THE EMBANKMTINT OF THE THAMES.
IS London merely a large English city, or is it the metro- polls of Great Britain ? Judging from the debate of Monday on the City coal dues, Parliament is as little pre- pared to answer the question as the Londoners. In every -other civilized country the capital is considered the common property of the nation. All the departments contribute to the embellishment of Paris, and without any marked appearance of unwillingness. Prussia is taxed to drain Berlin, and the wealthy citizens of Vienna do not decline a contribution from State funds. St. Petersburg was built, and is to this day preserved from the swamp which yawns to swallow it, out of the Imperial revenue. Even Washington, unless we are greatly mistaken, has been improved from time to time with funds voted for the purpose by the national Congress. London alone, of all first-classEuropean cities, is left in theory to depend upon its own resources, and obliged to Postpone improvements because local taxation is supposed to have reached its limit. Every improvement made in the capital benefits the entire empire. The trade of the Orkneys m facilitated by a new wharf upon the Thames ; the comfort of the inhabitants of Manchester is increased by wider arte- ries in the City. Still the municipal theory reigns paramount, and members indignantly protest against any taxation of the empire for the benefit of its metropolis. The belly will con- tribute nothing to quicken the action of the heart.
This municipal spirit, however narrow, involves of itself no absurdity. London can undoubtedly, if that is the will of the public, be treated as an ordinary- city. The Thames can be left to poison the representatives of the whole nation, the streets may be allowed to obstruct the traffic in which the entire people have a share. But in that case London is a municipality only, and ought like every other town in the kingdom to manage its own affairs, job at its own dis- cretion, and prefer economy to cleanliness, or puritanism to both, after its own whims. That course, however, would involve practical evils, and the practical English mind conse- quently throws consistency overboard, and determines to govern London as it best may, without any principles at all. Parliament dare not create a municipal council which might, in time of disaster, be stronger than itself. It will not leave national interests to be neglected by local vestries, and is obliged, as the only alternative, to do the work for itself, and confess in action the absurdity of the dogma it in theory maintains. London was to be drained—Parliament increased the rates. When the Thames is to be embanked it increases the City dues on the imports of wine and coal. In neither case are the inhabitants called on to assent to the taxation, which nevertheless they are compelled to pay. The result, therefore, of the English theory that the metropolis is only a city, is to subject the citizens to extra municipal taxation, and deprive them of ordinary municipal powers. We are not writing as in any way complaining of the bill introduced by Sir C. Lewis. To our thinking, the improve- ment of the metropolis is just as much a national concern as that of the Houses of Parliament or of the royal parks, which, while benefiting only London, are paid for out of the estimates. But if the municipal theory is in- evitable, if Manchester and Glasgow, Liverpool and Leeds, are jealous of their own centre, the official plan is probably as efficient as any which could be devised. The Home Se- cretary proposes to continue the tax of fourpence a ton levied on coal by the City, and ninepence a ton to be levied by Par- liament, for ten years, and devoted to the embankment of the Thames. This great work, proposed for thirty years, has at last become inevitable. The new sewers must be carried along the river, and if the embankment is not built, they must be laid down in the Strand, stopping that great thoroughfare for two years, and inflicting on its residents a fine at least equal to the expenditure on the works. By embanking the Thames, not only is this annoyance prevented, but the City gains a new street, urgently required, a new line of communication which will relieve the traffic which now surges through the Strand and the river streets of the City, and a quay which will increase indefinitely the wharfage con- veniences of the port. The Thames will be made once more a conspicuous addition to the beauty of the town instead of a mere highway through its centre, while the embankment, by narrowing the water-way, will increase its depth, and diminish the tendency to deposit filth just where it can most easily breed disease. The cost of the work is estimated at 2,000,0001. sterling, or about one year of the revenue produced from the direct taxation of the entire metropolis. The coal duty of ninepence, with the wine duties, will produce about 170,000/. a year, or, in the ten years nearly the amount required for the improvement, while the Parliamentary restriction of the re- venue to that single end will paralyze the local interests which so frequently interfere to destroy the completeness of a design. The only objections very earnestly pressed refer to the area over which the tax is to extend. It was absurd, it was contended, to tax St. Albans or Gravesend for coals imported into London. As our argument is that all Eng- land is interested in the capital, we have little sympathy with the wrath of the localities. Kentish-town might plead for exemption just as well as Gravesend, and Hornsey a great deal better, but the limit ultimately adopted seems as fair as a radically unfair arrangement can be made. Taxation is to be limited by the area covered by the metropolitan police, and that area is perhaps as good a definition of London as can be desired. It is not perfect, because the cluster of cities styled the suburbs of London are not united for any other .purpose, but it is as perfect as any other, narrow enough to exclude places clearly outside London, and wide enough to yield the necessary revenue. Amendments for postponing the bill were defeated by a conclusive majority, and London may rejoice that although it is neither metro- polls nor municipality, neither aided by the State nor allowed to manage its own funds, it will at least secure an improve- ment unanimously desired.
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