PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21813, 19 June 1936, Page 17

PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION

TO THE EDITOB OF THB FBE39.

Sir,—ln my last letter under this heading I traced the history of the income tax and showed that it dated back only as far as 1799. Accordingly the question suggests itself: how was the revenue of England provided before that date? History answers that the land was charged with the responsibility of providing the greater part °f the national revenue, though the obligation was sometimes discharged in actual services. In pre-feudal England there were two great divisions of land —Folc-land and Boc-land. The former was the common property of the people pursuant to the immemorial customs of the Germanic tribes from whom the Saxons were derived—Boc-land—that is, land held by book or charter —was individual property and could be devised by deed or will, but was nevertheless charged with certain public burdens, namely the trinoda necessity —the triple tax for constructing and repairing bridges (brieg-bot). for the maintenance of fortifications (burhbot), and for the maintenance of the natipnal militia or fyrd. As the result of the Norman Conquest all the land of England became terra regis, but the trinoda necessitas was continued. In legal theory the King became the supreme landlord, all other proprietors being tenants either mediately or immediately of the King, and, with a view to ascertaining his resources, William the Conqueror ordained the Domesday Survey in 108586.

The practical effect of the feudal system is proved by certain" outstanding historical facts, and the conclusion is irresistible that incidentally popular rights were preserved. First, though England engaged in such protracted conflicts as the Hundred Years War. the Crusades, and the Wars of th* Roses, these were paid for out of revenue. and no national debt is heard cf; second, there were no poor laws, for the reason that the indigent and infirm were maintained by the religious orders, themselves, in accordance with feudal theory, the tenants of tho Crown. Even Gibbon admits that hospitals and orphanages came with Christianity and in pre-Reformation England the Christian ideal was well maintained. For evidence of this great historic fact there is no need to quote Catholic authorities. One need go no further than the magnificent panegyric of the Catholic Church m the initial chapter of Macaulay’s History: “The Church of our ancestors,” says H. M. Hyndman in his "Historical Basis of Socialism in England.” “was not the organised fraud which prejudiced historians would have us believe,” and we have to the like effect the evidence of Professor Thorold Rogers in “Six Centuries of Work and Wages.” Finally, we know that in those far-off days, not only was there no public debt, but the taxation of England was so moderate that the fact was a matter of comment by foreign observers, Michiel, the Venetian Ambassador to the Court of Queen Mary, for example, in a report to his Government, remarks as “singular and wonder ul” that there are in England no taxes on salt, wine, beer, flour, meal, cloth, “and other necessaries of life.” Dowell in his "History of Taxation and Taxes in England.” tells us that "*uch taxation had always been hateful to Englishmen, who regarded them as badges of slavery.” . , , The first great infraction cf popular - ights in the land of England came when Henry VIII. seized the lands of :he religious houses and granted them to his favourites. At that time onethird of the land of England was held by religious corporations, and the laylords regarded them with ever-increas-ing jealousy. Many reasons made them look with dislike on the monastic proprietors. Thorold Rogers tells us for example, that they were indulgent landlords, and the aristocracy could scarcely impose cn their tenants conditions more onerous than those conceded by the Church. That the monastic lands were in effect national property is proved by the fact that there were no poor laws in England fer the reason that the maintenance of the indigent and infirm was a charge on the monastic lands. It is a rather striking commentary on the decadence of popular rights and the debasement of parliamentary government under the Tudors that in the reign of Elizabeth not merely was payment of members allowed to drop into disuse, but that, the first poor law was enacted. Despite the plunder of monastic lands, however, the ownership of land continued still to be conditional on the discharge of important public obligations. Yours, etc., p O’REGAN.

Wellington, June 17, 1936. [This Correspondence is now closed. Ed. “The Press.”]