LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.
IRISH TAXATION.
[TO THZ EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.]
SIR,—This question of Irish taxation seems to affect one like a nightmare. There is not, so far as I can see, any argument about it taken by itself. Given an Irishman and an English- man of equal taxpaying capacity, the former is to pay less than the latter because his country is poorer than England as to its aggregate wealth. This is so absurd a proposition in itself that recourse is had to promises held out by Pitt and his friends in 1800, and embodied, we are told, in the Act of -Union. The action of Pitt would not, I suppose, be brought forward in these days to justify bribery, but the precedent seems to be as good in the one case as in the other. If Pitt and others made a blunder in 1800 in their anxiety to satisfy Ireland, why should we repeat it and con- firm it ? As I have pointed out in a recent letter, we owe to the Act of Union the absurdity of Irish repre- sentation as it now stands. The only " argument " used in 18S4, as I well remember, in favour of so large a re- presentation was the policy and promises of 1800. We gave in very foolishly to that argument against the protest of Mr. D. Plunket, and now we are asked to sanction another absurdity on the same grounds. The "union of hearts" has at last become a fact, and the money question unites, for the moment, those who are bitterly opposed on almost every other issue. To a Unionist there is not much consolation in this unpleasant spectacle. No Report or Act or any other "entity" can ever make the proposal now made anything but a miserable muddle, and your remarks have been, I am sure, most acceptable to many of your readers. I cannot believe that reasonable men who are not governed by party sentiment will ever consent to such a ridiculous proposal, which would, for example, make the English shareholders in Guinness and Co. pay less taxes than the shareholders in Barclay's brewery, merely because their business is located in Dublin instead of London.—I am, Sir, Szc.,
WILLIAM FOWLER.
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