THE AUCKLAND POLL TAX

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XXIV, Issue 3433, 17 July 1868, Page 3

THE AUCKLAND POLL TAX

THI3 ingenious expedient of a needy a ..1 moribund Government has now beoome a stem reality, and already men are silently, but surely, at work on the compilation of that dreaded roll which is to include the name, age, and residence of every adulb in the province who is supposed to be able to pay ten shillings. No man in this community knoweth at what hour the inexorable taxgatberer may knock at his door, and demand payment of an involuntary subscription. Having regard to the uncertainty of the times, it therefore behovei every one of our fellow-citizens to keep a half-sovereign mug in his pocket as a provision for the evil day. We would feel almost iuolined to believe implicitly in Plato's celebrated Cyole. How strange that so fruitful a source of revenue as the poll tax should have been so long suffered to fall into desuetude ; and how strikingly illustrative of the rapid intellectual advancement of modern timei, and the spread of colonisation, that it should have been reserved for our Provincial Executive to drag the sohem& from the dust and obscurity of age', and j to resuscitate it at the antipodes. How that happy \ scheme for propelling the sails of the provincial windmill was hit upon we know not for certain, though lumour saith that in a fortuitous and lacid moment, during the casual perunalof a " History of Kngland." the welcome expedient came like balm in Gileai to the all but exhausted ingenuity of our Provincial Secretary, relieving him of all fuither anxiety in respect to his own salary and those of his colleagues. What sciences have not been rescued from oblivion by the I brilliant intellect and untiring industry of modern scientific explorers, and who shall say that posterity will not award our Provincial Secretary a niche in the Temple of Fame? Who shall dare to predict that when the present genemtion of financiers and taxpayers shall have passed away our Provincial Secretary will not be placed in the same rank with Benzoni and Layard, Cook, McCHutock, and Adam Smith ? While their predecessors in all nations under the British flag have for centuries past scarcely dared to hint at such an expedient as a poll tax, our Provincial Executive, emboldened by impecuniosity, come forward and in the frankest manner possible propose to levy ten shillings a head on every male adult in the province, themselves and proteggs included. How disinterested ! m It is somewhat interesting, if not instructive, to the studtnt of history, also to note the striking coincidence* and contrasts between the famous poll tax of 1381, in England, and that of 1868 in Auckland. First of all, it is worthy of notice that the circumstances which lend ti the imposition of both poll taxes were wonderfully similar. In that of 1331, "the Parliament, pressed by the exigencies of an exoessive and profitless war, levied a oapitation tax on all persons, except oommon beggar 3, who should have passed the age of fifteen." In our own case, the Provincial Exeoutive, pressed down by the legaoy of debt and extravagance (which they were not slow to imitate) bequeathed by their predecessors, and filled « ith anxiety as to the wherewithal to "maintain existing institutions in their integrity" (jobbery and Superintendentalism), also levied a capitation tax on all male persons, except common beggari and Maoris, who have passed the age of twenty-one. There is a remarkable difference, however, between these two great matters of hUtory. Eichard JI 's Parliament had the modesty to oonfine their exactions to three groats (one shilling), but our Provincial Executive, in the plenitude of their power and effrontery, come down with a bill for ten shillings a-head. In one other respect, however, the comparison is in their favour. Richard s Parliament, with a want of chivalry that is surprising, did not exempt the fair sex, but our Provincial Executive, being family men, with an amount of gallantry that does them infinite credit, left the ladies out of the bill altogether. True, some barbarous member of the Council did suggest that the ladies should pay the poll tax, but the proposition was treated with the contempt it deserved. Of course there are certain people who will never give their neighbours credit for diBinterestedness,and these have suggested that the Executive may possibly have had the feat of someProvincialWat Tyler before their eyas. We must confess that the suggestion is a very feasible one, for we remember that a very ominous allusion was made by an hon. member of the Provincial Council to the fete^ *-•• ~ J , ~? mnd Mr ; nAVU»»~-» -- -iro xrovincial Secretary, being knocked on the head with a tyler's hammer ; the idea is too horrible. Moreover in the present condition of provincial institutions and the City Board, the loss of the valuable services of these functionaries (opens up a train of contingencies too fearful to contemplate. Keading in an old English dictionary we came across this remarkable sentence : "As the Bum required from the peasant was precisely the same an that demanded from the peer, the former was fully justified in complaining, and the farmers (fur in those days the laws were farmed out) experienced considerable difficulty in collecting th»ir dues." In our case there i* no distinction, between poor audrich, and the struggling labourer pays as much as the rich merchant or shareholder in Hunt's Claim. Possibly our collectors too may experience considerable difficulty in collecting the several half-sovereigns, and if they do not exactly receive a polite knock on the head with a tiler's hammer, they stand a very fair chance of getting what pugilists in their own playful way designate " a warm 'un on the proboscis." Of courie we should deprecate a breach of the peace as much as anyone, and we trust therefore that our fellow citizens will make a virtue of necessity by paying down their half-sovereigns with a good grace, and without looking particularly black at the collector. By-the-by, it would be a very graceful act on the part of the Provincial Secretary if, as a contrast to the conduct; of Wat Tyler, he would come forward and head the list with his own ten shillings. The thing might be done with some little ceremony to render its moral effecb all the greater. The provincial officials, all and sundry, who would form quite a respectable little brigade, might be assembled to witness it, and the public could also be invited to become spectators of so praiseworthy and exemplary an act. We do not see any insuperable obstacle in the way. Most new institutions are inaugurated with some little pomp and circumstance, as for instance the laying of foundation stones, the opening of public buildings, &c. Why should not so important an event aa the imposition of a poll tax be similarly inaugurated? Imagine what an example it would be future generations ; what a powerful precedent it would be in the hands of colonial financiers ; what a standing monument of official virtue and patriotism. The ceremony might be handed down to posterity as " The inauguration of the Auckland poll tax." And then how historically valuable would be the receipt as a specimen of nineteenth century literature. Here it is, fresh from the handa of the printer's devil, a triumph of literary ingenuity, and a model for all future financiers :—: — "The Siok and Destitute Act, 1868. " No. on the rate 186 •'Received from the Bum of ten shillings sterling, amount of assessment payable by him under the Sick and Destitute Act, 1868, for the j period from 3rd July, 1866, to 3rd July 1869. " collector for the district of "£0 10s." It is naturally to be expected that at the end of the present year the poll tax (the * ' obnoxious measure" as it is more commonly called) will again subside into disuse for centuries to come. Having regard to this, how historically important it would be that the above receipt should be preserved in the provincial arohives I There is, however, another historical parallel that deserves notice. In the time of Richard 11. the seeds of the resistance to the poll tax, offered by the people, were sown by one John Ball, who was a very aotive dissemminator of democratic principles. The history says, " The villeins and artizans of England] began to murmur at their condition, which they were industriously taught to regard as unnatural by one John Ball, an itinerant preacher of sedition, rather than of the Gospel." We, ia our days, have oar Ball, Thomas by name, but a gentleman whose aims are totally different. Though he does not incite the "villeins and artisans" to rebel against the constituted authorities, he goes in to the utmost for local self-government, and urges the country settlers to adopt every constitutional means to abolish provincialism. X.Y".Z.