But with
reference to every article, there will be the necessity of
collecting this 3 per cent.
As regards each article that is
manufactured, some government official must interfere to appraise
its value and to levy the tax. Who shall declare the value of a
barrel of wooden nutmegs; or how shall the excise officer get his
tax from every cobbler's stall in the country? And then tradesmen
are to pay licenses for their trades - a confectioner 2l., a tallow-
chandler 2l., a horse dealer 2l. Every man whose business it is to
sell horses shall be a horse dealer. True. But who shall say
whether or no it be a man's business to sell horses? An apothecary
2l., a photographer 2l., a peddler 4l., 3l., 2l., or 1l., according
to his mode of traveling. But if the gross receipts of any of the
confectioners, tallow-chandlers, horse dealers, apothecaries,
photographers, peddlers, or the like do not exceed 200l. a year,
then such tradesmen shall not be required to pay for any license at
all. Surely such a proviso can only have been inserted with the
express view of creating fraud and ill blood! But the greatest
audacity has, I think, been shown in the levying of personal taxes, -
such taxes as have been held to be peculiarly disagreeable among
us, and have specially brought down upon us the contempt of lightly-
taxed people, who, like the Americans, have known nothing of
domestic interference. Carriages are to be taxed, as they are with
us.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 402 of 531
Words from 107481 to 107736
of 142339
