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share of a ship, or of a whole ship, from one person to another. This duty was an exception to the general stamp duties, and grew out of this anomaly-that we compelled, for reasons thought to be conducive to our navigation, all British ships to be registered by their owners. Now, to take advantage of a law which compelled the names of all the owners to be registered, in order to fix a stamp to every transfer that might be made in the ownership, was a great injustice in itself, and an unnecessary aggravation of an inconvenience, which, even if it were necessary, was still an inconvenience. He should therefore relieve the shipping interest from this annoyance, and should allow a ship to be transferred or exchanged, either in whole or in part, like any other chattel, without any payment of duty. There was another article in which he should also be able to afford considerable relief to the shipping interests. There were certain goods which were allowed to be exported only on certain conditions. Bonds were required from the exporters for the due delivery of the goods at the place to which they were to be exported; and these bonds were subjected to heavy stamps. A great difficulty often arose in the Custom-house respecting them, since the stamps were ad valorem. The discussions they created led frequently to fraud and perjury. Several goods were placed under the same entry for no other reason than to save the stamps. These stamps, which were as high as 40s., he should proposed to reduce in future to 4s. He would apply the same principle also to debentures; which were documents given by the Customhouse as a sort of security to those

who were entitled to drawbacks. He proposed to remove the stamps upon them altogether, because they assumed the shape of indirect taxes, when they were intended to release the subject from the operation of direct ones. Such were the direct measures, which Mr. Huskisson proposed for the relief of the shipping interest.

As conducive to the same end, he also proposed an alteration in the system of our consular establishments abroad. Those establishments were regulated by no fixed principle, were guided by no certain rule. In some places they levied fees on the ships, in others on the goods, and in others, again, on the documents. There they levied fees on ships with reference to their tonnage; and here on ships without any reference to that consideration, claiming them equally from the smallest and from the largest ships. Not only was there no fixed principle with regard to the payment of our consuls in general, but there was even no fixed principle with regard to their payment in the same country. For instance, at Rotterdam our consul had no salary, but derived the whole of his emoluments from fees; whilst at Antwerp he had no fees, but depended on his salary alone for his emoluments. At Bourdeaux our consul had a salary; at Marseilles he had not; and so in other places. To call upon the shipping interest to pay exclusively for consular protection was unfair, and founded upon no just principle. We owed to the shipping trade, and to the individuals engaged in it, protection in all their transactions in foreign countries, whether they carried them on under the faith of particular treaties, or in the courtesy usually extended by one nation to

another in time of peace: and it was quite as hard to make traders pay for consular protection at the seaports of a friendly nation, as it would be to make travellers pay for the support of the ministers whom we maintained at the different courts of the continent. He proposed, therefore, to grant to all the consuls a reasonable fixed salary, to be paid out of the public purse. He should retain, however, certain fees for acts which were extra-consular, such, for instance, as notarial facts, but their amount should, in no instance, exceed two dollars. With regard to the other expenses of consular establishments, such as the maintenance of the church, the payment of the chaplain, and the support of the other duties of religion, British merchants would find no difficulty in levying, by a species of voluntary tax, a rate upon themselves, calculated to cover and defray hem particularly, as government would be empowered to subscribe a sum to aid them, equal to half the sum which they should subscribe among themselves, to pay the chaplain's salary, or defray the erection of a church.

Though some members of the House expressed an apprehension that the consequence of the proposed changes in our commercial policy might be injurious, yet in general the propositions of Mr. Huskisson were extremely acceptable both to parliament and to the country. The resolutions, in which they were embodied, were adopted without a dissenting voice, and they were afterwards carried into execution by bills framed in conformity to them.

Connected with these changes in our commercial policy was the surrender of the charter of the VOL. LXVII.

Levant company. That company was established by royal charter, in the reign of James the 1st, when considerable privileges were bestowed upon it; and, in consequence of those privileges, considerable duties were imposed upon it. They were allowed by their charter to appoint all the consuls in the sea-ports in the Levant : they were subsequently allowed by act of parliament to levy for the maintenance of their consuls duties on all English ships which came to those parts. They exercised, also, a certain jurisdiction within the territories of the Ottoman Porte, which was reserved to them by several treaties made between the government of this country and that of Turkey. These powers and trusts had been exercised by the servants of the company, for two centuries, often under very difficult circumstances; and, generally speaking, with correctness, fidelity, and discretion. In the present state, however, of a great part of the countries in which those consuls resided, and looking to our relations with Turkey as well as with other powers, to the delicate and important questions of international law, which must constantly arise out of the intercourse of commerce with a country in a state of civil war-questions involving discussions, not only with the contending parties in that country, but with other trading and neutral powers— it was deemed expedient upon political considerations alone, that the public servants of this country, in Turkey, should hold their appointments from the Crown. It was to the Crown that foreign powers would naturally look for regulating and controlling the conduct of those officers in the exercise of

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their authority; and it was certainly most fit, not only on this account, but for the due maintenance of that authority, that they should be named, not by a trading company, but, like other consuls, directly by the Crown. Besides, the dues which the company was authorised to levy, were very considerable, amounting to a tax not much short of two per cent upon the whole of that trade; a charge quite sufficient, in these times, to divert a considerable part of it

from the shipping of this country to that of other states. Accordingly, in consequence of a communication from the ministers, a meeting of the company was called in February last; a letter from Mr. Canning was read; lord Grenville, the governor of the company, proposed the surrender of their charter, and to this proposition the company acceded. That surrender was accepted, and an act of parliament was passed, for carrying it into effect.

CHAP. VII.

Financial Situation of the Country-Income-Expenditure-Reduction of Duties on Hemp, Coffee, Wine, British Spirits, Rum, Cider Diminution of the Assessed Taxes-Motions for the Repeal or further Diminution of Taxes negatived.

N the 28th of February the

gave an exposition of the financial situation of the country, and of the pecuniary arrangements for the year. In the former session he had assumed that at the expiration of 1824, there would be a clear surplus of about 1,050,000l.; and upon that assumption the House had made a reduction in our taxes to the amount of 1,260,000l., of which sum it was calculated that the revenue would in that year lose about one half, or 630,000l.; so that, if, at the end of the year, the surplus had been 420,000l., his estimate would have been realized. However, notwithstanding the reduction was made, and notwithstanding that a more immediate effect was given to that reduction, and greater loss consequently sustained than had been originally contemplated, the actual surplus of the year was 1,437,744., exceeding even that surplus which might have been expected had there been no diminution of the taxes. Mr. Robinson made some observations upon the different branches of the revenue in which this increase had taken place. In the Customs, the receipt had been estimated at 11,550,000l.; and as Customs duties were afterwards repealed to the amount of at least

900,000l., of which it was anti

450,000 would be

lost to the revenue in 1824, his calculations would have been verified, if the actual receipt had been 11,100,000l.: in addition, however, to the loss sustained by the immediate effect of reduced duty, the nett receipt of the Customs was still further lowered by the payment of no less than 460,000l. upon the stock in hand of silk, in order to give more immediate efficacy to the change of system in regard to that article: and yet, in spite of these two circumstances, the nett produce of the Customs for 1824 was no less than 11,327,000l. "What are the causes" said Mr. Robinson which have produced this important result? The proximate cause, doubtless, is the increased capacity of the people of this country to consume the produce of other countries, aided and invigorated by the reciprocal facility which our consumption of foreign articles gives to other nations in the extended use of the products of our own industry. That increase may arise in some degree from the demonstrated tendency of population to increase: but independently of that cause, there is a principle in the constitution of social man which leads nations to open their arms to each other, and

to establish new and closer connexions, by ministering to mutual convenience; a principle which creates new wants, stimulates new desires, seeks for new enjoyments, and, by the beneficence of Providence, contributes to the general happiness of mankind. This principle may, it is true, be impeded by war and its calamities; may be diverted by accident from its natural channel: may be counteracted by the improvidence of mistaken legislation; but it is always alive, always in motion, and has a perpetual tendency to go forward; and when we reflect upon the facility which is given to its operation by the recent discoveries of modern science, and by the magical energies of the steam-engine, who can doubt that its expansion is progressive, and its effect permanent? It appears to me, therefore, that the increase in this branch of the revenue is not the result of accident, or of a temporary combination of fortunate circumstances, and that I am not too sanguine in my views, when I take the produce of last year as the solid basis upon which I calculate the state of that branch of the revenue for years to come."

In the Excise, the produce which had been anticipated was 25,625,000l.; the actual result was 26,768,000l., being an excess of 1,143,000l.: and this increased consumption was such as to indicate, in an unequivocal manner, the increasing ease, comfort, and happiness of the people.*

* The following was the detail of the increase and decrease on the different articles of Excise.

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The stamps had been estimated in 1824, at 6,800,000l. ; and afterwards there had been proposed a reduction of law stamps, which, at the rate of 200,000l., per annum, and commencing on the 10th Oct. 1824, would have brought the receipt down to 6,750,000l. one quarter only of the reduced duty being lost in that year. The real produce of the year was 7,244,000l. The Post-office which had been taken at 1,460,000l., brought 1,520,000l.

Mr. Robinson next stated his calculations for the present year, and the grounds upon which they were formed. He assumed the produce of 1825, including every thing, at 56,445,370l. The ex

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Tobacco and Snuff... A decrease upon Vinegar

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An increase upon

Wine

Wire

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