The English Budget. 

From an Occasional Correspondent. 
London, Feb. 11, 1860. 

The last was a great night, in the Parliamentary sense of the word. Mr. Glad- 

stone, in an immense speech, simultaneously divulged the mysteries of his 
budget and of the commercial treaty, linking both carefully together, and 
propping the frailty of the one by the boldness of the other. As to the treaty, 
now laid with all its details before the world, you will find the sketch I gave 
you many weeks ago to have been quite correct and, in fact, I have nothing 
to add to the general criticism I ventured upon at the time. Consequently, 
I propose considering Mr. Gladstone's budget as a simple operation of 
English finance, a treatment of the subject the more called for since the 
impending Parliamentary debates are sure to enlighten us, by the by, on the 
diplomatic undercurrent of Mr. Gladstone's facts and figures. 

Now, whatever inconsistencies may be traced in the details of the budget; 
whatever political objections may be raised against the prudence of answer- 
ing a deficit of more than 14 per cent on the total revenue, and a vast increase 
of expenditure, by one full sweep of many existing duties, part of which did 
hardly weigh upon the mass of the people; nevertheless, common fairness 

obliges me to say that Mr. Gladstone's budget is a great and bold stroke of 
financial ingenuity, and that the British Free-Trade doctrines once accepted— 
apart from some glaring incongruities necessitated by the treaty with France, 
as well as by the tenderness every British Chancellor of the Exchequer will 
always bring to bear upon the rent-rolls of the 50,000 paramount landlords—it 
is a fair budget. The position of Mr. Gladstone was fraught with difficulties 
created by himself. He was the man, who in 1853, in his so-called standard 
budget prospectively extending over a space of seven years, had pledged 
himself to definitely do away with the income tax in 1860-61. He again, in 
a supplementary budget, called into life by the Russian war, had promised 
to abolish, at no distant date, the war duty on tea and sugar. The same man, 
now that his promissory bills have fallen due, comes forward with a scheme 
in which the latter duty is maintained, while the income tax is enhanced from 
9d. to 10d. in the pound; that is to say, by IIV9 per cent. But, you will re- 
member that, in my strictures of his budget of 1853,1 tried to prove that, 
if the financial legislature of free-trade meant anything, it meant indirect 
taxation being displaced by direct taxation. I dwelt at the time on the incom- 
patibility of Mr. Gladstone's pledge of going on with the removal of custom 
and excise duties, with his simultaneous pledge of altogether expunging the 
income tax from the tax-gatherer's list. The income tax, only that it is par- 
tially, unjustly, and even stupidly laid on, is the best item in English financial 
law. That Mr. Gladstone, instead of seriously taxing landed property, main- 
tains a war duty upon such first necessities as tea and sugar, is a cowardice 
due much more to the aristocratic structure of Parliament than to any narrow- 
ness of mind on his part. If he had dared lay his hands on the rent-rolls, the 
Cabinet, whose prospects of life are precarious enough, would have gone 
to the wall in no time. It is an old proverb that the belly has no ears, but it 
is no less true that rent-rolls have no conscience. 

Before giving a succinct statement of the alterations contemplated by 
Mr. Gladstone, I shall first call the attention of the reader to some incidental 
remarks dropped in the course of his speech. First, then, the Chancellor of 
the Exchequer admitted that the common opinion of free trade being in- 
carnated in the English financial system was mere slang. Secondly, he 
admitted that England had no commerce worth speaking of with France, 
while France, on the contrary, had avery extensive and expanding trade with 
England. Thirdly, he could not help confessing that Palmerstonian policy, 
embarking upon "friendly expeditions" behind the back of Parliament, had 
turned the scale, and paralysed the increase accruing to the Exchequer from 
the extension of British commerce and industry. Lastly, although gilding the 
bitter pill with a sweet envelope, and presenting it in as handy a shape as 
French apothecaries are used to present you the most abominable pharma- 
ceutical stuff, he could not but own that the same dear ally, to whom Great 
Britain is just about sacrificing nearly two millions of income, is the main- 
spring of British military and naval expenditure being swollen, for the year 
1860-61, to the stupendous amount of 30 millions. Eighteen millions, it should 
be recorded, was the maximum of war expenditure, which the Iron Duke, 
twenty-four years since, entreated English rationalism to swallow. After 
these preliminary remarks I come to the changes proposed by Mr. Gladstone. 

They are divided into two categories, the one resulting from the treaty with 
France, the other embracing subsidiary changes, which Mr. Gladstone was 
compelled to introduce in order to free his budget from the reproach of being 
a concession extorted from a foreign despotic power, and imparting to itthe 
more acceptable color of being a general reform of the existing tariff. 

The changes introduced by the commercial treaty with France are these: 
There will at once be aclean sweep, absolutely and entirely, of manufactured 
goods off the British tariff, with the exception, for a limited period, of three 
articles only, viz.: cork, gloves, and another trifling article. The brandy duty 
will be reduced from 15s. a gallon to the level of the colonial duty of 8s. The 
duty on all foreign wines will be immediately diminished from nearly 5s. 1Od. 
per gallon to 3s. a gallon. England engages further to reduce the duty from 
April 1, 1861, to a scale proportioned to the quantity of spirit contained in 
the wine. AU duties upon foreign articles which are also produced in England, 

and there subject to an excise duty, will be reduced to the standard of the 
home excise. Such is the pith of the first set of changes to be introduced. 

The alterations which, independently of the treaty with France, are to give 
the present budget the character of a general reformation of British financial 
legislature are these: 

There are to be abolished immediately and entirely the duties on butter, 
tallow, cheese, oranges, and lemons, eggs, nutmegs, pepper, Ucorice, and 
various other articles, of which the total duty is about £382,000 a year. 
Reductions are to take place in the present duty raised on timber from 7/ 
and 7/6 to the colonial rate of 1/ and 1/6. On currants, from 15/9 to 7/; on 
raisins and figs, from 10/ to 7/; on hops, from 45/ to 15/. Lastly, the excise 
upon paper is to be abolished. 

The account of the financial year 1860, stands thus: 

Expenditure. 

Funded and Unfunded Debt. .......... £26,200,000 
Consolidated Fund Charges. ............ 2,000,000 
Army and Militia .....2.22 2222.22... 15,800,000 
Navy and Packet Service. . .. 2. 1 ws, 13,900,000 
Miscellaneous and Civil Service... ...... 7,500,000 
Revenue Department ................. 4,700,000 

MO tA rs ds Py rs nen en £70,100,000 

Income 

CUSTOMS: su tes 20 2 na A tea ee £22,700,000 
TEXEISE. ma 2 na ige ba ta Se tha ee en 19,170,000 
Stamps... aao D a ee 8,000,000 
Other Taxes? 02:24 un 2a sn A 3,250,000 

[Income.] 
Income: Tax’: . aia SE Eek ee RH a eS 2,400,000 
Post-Office.. 2... a 3,400,000 
Crown Lands. . aaa 280,000 
Miscellaneous Revenue................ 1,500,000 
TOGA yg E unerkannt ache ged £60,700,000 

Now, on comparing expenditure with income, it will be found that a deficit 

to the amount of nearly £10,000,000 sterling is avowed, for which Mr. Glad- 
stone, as already said, thinks to make up by the increase of the Income Tax 
from 9d. to lOd. and by the maintenance of the war duties onteaand sugar. 
The minor alterations, by which he proposes getting a penny here, and 
another penny there, it is not necessary to dwell uponin this general survey 

of the British Budget for 1860-61.