In ;1847 . the Lord Chief Justice decided that the over-
seers had been entirely wrong in letting personalty escape and that in future, they must levy rates upon it. This sudden decision caused something like consternation, and Sir Robert Peel at once passed a short Act exempting personal property for one year from all rates and confining the rates to land and tithes. He promised that the rating law should be reviewed and made equitable the next year. That year has never come, but the Act has annually been included in the list of Statutes renewed for one year more. It is a gross injustice that one indus- try, and that notoriously one of small profit, should be singled out for unique taxation. No industry pays on its raw material as well as its factory buildings except agriculture, which is made to pay on its chief raw material —land. That it pays only half rates is but a grudging acknowledgment of a grievance, not an abrogation of an injustice.
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