year would abridge him of many comforts, and he might almost say of many necessaries; and at any rate his sacrifice was immeasurably greater than that of the rich proprietor nominally paying ten times the amount. Therefore, if it were fit to make any reserve whatever of incomes of 150l. a-year, it would be proper to permit à similar advantage to incomes above 150l.

a-year.

Viscount Sandon declared, that the Whig Budget had not received half the condemnation it deserved; it was utterly unworthy, and not one single item of it could be relied on. For instance, there could have been no revenue from corn; for, if the harvest had been good, none would have been importedif bad, the fixed duty would have been taken off. Then as to the proposal to return to taxes repealed, was it for the comfort of the people to reimpose taxes on glass, soap, or other articles of domestic use? The attempts to raise a popular cry against the Income-tax had failed; a petition against it lay in the Liverpool Exchange for five or six hours before it received a single signature; and that was before it was known to be a rule of the House not to receive petitions against pending measures of taxation. Attempts were made to throw difficulties in the way of the tax, by undervaluing the emergency; but the war in Affghanistan was not to be measured by the loss of lives they could not compare lives lost in a defeat, to lives lost in a victory, the loss of 10,000 men, under circumstances shaking our moral hold over India, with that of 10,000 men in a hospital. And might not the event even influence the Emperor of China

:

to resist the demands of this country, and thus further increase the expense of the China war? As a proof that the tax was not met with dislike, he observed that the Opposition journals at first approved of it; and when they turned to a different opinion, the provincial journals of the same party very slowly followed the example. He vindicated the part which he and others had taken in resisting the proposal to reduce the sugar duties.

Mr. O'Connell argued for a Property-tax in contradistinction to an Income-tax. Nothing could justify the latter but the most absolute necessity,-a necessity which must rest upon a double assumption, the want of money, and the want of means to supply the want of money; and they must try other sources already pointed out, especially timber and sugar, and have practical demonstration that a revenue could not thence be

raised to the extent required, before they resorted to an Income-tax. It was not wise to depreciate the national resources in the eyes of foreign countries, while peace was as yet unsafe with Russia, France, and the United States; but the Income-tax ought to be hoarded up in terrorem. Ministers ought to recollect what enemies they were raising against themselves by the operation of such a tax; arraying against themselves all the active talent of the country,-the rising lawyers, the rising physicians, the skilful clerks, whose superior talents enable them to obtain larger salaries. For his own part he objected to the tax on account of its gross injustice, and because it was imposed to maintain the landed interests in possession of their high rents.

Mr. Hawes cited the authority of Sir Francis Baring in 1798, and Mr. Huskisson, in 1830, in opposition to an Income-tax, and in favour of a Property-tax; insisting that the Income-tax would fall on the productive industry of the country. With respect to the tariff, the step taken was in the right direction, but towards the mass of the people it was an injustice, because it retained the great monopolies; for the difference between the present plan and that of the late Ministry was, that the latter sought to obtain revenue by grappling with great monopolies, while the former think it their duty to maintain those monopolies, and to impose great additional taxation upon the country.

Sir James Graham said, that Mr. Labouchere had made the important admission, that although a revenue were obtained from an alteration of the corn and sugar duties, there still would be a deficiency to be supplied by direct taxation. It was hinted that repealed taxes might be reimposed; look at the most productive of them, the taxes on beer, malt, leather, candles, soap, printed cottons, or coals carried coastwise; would Mr. Baring who was about to address the House, specify which of those he would have reimposed? Sir James Graham wound up with a declaration that the Ministers would stand or fall by the measure of taxation which they had imposed, so as to bear upon the rich and powerful, and to spare the humble and poor. They were quite satisfied that the measures they proposed were prudent; they believed them to be indispensably necessary. They had not lightly proposed them; they

would not timidly abandon them; and it only remained for the House to determine whether they should be adopted. "You need expect no Appropriation-clause shirking from us; you need expect no Jamaica Bill resignation. That which we believe to be right we will manfully maintain; and we place our reliance for support in our present financial measures on the wisdom of the Parliament, and on the patriotic spirit and virtue of the nation."

Mr. F. T. Baring contrasted the manner in which the present Ministers magnified the difficulties of the time with the calm spirit of Mr. Pitt's speeches, when he brought forward an analogous measure. He accepted Sir J. Graham's wish to see meetings composed of persons who enjoy less than 150l. a-year, as a proof that the Income-tax was an excellent bidding for the "physical force" of England; but he threatened the Ministers with a future agitation among the shopkeepers and industrious classes-an opposition so strong as either to force them to give up the tax altogether, or to exempt incomes and lay burthens upon property alone. He went on to discuss particular points in the tariff, comparing it with his own Budget, which he declared would not be unpopular. He did not see how with a yearly deficiency of 1,200,000l. made by the tariff, amounting in three years to 3,600,000l., the Income-tax could be taken off at that time. He entered into some details to show that the late Ministers had not saddled the country with a debt of 41,000,000l., as they had been accused of doing; the real increase of the debt from 1835 to 1841 was only 8,500,000l.; or, leaving the

20,000,000l. of West-India compensation out of the account, there was a decrease of fully 13,000,000l. But a sinking fund had been at work; 2,500,000l. a-year had been paid for converting perpetual into terminable annuities. Mr. Baring denied that he had ever condemned the principle of taxing the succession of land; he had only objected to making good the Post-office deficiency by that means, because that was in effect unfairly transferring the burthen to the agricultural interest, which did not benefit so much as others by the reduction. He called on the House to appeal to past experience of the various kinds of taxation, and they would find that of all taxes the Income-tax had been the most odious to the people, for in 1816 the agricultural, commercial, and manufacturing classes exclaim ed unanimously against it, and demanded that, before all the rest, it should be repealed. He reverted, however, with satisfaction to the fact, that amid all the discussion, nowhere was there a single word of the breach of national faith.

Mr. Ferrand reproached the Opposition with opposing Sir Robert Peel, in his efforts to give food to the poor.

Lord Worsley declared that he could neither support the Government measure, nor Lord John Russell's resolution, which involved the principle of a fixed duty on corn. The House then divided, when the numbers were-For Lord John Russell's Amendment, 202; Against it, 308; Ministerial majority, 106.

Mr. William Williams then moved a resolution, which he had before given notice of; but afterwards withdrew it.

Lord Robert Grosvenor pro

posed a graduated Income-tax, varying with the extent and nature of incomes; but he made no formal motion. The report was then brought up and read.

Mr. Labouchere now recommended that the Income-tax should be postponed, in order that the tariff might be proceeded with.

Sir Robert Peel was quite sure that Mr. Labouchere had no apprehensions with regard to his intentions respecting the tariff. He had no wish to press the Incometax Bill with any haste; but the House would agree with him, that it was necessary that he should have the Income-tax Bill so far advanced as to give him a reasonable hope of its being agreed to, before he introduced the tariff, which depended upon it. He was as much bound to the Tariff as to the Income-tax; and he should feel himself bound to relinquish the office he had the honour to hold, as much if the House did not agree with him upon the Tariff as upon the Income-tax.

Leave was then given to bring in a bill founded on the resolutions moved by Sir Robert Peel.

On the motion for the first reading of the bill on 18th April, Lord John Russell, observing that as yet there had been no decision in the Committee of Ways and Means on the question of the Income-tax, moved as an amendment that the bill be read a first time that day six months. He referred to some of Sir Robert Peel's former speeches in Hansard's Debates, in which the odiousness of an Incometax was described. He said, he would not now object to the principle of changes in the Tariff, but these changes might much more easily have been carried through Parliament, and with less panic in

the country, if Sir Robert Peel had stated last year that these were the principles on which he undertook the Government. Speaking to the country generally, the Prime Minister said, that the Tariff would diminish the cost of living; to those interested in agriculture he said, that prices would not be materially diminished; the accomplishment of both results would be impossible; and it would be much fairer, if Sir Robert Peel, instead of shuffling between the two great interests of the country, were to tell them boldly and candidly, what he really contemplated as the result of his propositions. If Sir Robert Peel abandoned the restriction on the importation of foreign copper, he must abandon his argument against the importation of foreign sugar, that it would encourage foreign slavery, since the copper mines of Cuba were worked by slave-labour. Lord John Russell had no new proposition to make; therefore, he simply moved as an amendment that the bill be read a first time that day six months.

Sir Robert Peel vindicated the consistency of his present and former opinions. When he stated the strong objections he had to the imposition of an Income-tax in 1833, the financial state of the country was widely different. There was then a net surplus of 1,500,000l. over the expenditure. It was said, that the tax would soon be very unpopular; granted: what then, but a strong sense of public duty could induce any Minister to propose such a tax? Leaving India entirely out of the account, there was now a gross deficiency of 10,000,000l., to be increased in April, 1843, by 3,000,000l. The Tariff would en

tail a further yearly loss of 1,200,000., a total deficiency on the year of 4,200,000l. He could discover no mode of making good that deficiency so proper as that of calling upon the comparatively affluent to contribute a considerable portion of the additional taxation. He was confident, if the measure received the sanction of Parliament, that there would be, amongst the great consuming classes of the country, a feeling of satisfaction at the example thus set, which would in the end have a tendency to compensate the holders of property for some of the inconveniences to which they might be subjected.

A debate of some length ensued, which, however, consisted for the most part, of a repetition of arguments before urged for or against the measure. From this description must be excepted a speech delivered by Mr. Raikes Currie, a Member who usually voted on the Liberal side, who now addressed the House with great ability and earnestness, and whose speech created a powerful impression.

Mr. Currie said, that he came forward with reluctance, having, during the five years he had sat there, scarcely troubled the House with as many sentences; with sincerity, because he feared that his sentiments would find little acceptation in that focus of party spirit, "I feel it my duty, after the best consideration I can give the subject, to support the proposition of the right honourable Baronet. (Ministerial cheers.) I am by no means insensible to the serious objections to an income-tax; I am by no means blind to the defects and short comings of the Tariff; but, taking the Government propositions as a whole (and as a whole I think we are called

on to consider them), they appear to me bold, honest, comprehensiverequired by the circumstances which they are brought forward to meet, and at all events, not more objectionable than any substitute equally effective, which could be carried in the existing constitution of Parliament. I think this measure a bold measure, because in the discharge of public duty the right honourable Baronet braves the odium of imposing a tax which, whatever it may seem to be at present, will become doubtless peculiarly unpopular with that middle class, who form the bulk of your constituencies; its inquisitorial attributes will secure for it their extreme aversion. Ithink it an honest measure, because, while we impose no direct burthen on the working-classes on the great body of the people-we severely tax ourselves. No other impost would hit so hard the class to which I belong: you take 3 per cent. from funded capital, and 3 per cent. from profits-no small inroad, let me tell you, in a large commercial or banking business. I think this is a comprehensive measure, because, while you take money from the public, you do something at least, something in the right direction to unfetter commerce, and to invigorate and expand trade, the source of all revenue. I be lieve that those who most strenuously oppose the measure, acknowledge that it will be effective for the purpose it professes; but say that it is not required by the exigencies of the public service. This, indeed, is a most weighty argument; for if this be true, your tax is downright spoliation and injustice. I cannot come to this conclusion. When I see our expenditure annually exceeding income,

till a deficit of ten millions stares us in the face-when I see the miserable expedients to which we have resorted-when I remember the paramount duty-I will not say of upholding public credit, for that no one will deny-but of placing all your financial provisions above the shadow of suspicion, I cannot think that you have made too great an effort. When I look across the Atlantic, and see the shameless course which men who spring from our race, speak our language, and suppose that they have improved upon our institutions, have pursued, I feel more than ever that this country is called on to exercise her high vocation as a teacher of nations, and that the best teacher is example."

Mr. Currie went on to say, that he had looked forward to protecting and enlarging the Suffrage, as the means of righteous legislation, when he first came into Parliament in 1837. How had his hopes been met? By a manly and candid declaration from the noble Member for London, that the Reform Act, advisedly and with premeditation, gave the preponderance of power to the landowners of the kingdom; and that if any changes were to be made in it, he could be no party to them, as he considered the measure a final settlement of the question. Meanwhile, all history taught him, that no dominant class ever voluntarily gave up that which they deemed to be profitable to their own class-interests. Thus the friends of Liberal principles and of free-trade were placed in a complete dilemma. After four years not very well spent, the noble Lord came forward with his attack upon monopoly in a Parliament of monopolists; and however chival