TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE BUDGET.
REFERRING to our notice of proceedings in the House of Commons last night for the particulars of the Budget, we may observe here that the Chancellor of the Exchequer estimates the future perma- nent expenditure of the country at 50,000,0001., and the future income at 48,300,0001.; leaving a permanent deficiency of 1,700,000/. This deficiency he proposes to provide for by a change in the Timber-duties and the Sugar-duties, with a vague intimation of doing something with Corn. He proposes to raise the duty on Canadian timber from 10.I. to 20s. the load, and to reduce the duty on Baltic timber from 558. to 508.; from which change he hopes for an increased receipt of 600,000/. The duty on sugar imported from our own Colonies he will still leave at 24s. per hundredweight ; the present prohibitive tax of 63s. on foreign sugar he intends to reduce to 36s.; still giving the British colonists a protection of 50 per cent. : and from this measure he estimates an additional revenue of 900,000/. Instead of taking both together at 1,500,000/. he supposes them to yield a total in- crease of 1,300,000/. The 400,000/. still deficient on the expendi- ture of the current year, he leaves it to be inferred he will at some future time make up by a fixed duty on corn.
Of the two actually proposed measures, there is no doubt but the change of the Sugar-duties will be a benefit to the people of this country. It will increase the supply ; it will diminish the price ; it will conciliate the sugar-growing countries of South America, which were threatening heavy if not prohibitive duties on British productions ; and it will stimulate the existing markets for our manufactures, if it do not open up fresh. The effect upon the West Indian Colonies and the Emancipation experiment are dubious ; but it evidently will entitle the West Indians, more than ever, to demand complete freedom of trade, in addition to the lately-proposed decrease in their taxation—perfect freedom to buy where they please, to sell where they please, to transport their commodities in any vessels, and to manufacture their own produce in any way. If the effect of the Emancipation experiment was, however, to end in this long-sought admission of slave-grown sugar, common sense will think we might as well have saved our twenty millions, and not have risked throwing back our West Indian pos- sessions into a state of nature.
The change in the Timber-duties is a much more questionable measure in every point of view. We think it exceedingly doubtful whether it will realize the estimated sum ; and if it do, it will be to the injury of the Canadian interests, at the very moment of all others when our object should be to foster their advance, and to conciliate the good feelings of the colonists. Looking at colonies as an integral part of the empire, we should wish no duty whatever to be levied upon colonial productions, except for revenue. Had it been possible, it would have been more judicious to repeal the Canadian timber-duty altogether, and reduce the tax on Baltic timber to such an extent as to bring it into a fair competition with the Canadian, and sti- mulate its use. Looking at the state of our finances, this would perhaps have been too riskful ; but had the principle of the Sugar-duties been followed—the duty on Canadian timber been left untouched, and the Baltic duties boldly decreased—we believe the addition to the revenue would not have been less, and the relief to the public very much greater. At present there is a clear addition to the cost of Canadian timber, for those purposes for which it is preferred; it is doubtful whether the re- duction on Baltic timber is so considerable as to be a boon to the public ; it is still more doubtful whether the change will be productive of the calculated gain—whether, in short, this pre- sent timber project will not turn out, like Mr. BARING'S former per- centages. He is driven to admit in his speech, that his estimated deficiency for the year was 858,000/. but the actual deficiency 1,840,0001.; and a proportionate result may follow his timber cal- culations.
This Budget of two features—useful in one, questionable in the other—is admitted by the Whigs themselves to have been forced out for claptrap purposes in consequence of their late defeats in Irish politics : had their minorities been majorities, it would not have been so liberal. Whether anybody beyond the class-interests connected with Canada will engage in a struggle about the Timber- duties, is very doubtful. As regards the Sugar-duties, the commercial Tories will uphold the change ; though we fancy the disunion of the West Indian Tory interests will be much more than counterbalanced by the Whig Anti-Slavery people, who will not only see in this mea- sure a shock to their darling scheme, but be terrified by a threat- ened inundation of slave-grown sugar. But the would-be claptrap is ignorant and narrow for any purpose of popular excitement or general utility. The crying evils of our Import-duties are three- fold. 1. The multiplicity of taxes, (about 1,200 enumerated,) and sometimes heavy ones, which, though oppressive to the merchant and manufacturer, yield little or no revenue on account of the ex- pense of collecting them. 2. The weigh; of the taxation, that raises the price on some articles very greatly to the British con- sumer without any gain to the revenue, since the produce would be as much or more from a lighter tax; as in the case of brandy. 3. Protective or prohibitive duties, which increase the price of many commodities, and exclude others altogether ; embracing, inter alia, every, article of food, and every thing connected with the land. .There is nothing recondite in these evils ; they have been pointed out again and again ; and they were exhibited in elaborate detail by official witnesses before the Committee on the Import-duties, some of whom actually framed schedules for their remedy. The prin- ciple of these evils is not merely untouched by the plan of the Finance Minister, but actually unmentioned, unglanced at in his speech.* Yet there are knowing ones about town, who more than intimate, that this Budget with one good proposal has been got up to enable Ministers "to go to the country."
* Mr. M`GREGOR'S suggestions on Sugar and Timber were as follows—
British Possessions. Fureign.
Sugar 20s. 30s.
Timber 7s. 6d. 30s.
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