tax upon hawkers and pedlars, that upon
hackney-coaches and chairs, and that which
the keepers of ale-houses pay for a licence to
retail ale and spiritous liquors. During the
late war, another tax of the same kind was
proposed upon shops. The war having been
undertaken, it was said, in defence of the
trade of the country, the merchants, who were
to profit by it, ought to contribute towards
the support of it.
A tax, however, upon the profits of stock
employed in any particular branch of trade,
can never fall finally upon the dealers (who
must in all ordinary cases have their reasonable
profit, and, where the competition is free,
can seldom have more than that profit), but
always upon the consumers, who must be
obliged to pay in the price of the goods the
tax which the dealer advances; and generally
with some overcharge.
A tax of this kind, when it is proportioned
to the trade of the dealer, is finally paid by
the consumer, and occasions no oppression to
the dealer. When it is not so proportioned,
but is the same upon all dealers, though in
this case, too, it is finally paid by the consumer,
yet it favours the great, and occasions
some oppression to the small dealer. The
tax of five shillings a-week upon every hackney
coach, and that of ten shillings a-year
upon every hackney chair, so far as it is
advanced by the different keepers of such
coaches and chairs, is exactly enough proportioned
to the extent of their respective dealings.
It neither favours the great, nor oppresses
the smaller dealer. The tax of
twenty shillings a-year for a licence to sell
ale; of forty shillings for a licence to sell
spiritous liquors; and of forty shillings more
for a licence to sell wine, being the same
upon all retailers, must necessarily give some
advantage to the great, and occasion some
oppression to the small dealers. The former
must find it more easy to get back the tax in
the price of their goods than the latter.
The moderation of the tax, however, renders
this inequality of less importance; and it
may to many people appear not improper to
give some discouragement to the multiplication
of little ale-houses. The tax upon
shops, it was intended, should be the same
upon all shops. It could not well have been
otherwise. It would have been impossible
to proportion, with tolerable exactness, the
tax upon a shop to the extent of the trade
carried on in it, without such an inquisition
as would have been altogether insupportable
in a free country. If the tax had been considerable,
it would have oppressed the small,
and forced almost the whole retail trade into
the hands of the great dealers. The competition
of the former being taken away, the
latter would have enjoyed a monopoly of the
trade; and, like all other monopolists, would
soon have combined to raise their profits
much beyond what was necessary for the payment
of the tax. The final payment, instead
of falling upon the shop-keeper, would have
fallen upon the consumer, with a considerable
overcharge to the profit of the shop-keeper.
For these reasons, the project of a tax upon
shops was laid aside, and in the room of it
was substituted the subsidy, 1759.
What in France is called the personal taille,
is perhaps, the most important tax upon the
profits of stock employed in agriculture, that
is levied in any part of Europe.
In the disorderly state of Europe, during
the prevalence of the feudal government, the
sovereign was obliged to content himself with
taxing those who were too weak to refuse to
pay taxes. The great lords, though willing
to assist him upon particular emergencies,
refused to subject themselves to any constant
tax, and he was not strong enough to force
them. The occupiers of land all over Europe
were, the greater part of them, originally
bond-men. Through the greater part of
Europe, they were gradually emancipated.
Some of them acquired the property of landed
estates, which they held by some base or
ignoble tenure, sometimes under the king,
and sometimes under some other great lord,
like the ancient copy-holders of England.
Others, without acquiring the property, obtained
leases for terms of years, of the lands
which they occupied under their lord, and
thus became less dependent upon him. The
great lords seem to have beheld the degree of
prosperity and independency, which this inferior
order of men had thus come to enjoy,
with a malignant and contemptuous indignation,
and willingly consented that the sovereign
should tax them. In some countries,
this tax was confined to the lands which were
held in property by an ignoble tenure; and,
in this case, the taille was said to be real.
The land tax established by the late king of
Sardinia, and the taille in the provinces of
Languedoc, Provence, Dauphine, and Brittany;
in the generality of Montauban, and
in the elections of Agen and Condom, as well
as in some other districts of France; are
taxes upon lands held in property by an ignoble
tenure. In other countries, the tax
was laid upon the supposed profits of all
those who held, in farm or lease, lands belonging
to other people, whatever might be
the tenure by which the proprietor held them;
and in this case, the taille was said to be personal.
In the greater part of those provinces
of France, which are called the countries of
elections, the taille is of this kind. The real
taille, as it is imposed only upon a part of the
lands of the country, is necessarily an unequal,
but it is not always an arbitrary tax,
though it is so upon some occasions. The
personal taille, as it is intended to be proportioned