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THE PIPE OF PEACE . An absurd theory has got . possession of many minds , that the Emperor of the Freneh is less a man than a collection of fixed unyielding plans , which he is presumed to brood over and follow with the pertinacity of an instinct , such as that which directs the swallow to winter in Afriea or conducts the lemming in its periodical migrations . A successful speculator was never made upon these principles , and the amount of good fortune which has attended the imperial career of JN " apoleon III . shows that he has studied events as they
arose , and been ready to turn everything to accountr His fixity or principle is like the consistency of the Vicar of Bray , and come what will , he is determined if possible to die as the acknowledged sovereign of France . His activity , his restlessness , his energy , are no doubt' equalities quite natural to him , but as a sagacious thinker he must be aware that they are necessary elements , without which a centralised government could not long be exercised over an excitable and imoginative ° people . When he sketched his Italian prograrame he had to conciliate the pretensions of
the Pope and the Romish clergy with designs that were really hostile to their power . He had to gratify nationality and oppose revolution : to urge Sardinia into a collision with Austria and place obstacles in the way of an Italy that would be independent of France . As events arose in unexpected sequence he modified his plans , and the sudden peace of Villafranca wa 3 clearly the act of a , man ready at a moment ' s notice to bring himself to a sharp pull up if his interest appeared to require such a course . In . like manner a combination of reasons and motives led to his opposing
the Carignan Regency , and permitting , if not actually instigating , a scries of ill tempered and unreasonable attacks upon England , . whoso minister at Turin was offering to Victor Emmanuel advice in opposition to the avowed desires of France . While this was going on we ventured , to predict that if the Italians would styind firm the opposition would disappear , and now , simultaneously with an order to the French presa not to excite ill will againat England , comes a notification that the Buoncnmpngni Regency is not , ' after' ( ill , such an objection-Able affair . The fact ia that the English alliance is of great vatyo to the Empire , and if it can bo maintained , without sacrificing the fundamental maintained , without sacrificing the fundamental
pretensions of the heir of the first Napoleon , its preservation must be an object of solicitudes to the present ruler of Franco . Nnpoleonism requires . that cither England- should bo friondly or that England should bo politically destroyed ; and with anything like rational govornmont in this country the former alternative is easy and the lust out of the question . There are politicians among us who would drive the Empire to desperation , and leave no other outlet for ita disturbing oncrgios than an English war ; but happily public opinion is determined to give these quarrohnongora ft checkmate , and look upon our rifle-cluba and stoam navy not fts instruments of aggression but as guarantees of peaoe . Some time ago , with a Grahamisod
Admiralty , we no doubt had room for alarm ; but the most recent statistics of the naval force of the two countries , as collected by Mr . Thomas Page , are well calculated to remove our fears . From these it appears that the fighting navy of England now comprises 63 sailing ships , carrying 2 , 466 guns , and 384 steamers , carrying 9 , 553 guns , with 89 , 814 horse power . On the other hand , the French sailing navy contains 118 vessels , with 3 , 846 guns , and its steam navy , 132 vessels , with 4 , 941 £ uris and 53 , 105 horse power . In this statement 99 English sailing vessels , with 3 , 909 guns , are omitted , although many of them could be made serviceable inaction or for local defence .
When we look at the great superiority of our steam navy , and . consider " the efforts still making to render it more perfect , we can afford to ridicule the efforts of those who , in sjnte of any amount of preparation , are still determined to manufacture panics for breakfast , panics for dinner , tea , and supper , until the public stomach is thoroughly nauseated with such unpleasant food .. Without any bullying from us , the French Government is perfectly able to appreciate these naval facts , as well as the steady , though rather slow process of abolishing flogging and other cnuses of popular dislike to what is called " Her
Majesty ' s Service . " Every day that we become more powerful , our friendship is better worth making , and our enmity less an object of desire to the bold list potentate ; and as we coir . * - our increasing strength with proof of pacific intentions , our preparations ought neither to excite jealousy nor alarm , so long as popular intelligence prevents their falling into reactionary hands . If proposals for mutual disarinment are made in good faitl ) , they will recognize England ' s claim to naval superiority ; but no diminution of forces can really be carried out until the moral elements of discord are effectually removed . ,
It would , of course , be more congenial with British ideas of right , if the French Government would letyve the press alone , and suffer it to develope and reflect the public opinion of the country , but if it must move by Imperial orders , we are glad that the horrible gesticulations of the war dance , with its flourish of scalping knives and tomahawks , is to be superseded by more graceful movements to the pipe of peace . The recent policy of the French in Italy has nearly compromised the position of Sardinia , and necessitated the uplifting of the Republican banner , and Louis Napoleon must see that lie must either allow Italian aspirations for national existence to be gratified through '
Victor Emmanuel and monarchy , or be prepared to encounter that spectre of revolution which id the object of his greatest dread . Garibaldi has wisely retired from intrigues which he was not permitted to cut through with his sword , and he waits the time when , with Victor Emmanuel , if possible , but without him , if necessary , the struggle for freedom will enter another stage . By far the wisest and safest plan for Louis Napoleon will be to join England in aiding Sardinia to develope herself into d powerful State . If his soldiers want more fighting , there is still an Austrian army . Italy is not free from the Alps to the Adriatic , and , entrenched in great fortresses , the enemy still threatens the Lombard plains .
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WHO PA > S THE TAXEg P The publication , about a month ago , of Mr ' Brio-lit'a letter on taxation has done an immense deal , of good . It has provoked many interesting inquiries and produced , in defence of the . upper classes , many startling assertions . Their chief journals have taken the ' matter up warmly , and , ns is their . wont , have abused Mr . Bright and abused his doctrines . To defend him is no concorn of ours—he is well able to defend himself ; but wo are all 'deeply interested in knowing who pays the taxes . Ho say * , " the greater portion of our taxes i « collected on artioles the bulk of
which is consumed by tlmt portion of the population which has no property but its labour , nnd no income but its wagus . " " There is something essentially niean and " singularly cruel , " he affirms , "in the manner in which tho taxation of thin eountry has been and still ia loviod . " Those statement * nro characterised by liio opponents aa impudent fallacies , nddresBorl to a necessitous _ and ignorant population . It is , ' however , admitted , that if hit ) accusations bo true , the govornmont of England , by such corrupt boclios as ho
describes , would be . and ought to be , impossible . Let us look , therefore , at what has been , and what is . ¦ _ ¦ . ¦ . Just before the beginning of the great war the amount of revenue paid into the Exchequer , the produce of taxation in 1792 , was £ 19 , 845 705 ; in 1815 , the amount was £ 72 , 210 , 512 . Of this increase . £ 52 , 374 , 807 , the only part which fell exclusively on property was the Income and Property Tax , the amount of which , in 1814 , was £ 14 , 485 , 000 . In the interval , the interest on the National I > ebt was increased from £ 9 , 311 , 630 to £ 32 , 015 , 941 . The bulk of this increase of annual charge for debt was a transfer of property from one class to another , and mainly a transfer from the labouring classes who had no income , as Mr . Bri gh t says , but wages , to classes who had other property . In the interval , when the taxes were thus enormously increased , and there was this continual transfer of property year after year , the wealth of the upper classes—of the land and tithe owners for rent rose prodigiously ; of the . great capitalists and contractors ; of admirals and generals ; of Ministers and the chief servants of the Government ; of the master manufacturers and of the great farmers —continually increased . They all grew richer and richer , and all the labouring multitude bulk of tliem
became poorer arid poorer , till the were actually reduced to a frightful condition ol pauperism . In consequence of this distress several o-reat riots took place . By themselves , and others , their sufferings and their acknowledged degradation were referred to the introduction and ° ise of machinery , which we are now well convinced was the very thing-which saved them and saved the country from irretrievable rum . The noblest works of man were made the scapeo- ' oats of politicians . What really caused the poverty and degradation of the labouring multitude was the " mean and singularly cruel system ot taxation , " which levied the ¦ whole expense of the war , and much more than its needful expense , on them exclusively ; and of it transferred a very laro-e proportion to the classes enriched . Af ter this course had been continued from 1793 to 1816 , the first step the chivalrous gentlemen of England took was to repeal the Income and Property Tax , relieve the upper classes to the extent of , 4-14 , 000 , 000 , ¦ . and increase to a considerable amount , £ -2 , 915 , 888 , indirect taxation . They , however , had passed , the year before , the celebrated Corn Law , to levy a direct tax on the labourer ' bread , for the behoof of the land and tithe owners , in order , as one of themselves af terwards stated , to keep up their dignity anil enable them to endow their children . This is a brief history of what the gentlemen of England did in Parliament , in respect to taxation , from 1793 to 1816 ; and what they havo done since , and arc now doing , we proceed to describe . Naturally , after that expensive war there took place a great and continued reduction of taxes , but nil Mr . Hume ' s exertions were insufficient to restrain the extravagance ot the Government , and taxation was nut reduced as it ouMit to have been . The reduction , ns the rule , fell on ' indirect taxation ; but there was also n con- < siderablo reduction in direct taxation . Ihero were also changes ; and every increase of taxation till 1842 , with olio trilling exception , was in "idircct taxes . In 1 842 Sir Kpbert Peel began Ins fiscal and commercial reforms ; nndnowit is boasted for the gentlemen of * England , that , they then con . sented to a property and inoo . no tax m oi dor to relieve the iifloriiiff industrious classes . But why , did they do this ? fye beg to inform the writers m the Times , tlio Saturday Review , the Acmomist , and other sycophantic journals , who seem to have utterly forgotten , or never to have known , the i hUory of flat pcriod-that it was done because ( the multitude was in deep distress and fimrtuUy discont ented- —because the revenue did not equal i the expenditure , nnd it had been found Irom oxpe- I Hence that additional indirect taxation did not uive additional revenue . Mr . Baring , the Whig Chancellor of the Exchequer , tried it and failed . Ho impoflod n Customs and Excisu lax of fi per cunt ., which ho calculated wo produce on additional revenue of sei , 896 \ 676 \ but which actually producod , according to the documents submitted tothoHouna of Commons by Sir Robert X eel , £ 206 715 . The nominal tax was 5 per cent . —the yield wft « little more than 4 per cent . Admitting that tho course adopted in 1842 was the reverse
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SUBSCRIPTION TO " THE LEADEB . ' ONE GUIN EA PER YEAR , UNSTAMPED , PREPAID . ( delivered gratis . )
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OFFICE , NO . , CATHERINE-STREET , STRAND , W . C .
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SATURDAY , NOVEMBER 26 , 1859 .
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There is nothing-so revolutionary , because there is nothing so unnatural and convulsive , as the strain to keep things fixed when all the world is by the very law of its creation in eternal progress . —Dii . AnNOi-D . -: ¦ - '
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No . 505 . Xov . 26 . 1859-1 THE LEADEB . 1297
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Leader (1850-1860), Nov. 26, 1859, page 1297, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2322/page/13/
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