TAXATION. —DIRECT AND INDIRECT.

Waikato Times, Volume XVII, Issue 1405, 5 July 1881, Page 3

TAXATION. —DIRECT AND INDIRECT.

The amount of hard common sense, practical work to be done in these days f>y English statesmen, and the wonderfully keen detection .iml dislike of false pretension that prevail, are tiic most efficacious preventives of the indulgence in irrational theories, and the posturing and tiiekery of personal vanity, that it must be owned, have wrought before now much harm to England, ami are still powerful in many parts of the world, for the use of the selfish one at the expense of tho ignorant many. This is assuredly a most trying and unfruitful time foi false pretenders and conceited preachers of shallow creeds. The spread of education, and a cold scepticism of any pel - sonal assertions not fully vouched for by undeniable facts, that is peculiarly distinctive of tho well-educated Englishman of the day, are fatal to appeals to the feelings lather than to the reason, and make the House of Commons the most terrible ordeal for any of the old formidable stump orator and "solemn asb" tribes who may still fondly hope for believers and listeners. The ridicule with which ignorant loud-voiced assertion, bad taste, windy oratory, or ii rational credulity, are sure to be now greeted, is the most deadly corrective of such pests that could be found more effective than the stake, because it denies even the sanctification of martyrdom, and is as ignominious as the gallows or tarring and feathering without even the small solace to low vanity that may be afforded by the gallows promenade. The roars of laughter and the calls to sing that invariably aaluted poor Mr Whalley wherever his solemn pale face slowly rose above the .horizon night after night, and his miserable long drawn wail in denunciation of the Pope and his iniquities, broke forth with never changing monotony, sufficed to double up that great and good selfconstituted saviour, both morally and physically in spite of all the immense buckler of self approval that guarded him. Even a loud voiced red faced, pugnacious Hibernian patriot, foaming at the mftsrth with verbosity while tanating the .sanguinary Saxon and calling all the eainca and angels to witness the lamblike innocence of the peaceful Celt, could not long resist the, -freezing snigger, too contemptuous to be called a sneer, that ran* .along* the benches, the deliberate elevation of eyeglasses to the level pi hiscouatehqHoefor a moment /and then the resumption of quiat chats, reading »f ffiKVps, yawns, strolls in ( the lobbies, and total abandonment with which he is metl Hemust;snt>Bidewhenhe hasfinisbed liis war dance' without any more notice ihan wonWbe given to one of the flies on the' <&iKng. ' To see.atfme saoh poo* wind fote'-iotilti'Dg round the hofuse in desperation, for a listener, from Dizzy'p white ££ whefi'tfe ,watf one of comiwne, a»ta»ly sleeping the sleep of

the just, round to sometimes pugnacious. John Bright now also snoring under his hat 'with his arms folded, and down i>to the youngest and greenest novices; all either soundly asleepor chatting or, huighing with such crushing contempt for the man on his legs, was a sight to make the angels weefj. ' A few horrible throes of consciousness of -the fix he had got into,? and out of which lie must deliver himself without a hand or a Wok to help him, a gasp or two, and a mutter of some almost inaudible concluding sentences, and the poor fellow would sneak into his seat, limp and damp, and looking a« if he had been caught stealing another member's pocket-handkerchief. Even that imperturbable master of sarcasm, Dizzy, himself, could not face the amused, sneering " Heah Heah !" with which an occasional attempt to mount the stilts he used in his early days, would be applauded. One can fancy the reception our great Sir George would meet with when making his voice tremble as he talked of an opponent as a vampire sucking the blood of his victims (idea borrowed bye-the-bye) or old Wallis jerking his thumbs about and going into senile paroxysms of jocularity over some little tea-fight idea, how they would be stared at as two newly discovered specimens of the genus homo, the sham emotional old man, and the chuckling, chattering, old wag ; and how the ladies in the gallery, if th3y had nothing else to attract their attentiou, would applaud the latter as a dear old creature, whom they would cer. tainly employ at a high salary to amuse their children with his grimaces and contortions. Amongst the many indications of the thorough change which has taken place in the ideas of men within the last generation, none is more suggestive than the almost total abolition of party cries, and the acceptance of ideas upon their own merits, irrespective of party prejudice. The Tory of to-day goes f uither than the most daring revolutionist of the last century would have ventnretl, and the Whia: has to back up the ideas of the opposition when in power as only reasonable and quite to the putposo. One of the ideas that would most have scared our fathers is the preference of direct to indirect taxation now cc generally manifested by English Governments of both parties. To raise the tremendous sum annnally required by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and to do so by the best means, without imposing: a painful burden on any one class more than another, is a problem for a Gladstone, and requires no amount of oalcutation, philosophical reasoning of cause and effect, with lucid explanation of the view advocated without the slightest appearance of appealing to party feeling, that none but a master mind imbued with the spirit of the age could work out. Indirect taxation according to these modern re»soners, falls far more heavily upon the working class and poor consumers of necessities upon which a tax is imposed, than upon the moro prosperous, but not wealthy lower middle class, and the cost of collection is far greater, while a high income tax and import and export entirely free from duty, would place the whole weight of the country's taxation upon the shoulders of the upper and middle classes and entirely free the working receiverof wages, the mendicant, and all who go to make up the lower orders fiom their due share in the responsibilities of their country, though the intplligent and prosperous working man possesses actually moie, with a hundred times greater comfort than an income of greater apparent dimensions that is subject to the tax affords to its possessor who is subject also to the obligation known as " keeping up appearances." To steer between thc-e two difficulties is the work of modern fiHancers, so as to make the working member of society bear his share equally with the upper ami middle clashes without making the load of either painful, and this is mainly effected by louning the duties on imports and exports to a degree that .shall be no hindrance to trade though affording a certain proportion to the levenue, and by imposing an income tax low enough to be no burden upon the payers, and yet amply making up the sum required by the exchequer The payer of the income tax on a small salary, earned as a clerk or on a small annuity, perhaps complains that he has to bear this burden in addition to that imposed on the more prosperous working man through taxes on Ins necessities ; but low duties promote trade and find employment for the clerk, and the few shillings taken off the small annuity are saved in the reduced price of necessities that would be more heavily taxed were the income left untouched, so that really the class upon whom the tax is said to bear most 'heavily is really benefited when the advantages are duly compared with the evils. Protective duties it is now gen pi ally understood are of no advantage to a country, and as revenue must be drawn from some source the best policy surely is promote trade by every means, and so create incomes which can then be taxed lightly, better by far than to crush trade by screwing the necessary revenue out of the capital of the tradesman instead of out of his profits, There is no advantage in remaining poor to escape an income tax, any more than in the old rash act described as that of biting off one's nose to spite one's face. A good financier like Gladstone will always devote all his attention first to the inciease of the country's income, and then obtain his bill for expenses from the gains ; the opposite course is actually obtaining the oofcts ot Government from the country's loss. The broad question for consideration is, '"Has free trade impoverished or weakened England ?" to which the best of all answers is, "Look at the amount of trade now done, compared with that of the beginning of the century, and look at the accumulated capital of the country as compared with that of the old protection days.'' If classes suffer occasionally as the farmers have lately done by competition with those placed in more advantageous circumstauces, it is from want of adaptation to the altered times displayed by that class or those upon whom they depend. The landed class must have the fact brought home to them that their land will no longer pay a higher percentage than other sources of income, and that if they cannot get 5 per cent, they must be contented with two. Perhaps even land will no longer support the intermediate class , between the owner and the labourer. The formerly well paid tenant farmer with his five hundred or a thousand a year, and landlords may have to farm their own estates or let tham out to their labourers on ' the co-operative principle; but any return to protection would mean immense retrogression, and it would be impossible, let the trials of any one class be what they may, for the time, until necessity haa worked its usual benefit by teaching the navy course more in accordance with the spirit of the age, that must for ever supersede the old school. Adversity is a rough teacher, but the surest of any, and the great problems that are surely shaping outi to their solution in these strange and almost awful days of progress will be found beneficial to the ?ace, if hard,, for the individual class here and there.' • Nature rieVer pauses in Bet course to shbW mercy to one where 'the interest Of a whole race is concerned. ' [Humbly accept your lot, a,nd go with he« on, pain .of destruction is Ijer inflexible la>/" \" \' ' ( [ ' In'ayoungcqlonylike this, where ,th« expenses of the 5 government have 'to' be raised before tliQ trade is developed, I

make-shifts of all kind must be allowed for a time, but the first (consideration of any Government, ( unless it is composed of ignorant or selfish blockheads, must be 1 to promote and foster the trade of the country in every way ; to create an income and tax that, not to tax the capital or hamper the enterprise of the country in general ; not, in other words, to kilt the goose that 1 lays the golden eggs fonthenii That unfortunately too many of our senators are far from the wisest members of the community is a fact patent to all who have watched the hard struggle against foolish and vexations, opposition to their best interests that the traders of New Zealand have had to maintain. That the colony has survived and that in spite of all, manufactures and trade, are slowly, though far too slowly increasing is due entirely to the richness of the country, and the perseverance of its traders, and not to any intelligent efforts of its governments to develope its resources. Will a man of thought and genius ever arise to make use of the magnificent powers of production of New Zealand, or must those who love and admire the country as one of the richest and most beautiful under the sun, be for ever condemned to watch the mopping and mowing of silly old idiots over the splitting of straws, the constant rolling in the mud over petty squabbles, not worth a halfpennyto the community, and the prevention of the advance of millions while a few paltry old adventurers stay to pick holes in one anothers garments and scold one another. When will our representatives be pleased to remember that they are not chosen for the exhibition of their own ineffable graces or the expression of their own brilliant ideas, but to guard and promote the interests of others, and that, as paid servants, they cannot, without dishonesty, abuse the confidence placed in them by acting for their own advantage rather than that of their employers ? If they are entirely incapable of ideas of their own, let them read and think over those of Cobden, Bright, Sir Robert Peel, and Gladstone, and learn from the unparalleled advance of England under the guidance ol such men the lessons for the future greatness of New Zealand. Even the Great Pro-Consul, or the Great Panjandrum himself, might not disdain to learn from such teachers, and might Bometimes think that no fool is so hopeless as the one who thinks his wisdom perfect.