'IN THE MELTING POT'

Evening Post, Volume LXXVIII, Issue 64, 13 September 1909, Page 7

'IN THE MELTING POT'

EFFECT OF BRITISH BUDGET. ACCORDING TO LORD ROBEBERY. A EEVOLUTIO'N WITHOUT. POPULAR -MANDATE. NOT LIBERALISM, BUT SOCIALISM. By Telegraph.— Press Association.— Copyright. LONDON, 11th September. In the course of 'his speech on the Budget at the great meeting afc Glasgow on Friday night, the Earl of Rosebery declared that for a long time he had been an independent politician. He believed that.it was his duty to show why it 'was not in the best interests of the nation that the Finance Bill should become, law. Mr. Lloyd-George, Ih© Chancellor of the Exchequer, had proclaimed it to be a Budget of war against poverty, but it was a war which depleted capital, increased unemployment, and produced ' universal insecurity. He, Lord Rosebery, was not aware of the actual amount of the deficit. Sir Robt. Giffen, the well-known economist and statistician, had declared that ho believed there was no real deficit. The new taxes were not for purposes of national defence, but to raise vast sums | for use by the central Government without Parliamentary control. The Budget had had no adequate preparation. It contained material sufficient for six Budgets, and in the complementary Development Bill were the most novel and formidable proposals presented to Parliament for many years. A STEP TOWARD LAND NATIONALISATION. The Budget put Britain into the melting-pot, continued the speaker. It was a revolution without any mandate from the people. At a time when it was difficult to make both ends meet, the Budget took as much and harassed as much as possible. It placed new taxes on the land, besides expanding the income tax and death duties. It was a, distinct step towards land nationalisation, which Mr. Lloyd-George said must come. Land was selected because its taxation could not be evaded. The unearned increment could be applied to every other kind of property. No exertion was needed by the holders of consols or railway stocks. The speaker warned the country to consider the contagious interest of the principles raised by the Budget. Personally, he found land to be a harassing and unremunerative form of property. The land laws miglit be improved and more people of the yeoman class settled on the land, but the landlords should be as justly treated as they usually did human beings in difficulties. In 1896 a return showed that the capital value of lnnd had, fallen a thousand millions in thirty years, yet this was the industry which the Government sought to tax out of existence. Landowners seemed to be dnmned, and doubly damned, for holding property in land. Many millions tof working men's money invested by prudential, temperance, and friendly societies might soon be touched. « A DANGER TO CAPITAL. [ The enormous increase ,in the death duties, Lord Rosebery considered, was a danger to capital. They ought to be reserved for war purposes. The Government's enormous taxation of capital was strangling in peace the goose which laid golden eggs in war-time. The Government boasted that it had paid off fotty millions. It did not borrow, but proceeded to spend sixteen millions annually. The transference by enhanced death duties of masses of capital from the individual to the State injuriously reacted upon commerce and employment, and destroyed the nation's reserve power. Scores of millions were lying idle in t/he banks or going abroad to develop other countries, owing to apprehension of the Government's financial policy. : TYRANNY AND INQUISITION. - What feelings, asked Lord Rosebery, would the late Mr. Gladstone have had i for such a Budget? Liberalism and I liberty used to go together, but the j Budget established a tyranny and inquisition never previously known. He denounced the Government's bureaucratic Socialism. Bureaucracy, he said, was almost strangling France, yet the British Government created staffs of well-paid officers for small holdings and factory inspection, and administration j of the_ Pensions and Housing and Town Planning Acts. The super-tax would be administered by commissioners from whose decisions there was to be no appeal, r This sort of tyranny, said the speaker, was not Liberalism but Socialism. For five years before their death men would be ghosts. During ,that time they could give nothing to their children without it being reckoned part of their estate. Cabden, Bright, and Villiers never dreamt of levying the vast sum now asked for in direct taxation. If a tariff was to be the only alternative, he would cease' to defend the principles of freetrade. He urged retrenchment, but not in national defence. Why should Ireland cost £1,200,000 more yearly than she produced in taxation? He would conduct the State as a private business. A CONCLUDING irEKUKCIATION. Continuing, Lord Rosebery said he was sorry the Government had taken sides with Socialists. Some Ministers were conscious Socialists. The least worthy working men were being taught that they need not exert themselves, and his Liberal friends were clearly moving on the path leading to Socialism. He could not follow them one inch. Ho might think tariff reform or protection an evil, but Socialism was the negation of faith in family property, monarchy, and the Empire. A NEW SITUATION. LORDS INCITED TO THROW OUT BUDGET. i VARIOUS OPINIONS. LONDON, 11th September. In a subsequent speech Lord Rosebery declared that Bright would havo denounced the encroaching proposals of this Budget. Opinion in tho lobbies is that Lord Rosebery has created a new situation, and rendered even, more likely than before the Lords' rejection of tne Budget. The Unionists attach great sigmncicanco to Lord Rosebery's declaration of j his belief that the Government is taunting and daring the Lords to throw out the Budgot. The Tunes says : "The essence of Lord Rosebery's speech is that the Bill involves n social revolution without precedent. He showed that behind devices whoso professed end is revenue there lurk far-reachiug^ schemes for the subversion and redistribution ot private property." ' • i Tho Daily Mail doclaroa ; "The* csuceah Hill settle the fate of the Budget, be-

cause it will convince a multitude of independent voters belonging to neither party." i The comment of the Daily Telegraph is that Lord Rosebory pronounced an elegy over the Liberal party as it existed until Mr. Lloyd-George assumed tho Chancellorship of the Exchequer and Mr. Churchill was admitted to the Cabinet. The Daily News says : "There is no opponent so venomous as the renegade, no critic so stern as the man who has failed." The Chronicle considers the speech that of a great landlord, not of a great Liberal, and says it was entirely coloured by the prejudices and prepossessions of landlordism. GENERAL ELECTION EXPECTED. ; IN THE NEAR FUTURE. LONDON, 12th September. It is expected that tho Finance Bill will be sent to the Lords about 15th October, and both parties anticipate that a general election will follow m a few weeks. CUTTING THE PAINTER. LORD ROSEBERY RESIGNS FROM THE LIBERAL 1 LEAGUE. (Received September 13, 8.20 a.m.) LONDON, 12lh September. Lord .Rosebery- resigned the presidency of the Liberal League, of which Mr. Asquith, Sir Edward Grey, and Mr. 1 Haldane are among the vice-Drc&ideuts, before his Glasgow speech. The Liberal League was formed in 1902 for the purpose of bringing together, with a view to common action, all those who approve of the policy expounded by Lord Rosebery at Chesterfield in December, 1901. It believes that upon those lines progress can best be made with that practical Liberalism which the conditions of the day urgently require. Lord Rosebery, speaking at Glasgow, on 10th March, ISJO2, laid down the broad foundations of the Jerguo as follows: — " Hid" Liberal League takes its root in no parly disloyalty and in no personal intrigue, but in a deep and patriotic anxiety as tb the condition and as to the efficiency of this country. It threatens no one, it prosciibes no one, it sets itself in antagonism to no one. It offers, in my conscience and in my judgment, the' best means of .setting the Liberal party right with the country. It represents, at any rate, practical politics, practical Liberalism, common - sense Liberalism, imbued with a deep and a sane sense of the responsibilities of Empire. And if this policy be founded, as .1 believe it to be founded, on political truth and on political justice', it w.ill prevail, whatever may be the antagonism against it. If it be not so founded, it does not deserve to prevail." THE BUDGET SMASHED. PALL MALL GAZETTE ON THE SPEECH. PROVINCIAL PRESS CRITICAL. (Received September 13, 8.20 a.i.r.) LONDON, 12th September. The Pall Mall • Gazette states that City opinion is almost unanimous that Lord Rosebery has smashed the Budget. His speech is boimd to have a tiemendous effect in Scotland. The Radical provincial newspapers bitterly critici.«e and complain of Lord Rosebevy's .speech. The Sheffield Telegraph suggests that Lord Ilosebery has come down from the Olympic heights to fight the Budget. The Birmingham Post says the exPremier's statement will do much to cause the silent voter to think hard.