or a sum equivalent to what the tax is likely
to cost him during the time he uses the same
coach. A service of plate in the same manner,
may last more than a century. It is
certainly easier for the consumer to pay five
shillings a-year for every hundred ounces of
plate, near one per cent. of the value, than to
redeem this long annuity at five-and-twenty
of thirty years purchase, which would enhance
the price at least five-and-twenty or thirty per
cent. The different taxes which affect houses,
are certainly more conveniently paid by moderate
annual payments, than by a heavy tax
of equal value upon the first building or sale
of the house.
It was the well-known proposal of Sir
Matthew Decker, that all commodities, even
those of which the consumption is either immediate
or speedy, should be taxed in this
manner; the dealer advancing nothing, but
the consumer paying a certain annual sum
for the licence to consume certain goods. The
object of his scheme was to promote all the
different branches of foreign trade, particularly
the carrying trade, by taking away all duties
upon importation and exportation, and thereby
enabling the merchant to employ his whole
capital and credit in the purchase of goods
and the freight of ships, no part of either being
diverted towards the advancing of taxes.
The project, however, of taxing, in this manner,
goods of immediate or speedy consumption,
seems liable to the four following very
important objections. First, the tax would
be more unequal, or not so well proportioned
to the expense and consumption of the different
contributors, as in the way in which it
is commonly imposed. The taxes upon ale,
wine, and spiritous liquors, which are advanced
by the dealers, are finally paid by the
different consumers, exactly in proportion to
their respective consumption. But if the tax
were to be paid by purchasing a licence to
drink those liquors, the sober would, in proportion
to his consumption, be taxed much
more heavily than the drunken consumer. A
family which exercised great hospitality, would
be taxed much more lightly than one who entertained
fewer guests. Secondly, this mode
of taxation, by paying for an annual, half-yearly,
or quarterly licence to consume certain
goods, would diminish very much one of the
principal conveniences of taxes upon goods
of speedy consumption; the piece-meal payment.
In the price of threepence halfpenny,
which is at present paid for a pot of porter, the
different taxes upon malt, hops, and beer, together
with the extraordinary profit which the
brewer charges for having advanced them, may
perhaps amount to about three halfpence. If
a workman can conveniently spare those three
halfpence, he buys a pot of porter. If he
cannot, he contents himself with a pint; and,
as a penny saved is a penny got, he thus gains
a farthing by his temperance. He pays the
tax piece-meal, as he can afford to pay it,
and when he can afford to pay it, and
every act of payment is perfectly voluntary,
and what he can avoid if he chuses to do so.
Thirdly, such taxes would operate less as
sumptuary laws. When the licence was once
purchased, whether the purchaser drunk much
or drunk little, his tax would he the same.
Fourthly, if a workman were to pay all at
once, by yearly, half-yearly, or quarterly payments,
a tax equal to what he at present pays,
with little or no inconveniency, upon all the
different pots and pints of porter which he
drinks in any such period of time, the sum
might frequently distress him very much.
This mode of taxation, therefore, it seems
evident, could never, without the most grievous
oppression, produce a revenue nearly
equal to what is derived from the present mode
without any oppression. In several countries,
however, commodities of an immediate or very
speedy consumption are taxed in this manner.
In Holland, people pay so much a-head for
a licence to drink tea. I have already mentioned
a tax upon bread, which, so far as it
is consumed in farm houses and country villages,
is there levied in the same manner.
The duties of excise are imposed chiefly
upon goods of home produce, destined for
home consumption. They are imposed only
upon a few sorts of goods of the most general
use. There can never be any doubt,
either concerning the goods which are subject
to those duties, or concerning the particular
duty which each species of goods is
subject to. They fall almost altogether upon
what I call luxuries, excepting always the four
duties above mentioned, upon salt, soap, leather,
candles, and perhaps that upon green glass.
The duties of customs are much more ancient
than those of excise. They seem to
have been called customs, as denoting customary
payments, which had been in use for
time immemorial. They appear to have been
originally considered as taxes upon the profits
of merchants. During the barbarous
times of feudal anarchy, merchants, like all
the other inhabitants of burghs, were considered
as little better than emancipated bondmen,
whose persons were despised, and whose
gains were envied. The great nobility, who
had consented that the king should tallage
the profits of their own tenants, were not
unwilling that he should tallage likewise those
of an order of men whom it was much less
their interest to protect. In those ignorant
times, it was not understood, that the profits
of merchants are a subject not taxable directly;
or that the final payment of all such taxes
must fall, with a considerable overcharge, upon
the consumers.
The gains of alien merchants were looked
upon more unfavourably than those of English
merchants. It was natural, therefore,
that those of the former should be taxed more