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rate than it could have done, if the rate of interest had been unrestrained. Sir, whatever diminishes the prosperity of the country must increase the difficulty of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in contracting for public Loans. And here, sir, I cannot help remarking that all the governments, who have restrained the rate of interest, on private Loans, have found themselves habitually compelled to exceed that rate in their public Loans. Indeed in this country, so recently after the passing of the Act of Queen Anne, as the 3d year of the reign of her successor, the Bank of England was allowed to give a greater rate of interest for money borrowed, than the rate fixed by Law. In addition to all other considerations, I think that it is unjust as well as impolitic to fix a maximum on the produce of money; Sir, I repeat that opinion, notwithstanding the gestures of the chancellor of the Exchequer. But, sir, although I am decidedly of opinion, that the distresses of the Country, particularly of the landed interest in all its branches, have been most materially aggravated (in many instances produced) by the operation of these Laws, I do not intend that the repeal should immediately take effect; an instantaneous repeal, even of this most absurd and pernicious system, would not now be in my opinion either desirable or safe; it would tend too much to disturb existing contracts; therefore I shall propose in the Committee to fix a day some years distant as the time when the operation of the Act shall commence. Sir, viewing these Laws, as I do, as having had their foundation in blind superstition, to have been framed in no spirit of true policy, as adverse to every just end of political economy, and as one of the principal causes of our present embarrassments; I move for leave to bring in a Bill" to repeal the Laws, which regulate or restrain the rate of interest."

ON THE

CHARACTER AND TENDENCY

OF THE

PROPERTY TAX,

AS ADAPTED TO A

PERMANENT SYSTEM OF TAXATION.

BY THE

REV. GEORGE GLOVER, A. M.

EECTOR OF SOUTHREPPS, VICAR OF CROMER, AND CHAPLAIN TO THE MOST NOBLE THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

SECOND EDITION, WITH ADDITIONS;

Printed Exclusively in the PAMPHLETEER.

London.

NO. XVI.

Pam.

VOL. VIII.

2 M

BIBL

THOUGHTS

ON THE

PROPERTY TAX.

THERE is no feature of a Free Government more strikingly valuable and important, both to those who govern, and to those who are governed, than that it not only allows, but encourages, every individual, however humble, the liberty of discussing its measures, and publicly declaring his opinion upon the character and tendency of the laws it promulgates, and the line of policy it pursues, provided he exercise this privilege in a way free from factious and seditious objects. It is under this impression, and with a clear conviction of the purity and innocence of my motives, that I now presume to avail myself of the birth-right of an Englishman, and to state my sentiments upon a measure of domestic policy, in which I conceive both the future liberty and prosperity of my country deeply involved. I allude to the esta blishment of a Property Tax as a permanent system of taxation.

But before I enter directly into the line of argument I purpose to pursue, let me be distinctly understood as viewing this question perfectly apart from the justice or injustice, the policy or impolicy, of those public measures which have swelled to so enormous an amount the national expenditure, and ended in the accumulation of an unparallelled load of public debt. No opinions on the past need at all influence in this point any man's opinions of the

future, and he who has most zealously supported every part of our persevering contest with its public enemies abroad, may yet join with perfect consistency in an endeavour to save that country which he loves, from measures hostile to its freedom and prospe rity at home. Nay, he can have no claims to unsullied loyalty, and genuine patriotism, if he refuse to do so. All men, of every party, equally admit the difficulties in which we are involved to be great and palpable; that the debt which has been contracted must be paid, that the faith, the land, and the industry of the country are all pledged for its redemption; and the only subject of enquiry now is, whether these difficulties may not yet be met without violating the Constitution itself; whether, notwithstanding the dreadful impression made upon its outworks, the citadel itself may not yet be saved from ruin.

Again, if it on one hand be demanded that extraordinary emergencies may arise, which may fully justify a Government in deviating from the ordinary course of legislation; in which speculations in political science must be tried, like speculations in trade and commerce, and in which, as in flights of poetic fancy, "something must be ventured, or nothing can be won," we may readily concede it. And we may likewise concede further, that on the part of the subject also, it may in every such crisis be perfectly consistent with the greatest love of freedom, and the purest patriotism, willingly to sacrifice a large portion of his rights, his liberties, or his property, as the price of securing the remainder. But then on the other hand, it must equally be conceded, that all such occasions are strictly limited to the duration of the circumstances from which they arise, and that the expediency of all measures emanating from them entirely ceases with the danger they were intended to meet and to repel. If in times of great public calamity and alarm, when the very existence of the state was endangered, Rome wisely had recourse to a dictator, and more than once owed her safety or her victories to a measure which necessity dictated, we never can forget also that not only were all the benefits, which heretofore resulted from such a measure, lost and forfeited, but exchanged for the heaviest calamities and oppressions, from the very moment that the delegation of this high and despotic authority ceased to be carefully measured in continuance by the same

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