pense with the ufual number of his fervants; he could not avoid the expences of educating his children, nor abridge the economy of a table already ftinted by the moft rigid frugality. Upon fuch men the tax would bear most oppreffively; and he thought fome confiderable exemption was neceffary in their be half. He had afked the right hon. Chancellor of the Exche quer a question on this fubject, fome time fince, and underfood him to fay, that fuch an exemption as he now alluded to, would be adopted; but he found no fuch claufe in the bill, If fuch exemption was not made, the right hon. Gentleman would find his bili extremely unpopular, and the produce on which he reckoned, highly illufory. For though the gaols of the country fhould be filled with the fathers of families, he fhould not find it poffible to extort from them that which they could not furrender without reducing their families to abfo lute want. He therefore wished, that if the right hon. Gen tleman rejected this principle, he would abandon his new fyf tem of affeffed taxes, and adopt the former income tax, as one infinitely lefs oppreffive than the new arrangement which was profeffed to be fo much less burthenfome.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer wifhed to apprife the hon. Baronet that a provifion was intended to the purpose he propofed; and defired to know, if an exemption from the houfe and window tax, in favour of perfons with large families, would not go a great way towards the object he fo earnestly defired.

Dr. Laurence thought the tax on income, of every fort, a very fair one; but he difapproved of the confufion neceffarily arifing from the confolidation of two bills into one, He fully coincided with the fentiments of right hon. Gentleman under the gallery, (Mr. Pitt) and fhould certainly vote for his propofed motion for the inftruction of the Committee.

Lord Hawkesbury expreffed fome regret at the refolution taken by his right hon. Friend (Mr. Pitt) to prefs a motion for an inftruction to a Committee, which, if even it was confiftent with parliamentary forms, was ftill unneceffary, because it would give the Committee no powers which they would not have without that inftruction. The cafes wherein it was ne ceffary to vote inftructions to Committees were, those wherein fome new provifion or claufe, different from any thing in the bill referred for their difcuffion, was neceffary to be adopted. In this cafe, however, there was nothing in the nature or fubftance of the regulation propofed by his right hon. Friend, which the Committee might not adopt as amendinents to the

bill without any fuch inftruction; and therefore, in his mind, it would be the better way to let the House go into the Committee unembarrassed by an instruction, which would be mandatory upon them, if they did not think fit to adopt the propofition. His right hon. Friend had faid, that this bill, in its prefent fhape, would go to injure the credit of the country; but always a friend to that credit as he was, if he had the leaft idea the bill could have such a tendency, he would be one of the first to abandon it. His own original idea of the former income tax was, that it should attach upon all income whatsoever, without exception, leaving commodities and labour to find their own level in confequence;-but to this it was objected, that vaft numbers were fo circumstanced, as not to be able to raife their wages in time to avoid feeling fevere pres fure from the tax; and therefore it was that an exemption of the poorer claffes was adopted. But in principle, he thought that the tax ought to attach upon every man in proportion to his income.. It did not attach upon the funds merely as funds, but as an income arifing from capital fo veficd; and therefore in the diftinction taken by the bill, between the income arifing principally from fmall capital, and much perfonal labour, which was uncertain and fluctuating, and muft ceafe with the death, or even the illness, of the party, and that on the income arifing from folid and permanent capital in the funds, he thought the diftinction made by the bill extremely fair, as its principle was to tax income arifing from capital, and exempt, as much as poffible, that arifing from perfonal labour. Its object also was, in conformity to the principle of raising the supplies for the public fervice within the year, by a tax on property in every tangible fhape.

Mr. Babington obferved, that the principle of exemption to perfonal and profeffional labourers was not carried throughout the bill; and he thought alfo with Mr. Pitt on the propriety of exempting fmall capitals in the funds.

Sir W. Geary faid, the right hon. Gentleman (Mr. Pitt) had faid this bill would bear hard upon the funds, and injure the public credit; but he defended the tax as fair upon funds as well as upon every other fpecies of income.

Mr. Pitt explained by repeating his former point.

Mr. Elifon faid, he had the honour to vote formerly for the income tax propofed by his right hon. Friend under the gallery (Mr. Pitt). He perfectly coincided with his opinion that night on the exemption of minor incomes in the funds, and on landed poffeffions; but conceiving the Committee fully

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competent to adopt the right hon. Gentleman's propofition, by way of amendment, without any previous inftruction, he would vote for an inftruction to the Committee, which would feem to have no other cbject than to embarrafs his Majesty's Minifters.

After a few observations from Sir Robert Williams and General Gafcoyne, who fpoke in approbation of the propofition of Mr. Pitt, the report was ordered to be brought in.

Mr. Pitt now rofe to make his promifed motion; in doing which he declined the repetition of the arguments His motion, he said, he had already used in fupport of it. was objected to on the ground that the Committee was empowered to do that which he wished, without inftruction; but as nothing was faid to difpute the Parliamentary regularity of the motion he propofed, he felt it his duty to perfift in it; becaufe, however he might otherwife approve the prefent bill, he could not give it his affent, unless the principle to which he alluded fhould be adopted; nor would he vote that the bill go into a Committee, until he should have the affurance he now defired to that effect. The argument against his motion was, that the Committee may adopt the principle without the inftruction; his motive for perfifting was, that with the inftruction they must adopt it; and he was convinced that if the Committee, after fuch inftruction, omitted to adopt the principle, it would be a full reafon to induce the Houfe to re-commit the bill. He knew, that in the ufual mode of voting instructions to Committees," that they have power to adopt fuch and fuch clauses," it is for their option to adopt or reject; but where the inftruction is pofitive and mandatory, the House would, of courfe, exact compliance with its pofitive inftruction He ftated thefe reasons, not to thew that in all cafes inftructions were neceffary to Committees for the adoption of particular claufes, but because this was a cafe which he confidered of importance, and one, without which he could not give his affent to the bill. He faid, he was not a little hurt at an imputation coming from an honourable Member on the other fide of the Houfe (Mr. Ellifon) that he had chofen this motion as an attack to embarrass his Majesty's What! (continued Mr. Pitt) an attack on Government. his Majefty's Government, becaufe a Member of Parlia ment ufes that which is his undoubted privilege--to move for an inftruction to a Committee upon a bill in difcuffion before the House! I fhould be furprised, indeed, if any of

the

the right honourable Gentlemen below me conceived my motion, or my conduct that night, in any fuch view as an attack upon their meafures. They have known for weeks past my objections on this ground; and if I did not state them publicly, in the first inftance, but rather waited till the last moment, it was becaufe I hoped the alteration would have been made in the bill before it came to this ftage Mr. Pitt concluded by moving, "That it be an inftruction to the Committee on the bill, to infert a clause for exempting all income arifing from lands, or from property in the funds, in the fame manner as income arifing from any other fpecies of property, profeffion, or employ

ment."

Mr. Speaker rofe and faid, that confidering the turn which the debate had taken, he felt it his duty to state, that he entertained ftrong doubts whether it would be regular, or confiftent with the established order of parliamentary proceedings, to put a queftion from tl e Chair, upon the motion propofed by the right honourable Gentleman, conceiving as he did, that the Committee would have power to adopt the principle without the inftruction, which would, therefore, be unneceffary. He faid he had not been able to recollect any cafe.in which fuch a motion had been put from the Chair, nor had he been reminded of any fuch case in the course of the debate; nor had he ever understood that the power given to a Committee by a vote of inftruction, was mandatory upon them to adopt the purpofe for which they were fo inftructed; at the fame time he thould cheerfully do his duty in putting any queftion from the Chair which the Houfe fhould think proper to direct.

Mr. Pitt profeffed the highest deference to the authority of the Chair; but faid, that although he had not thought it neceffary to fearch for fpccific precedents applicable to this cafe, which were fo numerous on the journals, though not, perhaps, in any recent practice, he had, however, requefted a friend to look to the journals, who had found one precifely in point. It was in feffion of 1721, vol. 19, page 623, when a bill was before the Houfe for appointing commiffioners to examine the debts due by a Paymaster of the Forces, and it was moved as an inftruction to the Committee on the bill, to nominate the fame Commiflioners as had been appointed by the bill of the preceding years. Here then was an inftance where the Committee, without such inftruction, might nominate or reject those perfons or VOL. IV. 1802-3. 3 T any

any of them; but the inftruction being mandatory, they were bound and did comply with it.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer faid, he felt great delicacy in delivering his opinion on the point which had created the doubt expreffed from the Chair; and though he could not certainly take upon him to fay, that the motion made for this inftruction was irregular, he certainly might be allowed to give his opinion, that it was not ufual, and was a measure of that kind which he could leaft of all have expected on the prefent occafion. In the very nature of things, it was impoffible that a Committee should be inftructed to do that, for the doing of which there is a dif cretionary power vefted in it. Such a proceeding was always used in cafes where a larger power was intended to be given, but never in a cafe of this kind. It had been ftated by his right honourable Friend, that fome Gentlemen, in the courfe of the debate, had contended that fuch an inftruction as the prefent was a direct reflection on and attack against his Majefty's Minifters. He did not recollect to have heard fuch a fentiment delivered by any one; and, for his own part, he affured the House, and his right honourable Friend, that he perfonally had never felt it as a fubject of complaint. He only wondered he had not heard of it before that night. He had made it a point to take the opinions of all thofe who could be fuppofed beft capable of forming a true judgment of the nature of the public funds, and in what refpect this tax would affect them, by being Jaid on the income arifing therefrom; and from every information he had been able to acquire, he could not find that any one perfon with whom he had converfed on the fubject, was at all aware, or had conceived the fmalleft idea, that the diftinction of which his right honourable Friend complained was in any refpect held to be inconfiftent with the public faith. It was not, he faid, his intention at prefent to enter into that queftion; but he would beg the House to confider the state in which it now ftood. was a bill which it was neceflary fhould pafs as foon as poffible, as on it very much depended the public credit of the country. Every method had been taken to expedite it, by ftating what were its contents; and if there had been any ferious objection to any part of it, fuch might certainly have been brought forward in the previous ftages of the bill. When the Houfe went into a Committee, pro forma, in order that the bill might be printed for the confideration

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