Besides, how hard is it to deprive them of the power of drawing back what they pay? And how ill judged to trust money with those who are supposed only to gain an easy physical-necessary? An equivalent for procuring the articles of ease and luxury, should not be left in the hands of those who are not permitted to enjoy them.
From this we may conclude, 1. That the more such taxes are proportional to the subject taxed, 2. the more evident that proportion appears; and 3. the more frequently and regularly they are levied, the more they will resemble proportional taxes, and the less burden will be found in paying them. Let me illustrate this by some examples.
The stoppage upon a soldier’s pay, either for the invalids, or Chelsea, is a cumulative tax; but the method of levying it gives it all the advantages of one of the proportional kind. 1st, It bears an exact and determinate proportion to the value of his pay. 2dly, This proportion he knows perfectly. And 3tio, Instead of receiving the whole into his own possession, and paying the hospital at the end of the year, it is regularly and gradually retained from him at every payment.
Tithes are a cumulative tax; but they are accompanied with all the three requisites to make them light; although in other respects they are excessively burdensome. 1st, They bear an exact proportion to the crop. 2dly, This proportion is perfectly known. 3dly, Nature, and not the labourer, makes the provision. But they fall upon an improper object: they affect the whole produce of the land, and not the surplus; which last is the only fund that ought to be taxed.
The land-tax in Scotland bears, 1st, a very determinate proportion to the valuation of the land; and has, 2dly, the advantage of being well known to every contributor; so that provision may easily be made for it. But the third requisite is wanting: the proprietor having the public money in his hands, often applies it to private purposes; and when the demand is made upon him, he is put to distress.
The taille, in many provinces of France, bears, first, a very exact proportion to the value of the land[[40]].
[40]. This sort of taille is called tariffée; because it is imposed according to a valuation of the land. It is a late improvement; but still is exposed to numberless inconveniences, which are mentioned in the text.
But in the second place, the proportion is entirely unknown to the man who pays it; being nowhere to be seen but in the offices of the intendant and his deputies.
And in the last place, the whole payment comes at once.
What hides, and consequently destroys this proportion, is, that after the distribution is laid on, as in Scotland, at so many shillings in the pound of valuation, the full sum intended to be raised does not come in; either because the intendant has given exemptions to certain parishes, on account of the accidents of sterility, hail, mortality among the cattle, and the like; or because the property of a part of the parish has fallen into the hands of people exempted from the taille; or that others, who were really bound to pay part of it, are become insolvent. The intendant must then make a second, and perhaps a third general distribution of the deficiency upon all the contributors, in the most exact proportion to the first, but yet by their nature impossible to be foreseen. It is for these reasons chiefly that the taille in that kingdom is so grievous.