TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE GREAT TASK FOR NEXT SESSION.
FINANCIAL REFORM must not share the fate which awaits Mr. Cobden's ill-constructed budget ; nor need the supporters of the actual system hope for much benefit from the diversion of that false move. It is true that Mr. Cobden's proposition, however well calculated to win the suffrages of coffeehouse economists and street statesmen, is open to an infinite variety of manifest objections. No special pleading, for example, can get over the absurdity of fixing arbitrarily upon the year 1835 as a standard of expenditure. After the monstrous drain of the long war, all but those who derived direct benefit from public expenditure hoped to find a summum bonum in "retrenchment ": even Tory Governments were compelled to that course; and when the Whigs came into power, they were under all the clean-sweeping responsibilities of new brooms. Much of the subsequent increase has been caused by "improvements" forced upon the Govern- ment : so that Mr. Cobden's flourish of the financial pruning- knife—" the pruning-knife 1 zounds 1 Sir, the axe I "—fairly lays him open to an effective enumeration of improvements in work- houses, hospitals, barracks, docks, Irish measures, and innumera- ble other " necessities, hobbies, fancies, or follies," after the hap- piest manner of the Times. The journalist humorously turns the reformer's implication against himself—" By Mr. Cobden's own showing, the Reform Bill now costs us 10,000,0001. a year " ; " there is nothing so expensive as reform," Europa. teste ; so that the best economy would be, to reform no more. Cobden's as- sumption that the land is unduly exempt from its share of taxa- tion, because it is exempt from Probate and Legacy duty, is a point that equally invites the slashing censor to a retaliation in kind, with opposite assumptions in favour of the landed interest. The graver Chronicle brings home to the amateur Chancellor of the Exchequer serious errors in specific statements of figures,— showing that, by taking the expenditure in Lord John Russell's budget of 1848, [54,596,000/.,] instead of Sir Charles Wood's re- vised version, [52,422,000/.,] Mr. Cobden has overstated the in- crease by two millions : moreover, as there is a deficiency of in- come to be made good, the volunteer Minister would not have eight millions to dispose of in relaxation of taxes, but only about five millions and a half. Such objections, we are aware, plight be multiplied ad infinitum ; cumulatively, they would be as fatal to Mr. Cobden's scheme in detail as his enormous postulates are fatal to its practicability as a whole : but what we must insist upon is, that they prove nothing to gainsay the urgent necessity and prac- ticability of a real financial reform.
The arguments against "poor Richard's" budget do-not apply against substantial amendments in our public economy ; the faults of the particular scheme would not exist in a sound plan. Cob- den rests all on assumptions ; he assumes everything—data, standard, practicability, results, operation—all. A sound plan of amendment would be based on ascertained facts. Cobden assumes the standard of 1835 as that of the proper expenditure, without showing that it was marked, either in the amount or disposition of expenditure, by any traits of propriety. A sound course would determine the expenditure not by a Procrustean measure- ment, but by the exigencies of the country. Mr. Cobden is mar- vellously caught with the dull mistake that a country is to be en- riched by mere " savings " ; a process that enriches nobody— that has no result except the sterile accumulations of the miser. Even the humble economist saves to spend—saves fruitless out- lay to spend fruitfully; which is precisely what the national steward should do : but success in that behalf would not be indicated by mere retrenchment of a gross expenditure. Mr. Cobden's overruling mistake is, that he treats the country as if it were insolvent; which it is not. Quite the reverse. No country has so great masses of accumulated and available wealth. It is not the failure of resources that has to be met, but the mismanagement of resources. It is true that in whatsoever phase you view Mr. Cobden's scheme, you find it to be erroneous ; but it is also true that the very objection to his course points out the course which ought to be followed.
It is not because Mr. Cobden has proposed a lumping abandon- ment of taxes, that it is safe for the State to persevere in a pro- cess of meeting a deficient income by annual borrowing. It is not because he is unwise in lopping off expenditure without duly assigning a why or wherefore, that it is right to persevere in a system of nepotism, of mechanical routine—a system of semi- sinecures granted for the benefit of placeholders rather than of the public service. There is but one rule for the proper economy of the public resources : whatever service it is desirable for the coun- try to have, it should have, at a proper price. If a particular service is not profitable, not worth its cost, it should be re- trenched on that account. On the other hand, if the State foregoes some needful service, then the subjects of the State will have to pay for that omission in the shape of lost advantage ; and most probably that loss could be represented by a distinct money value to each citizen far outweighing the aggregate cost of the omitted service. Although Mr. Cobden's budget is a fallacy, it roughly represents the broad truth that the financial system does want mending ; and that grain of truth in it will have sufficient power to compel attention. Its worst faults do Ziot prevent it from being an attractive, sign for popular agitation, and it is not unlikely that an immense pressure from without will force the subject of "financial reform" upon Parliament : the danger therefore will be, not so much neglect of that subject, as false conclusions upon it. Equal dangers would lie either in an obstinate resistance to judicious reform on the plea of Mr. Cob- den's fallacies, or in a submissive adoption of those fallacies. Both dangers ought to stimulate active attention to the subject among our statesmen, so that they may not be driven into error. Last session, the responsible Ministers confessedly sank under the weight and urgency of the subject, and turned it over to two Committees of the Commons on the Civil and Military Expendi- ture : a few blue books a few niggling " reforms" are the result. But our statesmen ought to be aware that such feeble evasion of responsibility and labour is no longer safe for the country : some course will be forced upon Parliament; and unless it be guided by distinct, comprehensive, and definite views, controlled by a powerful will, serious mischief must be done. On the other hand, the statesman who can grapple with the subject, who can super- sede Mr. Cobden's fallacious scheme by striking out a sound course, and satisfy the popular demand for financial reform with- out detriment to the public service, will earn a civic crown of imperishable honour. It is quite possible. A thorough search into the public departments will show much that is im- provident in the expenditure, much that needs strengthening in the service. But it is no simple Chancellor of the Exchequer that can master the allotted task : half of our wasteful expendi- ture is due, though Mr. Cobden says so and puts it so unwisely, to our bad policy abroad and in our colonies. Bad policy is waste- ful and expensive, and a wise economy will begin by.regenerating our statesmanship. Policy which provokes insurrection or chro- nic disaffection in colonies is expensive. Policywhich multiplies fruitless interventions abroad is expensive. Policy which keeps on feeding Ireland with palliatives is expensive. Policy which maintains an aristocratic system of promotions, civil and military, is expensive. It is not so much outlay that proves waste, but out- lay without return : that is extravagant, dishonest, and suicidal; that imparts strength to the popular agitation which Mr. Cobden is preparing. If our statesmen want to save their country from mischief,—if they want to fortify our institutions, to maintain our peaceful contrast with foreign countries, to preserve the " order " to which so many of them belong,—they will not be content with the easy warfare of calling Mr. Cobden a demagogue and exposing his errata, but will vanquish him by taking the game out of his hands and outdoing him at his own work. The labour, however, is not one for Parliament, or even for Select Committees, or any other body open to conflict and vacillation: it is work for no council but a Ministry—work for no Ministry but one strong in practical ability, in concentrated purpose, and in will to act.
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