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CHAPTER XVII. 



FISCAL RELIEF. FROTECTIO^^ PRICES A^D PROTECTION TAXES, 

 OR FREE TRADE TAXES AND FREE TRADE PRICES. 



Restored confidence, largei- powers of dealing with their 

 land, increased practical and scientific knowledge, well- 

 directed State assistance, revised railway rates, may infuse 

 new life into landlords and tenants. But their special 

 public grievance is the unfair incidence of local taxation. 

 At the present moment agriculturists are oppressed by Pro- 

 tection taxes upon Free Trade prices. In the debates on 

 the Repeal of the Corn Laws, both Sir Robert Peel and 

 Lord John Russell argued that the removal of the burdens 

 upon land must necessarily accompany the extinction of 

 its immunities and privileges. So long as consumers of 

 agricultural produce were heavily taxed through import 

 duties for the benefit of producers, it was but reason- 

 able that agricultural land should bear the largest share of 

 the burden of rates. But from 1848 onwards that reason 

 ceased to apply. Free Trade ought, in common justice, to 

 go hand in hand with fair taxation. Yet legislators con- 

 tinue to burden agricultural land, as if the community 

 was still burdened for its support. Rates are charged with 

 innumerable items of national concern, inseparable from 

 civilisation or social organisation ; and existmg arrange- 

 ments exhibit a chaos of areas, districts, and local authori- 

 ties, in which national and local purposes are confusedly 



