PROPOSED TAX ON BACHELORS IN FRANCE.

Clutha Leader, Volume III, Issue 149, 18 May 1877, Page 3

PROPOSED TAX ON BACHELORS IN FRANCE.

: ,♦ The diminution in the French population has lately awakened general attention in France, and everyboby has his own pet theory for remedying this evil. One of the French Deputies, M. Menier, has hit upon the^noyel device of taxing the unmarried portion of the community, and making those who wish to indulge in bachelorhood pay, 1 in the shape of a special impost, for the privilege. The following*, are. his : reasons for this proposal: Each person ., should bear an equal share of the social burden, and as matters are at present, this burden is far heavier for married people, espe-.ci.-lly with families, than for bachelors ; while on the other hand, the baih^or has the same civil and p i tical form, and givrs less t> society. Therefore tax celibacy, and thereby relieve matrimony — this is what justic requires. .Although this may appenr an attack, on individual liberty, yet it reaUy leaves to everybody the right, to do as he likes. Tt simply^ (ienies to the bachelor the right to neglect gratuitously h*s duty towards society. The man who, is base enough not to marry owes compensation to society foi* the services Jhe. refuses to render it, , and, therefore it is but just that he should be t:ixed and aid his mated, fellow-citizen to pay their way. The tax on bachelors wnuld serve to create a premium on births, and, hence it would; be strictly moral., 'ihe greater the number of children, the larger the number of active members given to society. 7 On them it depends for its continuation, its : sustentation, and its defence; Hence those who co-operate in this Avork ought to be assisted. -Bachelors derive the benefit of tbe prosperity they produce in the countrA', but in no ; wise . contribute towards it—hence let them be taxed. Only fancy what a revenue might be o-ot put of the Catholic clergy, of whom there are, about ,l7s,ooo in France, by this means! , Again, you takeaway the excuse. of a. man's, saying. he..is. too poor ' to. marry, . According to the proposed system of premiums on matrimony and its . fruits, a young, man ..inclined to speculation might find it, to his. pecuniary advantage to marry, exemption from the 'ax and the prospect ofa bonus at the birth of an offspring being, real inducements to him, to pop the question. Should VT. Menier's proposal be adopted by the French Chamber, we may look to immigration in this country on a large scale from France.