[ 558 } 
(Jan. 1, 
POLITICAL AFFAIRS IN DECEMBER. 
—_—— 
GREAT BRITAIN. 
AVING in our last Number in- 
troduced some observations on 
the State of this Empire, we have re- 
ceived Jetters from various correspon- 
dents on the subject, and among others 
from one of the most enlightened men 
of the time. This document, though 
not written for the public eye, we feel 
it proper to substitute in place of the 
usual observations of our own on do- 
mestic politics. / 
You may, perhaps with as much pro- 
priety as any one, adopt the patriotic ex- 
clamation of Pope :— 
“ Truths would you teach, or save a sink- 
ing land, 
All fear, none aid you, and few under- 
_ stand.” 
Ihave perused with much attention your 
Essay on the Causes and Remedies of the 
present Distress, and, entirely coinciding 
in your reflections on the misgovernment 
of the country, I sincerely wish the reme- 
dial measures were equally obvious. 
You say “that the miseries of the country 
arise solely from the circumstance of taxes 
and rents being collected in one place, 
and spent and accumulated in another.” 
This is doubtless an important considera- 
tion; but the grand cause of distress I 
conceive with the Radicals to be the enor- 
mity of the national taxes; and the Radical 
remedy proposed by them is a thorough 
reform of the House of Commons. 
The weight of seventy millions of annual 
taxes is unquestionably, from causes you 
assign, far more heavily felt in time of 
peace than of war; but in what manner 
your plan of relief is to be enforced I am 
unable to comprehend. [ will suppose a 
case.—A.B. residing in the vicinity of 
London possesses, or did lately possess, 
10,0001. in the five per cents, now reduced 
to fours; his 5001. per annum is therefore 
lowered to 400. He is then informed that 
he is sentenced to banishment, at the dis- 
cretion of certain commissioners, to some 
unknown place beyond the sphere of social 
life, unless he relinquishes half his remain- 
ing income. This he submits to as the 
least of the two evils. His income is ac- 
cordingly sunk to ZOOlI. and the poor stock- 
holder, if he isa staunch patriot, must be 
content for the good of the country, to live 
upon 2001. per annum, instead of his ori- 
ginal 5001. while a new fund will thus be 
created to defray the expense of future 
wars as wicked and pernicious as the past. 
You compliment Mr. Vansittart by saying 
“that every shift of financial ingenuity has 
been resorted to by him, and that he has 
adroitly kept it going.” But I cannot dis- 
-eover any resemblance to adrvitness aud 
ingenuity in his financial operations, and 
am quite at a loss to conjecture what are 
the measures to which you refer, ‘The de- 
vice which distinguished the beginning of 
his administration of finance, and which he 
has had recourse to every year since, is 
either to transfer the payment of the inte- 
rest of his new loans to the sinking fund, or 
openly to rob and plunder it of the sums 
wanted for current services, 
In the seven years which have elapsed 
since peace was perfectly restored, he has 
not diminished the national debt a shilling, 
though in the year 1819 he imposed three 
millions of new taxes upon the people, on 
pretence of raising a clear annual surplus 
of five millions, to be appropriated to that 
purpose. In the year 1786, when that 
“sacred deposit,” the Sinking Fund was 
established, the national debt amounted to 
about 230 millions; of which, if we had 
kept clear of the crusade against France, 
150 millions would by this time have been 
liquidated, and the fund itself would have 
risen to five millions, which would, in com- 
paratively few years, have discharged the 
remainder. But I fear under present cir- 
cumstances, and I am sure under the pre- 
sent ministers, the country is ruined past 
all hope of redemption. 
Our agricultural readers will, we 
have no doubt, agree with the writer ; 
and there are few of the trading classes 
who do not, or will not soon, concur 
in the same sentiment. 
A circumstance of still greater mo- 
ment than public distress occurred 
within the month, which claims our 
notice as affecting PUBLIC LIBERTY, 
without which the utmost social pros- 
perity would be worthless. It seems, 
some individuals, who had by perjury 
conspired to convict certain persons 
of frauds on the revenue, had been in- 
dicted, and that the crown lawyers en- 
gaged in their defence moved for a 
special jury, which was granted. But 
on the day of trial, as is generally, if 
not always, the case, a suflicient num- 
ber of these guinea-men not attending, 
the counsel for the prosecution prayed 
a tales, that is, that the number should 
be supplied from common jurors in at- 
tendance. For this purpose the attor- 
ney general’s warrant, a thing usually 
granted as of course, was refused, and 
the trials set aside, to the great loss of 
the injured prosecutors, who, it is un- 
derstood, had brought witnesses from 
great distances. This we regard not 
only as a denial of justice, but as a cir- 
cumstance calculated to draw the at- 
tention of parliament and of all men 
to 
