A LICENSING SUGGESTION.
[To TH1 EDITOR Or TRH "SPECTATOR.:] SIne—In the closing paragraph of your article on the licensing question published in your issue of February 1st you state what is indubitably the principle by which reform should be regulated,—viz., that "the State should ultimately reap the full benefit of the valuable monopoly created by the restric- tions which it places on the sale of intoxicants." At the same time, you point out that "no particle of injustice must be done to individuals." By what compromise can these two obviously conflicting propositions be reconciled ? The first means confiscation in some shape or form, and there is no use ignoring that fact. Now there is one form of confiscation to which the public has, become accustomed. I mean " Death- duties." In computing these duties the value of licenses is already appraised and taxed by the State. I suggest that
on the death of a license-holder the monopoly value of his license should be estimated, and a sum of (say) 5 per eentum of this value imposed as a yearly license fee, or vend rent, so long as the license should continue. The tax might be subject to revision on the death of each successive holder, or, alternatively, every thirty years. To obviate fraudulent transfers, it might be enacted that all transfers made within one year previous to the death of a license-holder should, for the purpose of this measure, be held void and of no effect. The advantage of this scheme is that it permits of the resump- tion by the State of the monopoly value of the license, with a minimum of disturbance of vested interests, and that, too, by a method which in principle already has the sanction of usage in connexion with the Death-duties.--I am, Sir, &c., A. B. B.
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