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    March 31; I860.] The Leader and Saturday...

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    NAPLES.. WHILE the proator part of tho I...

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    India—Finance Taxation. C Ommon Sense, T...

    practicable in India we do not-assert , but it deserves to be , and as a novelty is very likely to be . Income and license taxes are direct taxation . Mr . Wilson also inflicts some new indirect taxation on the people . _ n Tobacco , when imported , is to be taxed 6 d . per lb . unmanufactured , and Is . manufactured ; and a corresponding ^ impost , _ as nearly as it can be estimated , like our hop duty , is to be levied on home-grown tobacco . Saltpetre , too , is to be taxed on export , on the supposition that as no other country produces the article , the foreigner who needs it will pay the tax . The idea of making a foreigner pay for what he requires more than its commercial worth , is conceived in a perfectly anti-commercial spirit . It is worthy of the worst : times of protection . The peculiar advantages of particular p laces and particular individuals

    the peculiarities of climate and soil , are the sources oi ali traffic , and Mr . Wilson ' s proposition is utterly at variance with the free-trade principles by professing and generally acting on which he gained his present eminent position . Such a tax , too correctly , imposed , is found to fall , like our former prohibition to export wool , on the industry engaged in producing the commodity taxed . It is consequently a gross injustice to one class , and it may fail . In the present condition of art , saltpetre can he manufactured , and it may possibly be manufactured elsewhere , as cheaply as-it can be gathered and made in India . Had Mr . Wilson studied Mr . J . S . Mill ' s work , as we happen

    to know he has contemned it , he would have seen that an export tax may , under certain cir cumstances , fall wholly on the couutry which imposes it ; and lie would have avoided imposing a tax on saltpetre manufacturers , erroneous on his own commercial principles , and certain to be injurious . We are the more astonished at this retrogression , because Mr . Wilson is sensible that it is a . " special tax on the producer , " and points oat that the revenue derived from the monopoly of ,

    opium , equivalent to an export duty , is already , from competition , rendering that revenue insecure . He has , too , wisely and : justly abolished other export , duties and transit duties on articles passing from native states into British territories , thus extending the area of free exchange , and p lacing all India , like all England , under one commercial law , free to buy and'free to sell . To " encourage native producers , " surely he could do nothing more barbarously protective than to dimmish the value of their productions in the ¦

    foreign market . . . ' "''¦**¦ These : new taxes are more objectionable on principle . than Mr . Wilson's tariff , which reduces some duties , and imposes . a uniform ad valorem duty of ten per cent , on all articles now subject to import duties , except btser , wine , and spirits , the duties on Which arc unaltered j though it raises , tothe chagrin . of the Manchester men and tlui advantage of spinners in Madras and Bombay ; the duty ou cotton yarn live per cent , Naturally , the former ' remonstrate against this increase in a protective duty , and thnvmust act energetically or they will be obliged to submit . India , under Mr . Wilson's rule , is to follow apparently the courso of Canada and the United States ^ and maintain , in spite

    of experience , a tariff protective nnd fiscal . His scheme has otherwise the fault of being complicated , as if he contemplated rivalry with the discredited and complicated fiscal systems of Europe . Here , it has been the object of scheming ambition to invent as many species as possible of annoying taxation . Why should this erroneous policy be imitated in Bengal ? If an income-tax in such a populous aiid opulent country be practicable , it might bo the substitute for all other taxation , If this be tho object ultimately aimed at , and the population is—by commencing the tax . at a low percentage and raising it gradually —to- be habituated to it , with a view to extinguish all other

    taxes , we give it our approbation 5 but imposed with other new taxes it complicates the system , increases tho cost , and unncc . es- > - savily aggravates the burden of government . Whethor . it be sustained by an extorted rent , enforced by claiming to bo the sole landowner , or sustained by taxation , its pecuniary cost—though not the injury it inflicts on society—is tfqual . Mr . Wilson therefore seems to underrate the real bimlou of the Indian Government by talfc'ing only tho amount of taxation now levied— $ 9 , 027 , 973 , and concluding that each of the

    182 , 000 , 000 inhabitants of India pays only one shilling and four * ; pence taxution annually . He ought to add tho sum the Government yoceives us Jan-downer iu chief , to make the comparison just . The assumption that the people are very lightly "taxed may lead to increased taxation beyond what they will readily bear . Xhey have submitted to our rule because it is milder and more equitable than that of their former masters and-tyrants ; but it to the old exactions of land and slave owners wo acid tlio fiscal exactions of skilful European financiers , we may irritate them into discontent , resistance , and rebellion . They will hardly ho encouraged to obey by being taxed to onforoo obedience . Such a procwdiug irrust generate at least ft substratum of cU 3 sntisfoction , which

    may in the end , before commerce has knitted the two people closely in the bonds of mutual interest , topple- down our dominion . We have read with great : pleasure Mr . Wilson's declaration , that the internal prosperity of India , corresponding to the increase in trade , is remarkably great . Railways have been " a great success , " though their produce seems to be only £ 330 , 700 , and the interest guaranteed on them £ 1 , 114 , 000 . Landowners have been enriched ; and defaulters , sold up by the lord paramount , have decreased from an annual rental of J 395 , 65 O in 183 . 4 ^ 5 to £ 14 . 49 in 1 S 58-9 . Arrears of rent have almost ceased

    to exist . Wages , too , have risen in common with wages in Europe , in many cases threefold ; hut Ave can scarcely find in history a Government which , perpetually engaged in the work of annexation , running into debt , and provoking mutiny , maintaining its power by arming class against class , and fighting , country or district against country , except it be one of the despicable and quarrelling tyrannies put down , has really done less for the welfare of the people than the Company ' s Government in India . It cannot justly claim , on account of any great services reiulered to society , a greater revenue . Mr . Wilson , however , honestly declares , like his class , that the Government is to be paid according as the people are rich , not according to the services it performs for them . Commerce must , sympathize with the destructive Government , which , being short of funds , " all must contribute their share . "

    Mr . Wilson is well aware that the Government of India has had far less influence over the rapid progress of the people of late than the great increase of gold in the world . Everywhere this has stimulated enterprise , and made , even in Europe , political oppression less igamous and unbearable . The great increase has . depreciated this metal in relation to silver , and has caused it to be substituted , for silver in use as coinage in Erance , Germany , Belgium , and many other , parts of Europe . It has , atvthe same time , caused silver to be sent in unwonted quantities to

    India , where , from remaining exclusively , the currency , it has a value it has lost here . There , it is diffused amongst , the immense population , has increased their rewards , and stimulated their enterprise . The increase of silver there raised " the price of country produce , " raised wages ,-increased produce , increased rent , made laudlords solvent , and caused the prosperity on account of which Mr . Wilson justifies increasing taxation . In this -justification the truth , honesty , and comhion sense generally prevalent in his address , are deficient , and to continue to act in accordance with it must ultimately increase the embarrassment of the G overmnent . wont

    Though we , continuing , to-follow , as 'Mr . Wilson was to follow , the-doctrines of free trade , reprehend those parts of his plan which are palpably at variance with them , and with the approved maxims of taxation which flow from them , we can but remark that , from following them he has become great . The European intellect , from the perception of its superiority to the crowd of moan and submissive Asiatics it practically becomes familiar with in India , expands into still greater superiority . Great men—Clive , 1 Iastjin

    involved , and courageously expresses his views , " . A . bill was immediately passed to . levy the customs' duties proposed by Mr . Wilson . At the same time ho announced a measure fox establishing a paper curreucy 5 but , considering the length of this article , we do not regret that Sir C . Wood ' s apparently unnecessary delay iu producing Mr . Wilson ' s minute , with his own commentary , in the House of Commons , compels us to * postpone the consideration of this part of his plan till next weok . "

    March 31; I860.] The Leader And Saturday...

    March 31 ; I 860 . ] The Leader and Saturday Analyst . 299

    Naples.. While The Proator Part Of Tho I...

    NAPLES .. WHILE the proator part of tho Itulia . i Poninsuhi showp aotivo wi ^ ns of life , and is stundily proy-ninHing 1 towards union and independence , a dread silenoe and letJiiirffio Btupor i-pigu throughout t | jq Two Sicilies . Wvom time to timo , it is tjnio , tins douthliko stillness is interrupted by tho shriek of so mo ( wli victim of the tyvanny of tho JSourbon polioo . But tho pound hap Bouvcoly died away , when the JtfoapolifcuiiB and their nffiurs are by oLhov Italians , and Europe in ^ onerul , suffered to Jio dormant in thoir winduig--sheet , as if they had no concern or eonnocfjion with tho uiwm ot this world . And yet Naplos and Sioily form an important pure ol Italy , nor can tho political organization of thoPoninHulu b « coinploto without thoin . JbV » v long timo pusfc , % \\\& unhappy -ki » K « oM » iWH eoeipod to poenoHfl the neorot of Btimtling huH > in doiiancq ot the 1 ftws of plu'sionl attraction and poriodio proyroHflion . Wop sou ,

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), March 31, 1860, page 7, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_31031860/page/7/