foreign commo modity be reduced, it is customary for the reduction of Duties on duty to come into operation the day after the adoption of the resolution by the House; and it is entirely con- dities. trary to the usage of Parliament to allow any drawback upon stocks of the article in the hands of dealers, wholesale or retail; or to allow time for the disposal of their stock before the new duty should be enforced. But a distinction has been drawn between manufacturers and dealers; and in 1870, upon the reduction of the sugar duties, ministers agreed to allow a drawback of duty on sugar remaining in any bonded warehouse, or under process of manufacture on the premises of refiners, and on stocks of manufactured sugar in quantity not less than 100 cwt., and in packages unbroken in the hands. of refiners,' when the reduction of duty took place.j dealers. On May 4, 1865, the case of the retail tea dealers,-who are Case of obliged to keep large stocks on hand of duty-paid tea, and who the tea would be great sufferers by the sudden reduction of duty thereon, and the consequent influx of fresh stocks of tea at the reduced rate of duty,--was brought before the House. The chancellor of the exchequer declared that, 'as a general principle, the time at which a reduction of duty shall come into operation is regulated by large considerations of public policy, and not by the convenience of retail dealers; and that he knew of 'no case, during the last twenty years, in which, in regard to any article not about to undergo a process of manufacture, but simply to be distributed to the customers, time had been given to get rid of the stocks of the retailers.' Nevertheless, as in the present instance there had been an expectation to the contrary, specially founded upon a declaration of the government in 1863 in respect to the tea duty, he would consent to postpone the reduction from May 6 to June 1, with an entry on the Journals that the delay had been granted on special grounds.' The resolution was amended accordingly.k The financial operations of government are not confined to propositions concerning supply and taxation, but necessitate various proceedings in the money market 1 Hans. D. (Chanc. of the Excheq.) v. 178, p. 1241; v. 195, p. 585; v. 200, pp. 1680, 1720; v. 201, p. 1787. Ib. v. 201, pp. 1409, 1789. All finan cial opera tions to be laid before Parliament. may under for raising the supplies voted by Parliament, as well as The government have no right to fetter the judgment of the House of Commons in any matter involving a pecuniary liability upon the Exchequer. But whenLoans and ever a loan, or financial contract, which has been financial contracts. 124 Vict. c. 5. And see Mr. Gladstone's speech on introducing the Bill, in Hans. D. v. 161, p. 1309. m 25 Vict. c. 3. And see Hans. D. v. 165, p. 131. " Mr. Gladstone, in Hans. D. v. 170, p. 104; Ib. v. 186, p. 751. 。 İb. v. 186, p. 751. entered into by government upon its own responsibility, is submitted for the approval of Parliament, the sense of the House in regard to the same should be expressed with as little delay as possible." It is the practice to give immediate effect to reso- Stocks. lutions of the House of Commons with regard to the commutation and redemption of public stocks; and the Speaker notifies parties concerned as soon as the resolutions have been agreed to." rejected or House In the exercise of their constitutional functions, the House of Commons not infrequently dissent from the financial propositions of ministers. Thus, in 1711, a duty on leather was proposed, and rejected on a division by a majority of the House. But ministers did. not give up their point. They also brought forward a motion for the same amount of duty upon skins and tanned hides '-that is, leather under another name-which was agreed to by the House. In 1767, on a proposal Budgets to continue the land tax of four shillings in the pound amended for one year, an amendment, to reduce the tax to three by the shillings, was carried. This was the first occasion, since the Revolution, on which a minister had been defeated on any financial measure. Throughout the French war the Commons, with singular unanimity, agreed to every grant of money, and to nearly every new tax and loan, proposed by successive administrations. But in 1796, Mr. Pitt proposed a succession duty upon real property, which being agreed to only by the casting vote of the Speaker, he was reluctantly obliged to abandon." Again, in 1805, Mr. Pitt's budget was amended by the rejecting of the duty upon husbandry horses, against which the landed gentry combined. But in 1816, after the close of the war with France, when the government were Hans. D. v. 132, p. 1490. • Ib. v. 126, p. 321. Parl. Hist. v. 6, p. 999. • Ib. v. 16, p. 362. 8 the sole gift of be superfluous to enter upon them here; suffice it to say that the proceedings between the two Houses on this subject are now in strict conformity with the resolution of the Commons on July 3, 1678, which declared Supplies, that all aids and supplies, and aids to his Majesty in Parliament, are the sole gift of the Commons; and all Bills for the granting of any such aids and supplies ought to begin with the Commons, and that it is the undoubted and sole right of the Commons to direct, limit, and appoint in such Bills the ends, purposes, considerations, conditions, limitations, and qualifications of such grants; which ought not to be changed or altered by the House of Lords.' the Com mons. Practice of the Lords in supply. Without abandoning the abstract right of dealing with Bills of supply and taxation as they may think fit, the Lords seldom attempt to make any but verbal alterations, in which the sense or intention is not affected; but even in regard to these, when the Commons have accepted them, they have made special entries in their journal recording the character and object of the amendments, and their reasons for agreeing to them." Of late years an attempt has been made, by an ingenious process of reasoning, to establish a distinction between the right of the Lords to reject a Bill imposing a tax and one repealing a tax. But this distinction is fallacious, and is not warranted either by precedent or by constitutional authority." The only ground for such a difference is the fact that taxes being levied on behalf of the sovereign, when she, by her responsible financial advisers, is desirous of renouncing any specific tax, and the Commons assent to the repeal of the same, it is not customary, under ordinary circumstances, for the Lords See May's Parl. Prac. ed. 1883, p. 639, citing precedents. Report of Com". on Tax Bills, Com. Pap. 1860, v. 22, pp. 125–134. * See Cox, Inst. p. 188. to oppose the wishes of the sovereign and of the other House. The control of the public finances by the House of Commons is a constitutional right, and they are presumed to be the best judges of the financial condition of the state, its obligations and requirements. Nevertheless, every Bill to impose or repeal a tax involves other considerations besides those which are purely questions of revenue; it necessarily includes principles of public policy, or of commercial regulation, and on points of this kind the Lords, as a co-ordinate branch. of the legislature, are constitutionally free to act and advise as they may judge best for the public interests. It is true that the peculiar privileges of the Commons in regard to supply and taxation should ordinarily restrain the Lords from intermeddling with the details of financial schemes propounded by the government and agreed to by the popular branch, but circumstances may occur when the exercise by the House of Lords of their right to accept or reject any measure affecting the finances of the nation may be most beneficial to the interests of the community at large; and it would be unwarrantable to deny them the possession of this right because it might be expedient that it should be resorted to upon extraordinary occasions. The relations between the two Houses in matters of supply and Paper taxation will be further illustrated by a narrative of the case. paper duties We have already seen that in the year 1858 the House of Commons, by the adoption of an abstract resolution, condemned the continuance of the paper duty as a permanent source of revenue. Accordingly, in 1860, a measure for the repeal of this impost was submitted by the chancellor of the exchequer in his budget, and in due course was sent up to the House of Lords in a separate Bill. The paper duty yielded a revenue of 1,300,000l. per annum, make up for the loss of which it was proposed to add a penny in the pound to the income tax. This recommendation was agreed to by both Houses; but the Lords refused to concur in the remission of the paper duties, on the ground that the state of the public finances, and the condition of the country, then on the eve of war with China, See ante, p. 716. to duties case. |