50 
Indirect taxation (by customs and excise duties) was 
frequently oppressive and unjust in its operation, it occasioned 
vexatious delays in the transaction of business, adulterations, 
and frauds. The cost of collection was from 6 to 10 per 
cent ; and it was estimated that, in addition to the duties 
levied in many cases, the loss to merchants and traders by 
extra trouble, warehousing', waiting, and other impediments 
and restrictions, involved an additional loss of from 5 to 20 
per cent on the amount of duty. 
Mr. Chadwick proposed to carry out the principle recog- 
nised in Mr. Pitt’s first income tax, and in Mr. James 
Wilson’s scheme, by assessing the tax on a graduated scale 
as follows : — 
1st. To make the tax at one uniform rate on the capitalized 
value of all incomes. 
2nd. To classify the various sources of income according 
to their general average market value. 
3rd. To assess the tax by a rate on such capitalized value, 
instead of the present mode of assessing it on the annual 
income. 
4th. To apply, as far as practicable, the principle of the 
government legacy duty tables to all fixed incomes. 
5th. That the tax (on the repeal of the excise and 
customs duties) should be applied to all incomes above £50 
a year, and stopped by the employers out of the wages and 
salaries of all persons in their service. 
Gth. That in lieu of the present income tax com- 
missioners, there shall be in every surveyor’s district, or 
union of districts, a paid board of three assessors, two 
elected by the inhabitants (in the first instance, by those on 
the list of parliamentary electors, and subsequently by those 
paying the income tax), and one by the government, with 
power of appeal to the judges, in like manner as the present 
appeals on assessed taxes. 
