering. But the proposal of the author of the pamphlet to grant a drawback of 5s. or 6s. a quarter on corn exported when prices fall below a certain level—not specified—is another instance of the twist in his mind which makes him prefer crooked to direct ways. The reason assigned for this proposal is, that it would enable our heavily-taxed agriculturists to compete on equal terms with the less heavily- taxed agriculturists of the Continent in foreign markets. The writer assumes that the agriculturists are more heavily taxed than other classes of British subjects—an assumption diametrically the reverse of truth. But, waiving this consideration, would it not be better to untax them to a certain amount, than be at the expense first of collecting taxes and then paying the proceeds to corn- exporters? The definition, "a straight line is the shortest be tween any two points," holds good in morals, and we should think in political economy, as well as in mathematics.
3. Extracts from the Report of the Hand-loom Weavers Commissioners. Reprinted by Mr. RAIRES CURRIE for the Working Men of Not- tingham.
This belongs to a class of publications of little pretension but Feat usefulness. Mr. CURRIE has selected some of the most important passages in the Report of Messrs. SENIOR, JONES LOYD, Memos:, and Lantz, bearing on the question regarding the effect of high and low prices of food on the rates of wages ; and has pre- fixed to the reprint an appeal to the working men of the com- munity he represents, imploring them to bring their own common sense to bear upon a controversy so vitally interesting to them. As this address is short as well as pithy, we quote it entire— "The Reform Bill recognized an abstract principle, which the people will one day make an all-important truth, viz. the principle of real representation : meanwhile it left the power of making laws to a small minority—the land- owners of the country. They are men of like passions and feelings with your- selves, neither better nor worse than any other class ; as a class they will never willingly close up their' old right of way' into the pockets of the public. "The whole body of monopolists are now chuckling over their successful efforts to deceive and divide the people, to distract them from the pursuit of substantial good by opening np a dishonest cry about the Poor-law, the Slave- trade, or any thing which serves their purpose, while the more crafty play off their juggling tricks (and they are accomplished jugglers) to mystify the plain subject matter of these extracts, viz. the effect of the price of food on the rste of wages. " Amid much to disappoint and to dishearten, they who have faith in human progress will still believe that NOTHING rAtss is PERMANENT ; that every system based on wrong and robbery' will crumble when once it is made mani- fest and understood. Firm, enduring, and impregnable—if we take Parlia- mentary majorities as a test—still seems the Corn-law, the keystone of mo- nopoly : but there is a boding murmur on the wind; the voice of PUBLIC OPV NION is rising trumpet-tongued against it, and before that blast it will fall down like the walls of Jericho amid the shootings of the people.
" Men of Northampton ! will you sit idly by, passive spectators of a straggle which concerns your daily labour and your daily bread ? I do not ask you to take up any electioneering, any party question ; I do not ask you to put your trust in any faction—Whig, Tory, or Radical; but I do implore you, while you manfully maintain your own political opinions, to combine and cooperate with any party or any individuals who are fighting a good fight against the Corn-law in the cause of regular employment, better wages, and diminished toil!"
The use of a publication of this kind is, that by setting the seal of a man of local influence on certain facts as important and worthy of attention, it attracts to them the notice .of many who would otherwise have passed them unregarded. Mr. Hurr has done much good in this way, and it would be well if others as well as Mr. CURRIE were to take a leaf out of his book.
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