for the support of such persons as are too poor to support themselves. It is assessed and collected by persons, appointed by the taxed people, in every parish, called Overseers of the Poor; but, before they can proceed to collect any rate, they must have the approbation of a Justice of the Peace, who is, as they all are, appointed by the Crown. In the distribution of this money, the Overseers are again liable to the control of the Justices of the Peace; for they may, upon the application of any pauper, order, without appeal, the Overseers to relieve the said pauper, in any manner that they please. This, therefore, is a tax, not paid into the Treasury, but disposable under the jurisdiction, and at the discretion, of His Majesty's Justices of the Peace.

The office of Overseer is performed without any pay. It is a duty, or service, which every taxed householder is liable to be compelled to

execute.

Now, then, as to the amount of this tax, which, you will observe, forms an addition to that of the Taxes already noticed, it was, in the year 1803, when the Report was laid before Parliament, 5,348,2051. For the last year I have only computation to guide me; but, that assures me, that the nation paid in poor-rates, last year, 7,896,5561.; or 31,586,224 dollars, being more than twice the amount of all the taxes which you paid during the last year, if Mr. MADISON'S statement be correct. But that I may not expose myself to the risk of being charged with a wrong computation, I must first state, that no official account of this important matter has been laid before Parliament, since 1803; and that, therefore, I am forced to resort to computation, the grounds of which I will now explicitly state. I have the means of coming at the exact amount of the poor-rates in Bishop's Waltham parish, where my farm lies, for the last year. This is a parish subject to no fluctuation of prosperity; it has no manufactories in it; it has a small country town, and a large track of arable, meadow, wood, and waste land. Therefore, I may very fairly take the increase of the poor-rates here as a criterion of the increase of the poor-rates of the whole country, especially, if we find, from the official reports, that the poor-rates of this parish had, for nearly thirty years, up to 1803, kept a very nearly exact pace with the poor-rates of the whole nation. There were three different periods, at which the report of 1803 took the poor-rates of the whole nation, and also the poor-rates of Bishop's Waltham parish; and the statement was as follows, observing, however, that, as to poor-rates, we speak of only England and Wales, Scotland not being under the poor-laws.

It is quite surprising to observe how exact are these proportions; how regularly this parish kept pace, for twenty-seven years, with the whole nation, in the increase of its poor-rates. But, in order to leave no room for cavil on this head, the subject being one of the utmost importance, we will see what proportion this parish, according to its population, had of paupers in 1803, there being no account of the nation's number of paupers previous to 1803, and there being no likelihood that we shall ever see another.

England and Wales.

Population.
Paupers ..

....

Bishop's Waltham. 8,872,980 Population.... 1,256,357 Paupers.

1,773

236

Exclusive of persons in almshouses. Now, if you multiply the paupers by seven in both instances, you will find that they amount to nearly the whole of the population; making it appear, that in 1803, there were nearly one pauper to every seven persons in the parish of Bishop's Waltham, as well as throughout England and Wales. It was said, in our newspapers, that the Emperor of Russia and the King of Prussia expressed their surprise at seeing NO POOR PEOPLE in England. If this was true, it is clear, that their Majesties did not look in the right places. We now come to the result. The poor-rates in Bishop's Waltham parish, instead of the 1,5951. to which they amounted in 1803, amounted, last year, to 2,355l. 18s. 61d., as I know from the poor-book now lying before me, and of which sum I myself paid more than 100l., or 400 dollars. If, therefore, this criterion be a good one, and such, I think, it cannot be denied to be; if, in 1803, Bishop's Waltham paid 1,5951., while England and Wales paid 5,348,2057., England and Wales must, last year, have paid 7,896,556l., seeing that Bishop's Waltham paid, in the same year, 2,3551., throwing aside the shillings, pence and farthings.

I return, then, to my former statement, that the poor-rates alone of England and Wales, exclusive of Scotland, where, however, there is something paid in support of the poor, amounts to more than double the sum, which was last year (a year of great expense), paid by the whole of the population of America into the Treasury, in taxes of all sorts, direct and indirect.

Then comes another question; namely, what is the relative population of the two countries? I have not the account of your last Census at hand. I think it made your total population amount to between seven and eight millions. At this time I cannot suppose it to be less than 8,000,000. Take, then, the 5,348,2057. of poor-rates in 1803, observing that then there were 1,256,357 paupers, and you will find, that we must have now upwards of 1,800,000 paupers, provisions being, at this time, as cheap, if not cheaper, than they were in 1803.

Deduct, therefore, from the 8,872,980 (the population of England and Wales), the 1,800,000 paupers, and there are left, to pay the 7,896,5567. of poor-rates, only 7,072,980 persons, including women and children. The paying population, as to poor rates, is, at any rate, smaller than the population of your Republic; and the sum paid exceeds, as I have before stated, twice the amount of the whole of the taxes of every sort, which you paid, last year, into the Treasury of the United States, if Mr. Madison's statement be correct.

Turning towards another view of this interesting subject, we perceive, that, if we exclude the paupers, as we rationally must, the poor-rates alone amount to more than one pound sterling, or four dollars, a head on the whole of the population of England and Wales. Our poor-rates alone amount to this on the whole of our population; while, according to Mr. Madison's account, the whole of your taxes of every sort, paid into the Treasury of the United States, do not amount to more than two do'lars a head on your population, even supposing your population to be now little more than 7,000,000.

The TITHES form another part of our taxes, I do not mean to speak

of them, as some most loyal men do, as being peculiarly odious; or, indeed, as being odious at all, either in their nature, or the mode of their collection, in which latter I have never experienced anything severe or vexatious; nor do I believe, that, as far as the clergy are the owners of the tithes (for they do not own more than about the half of them), their rate, or collection, is often severe, or unfair, or even troublesome. Still, however, the tithes, which Arthur Young, in 1792, estimated at 5,000,000l. in England and Wales, must be looked upon as so much money raised from the land; and, certainly, it would not be raised, if there were no Established Church; no State Religion. In short, the tithes, as far as the clergy are the receivers, must be looked upon as so much money received and expended by the Government; so much money given by the Government to a description of persons, eminently calculated to repay it in support. Nevertheless, I will not include the tithes amongst the taxes of the nation. Lord Sheffield, indeed; he who predicted, in his book, published in 1783, that you would soon wish to return to your allegiance, which, as he made it out, would be found necessary to your very existence as a people; that same Lord Sheffield, in a speech to a meeting of woolgrowers, lately reckoned tithes amongst the causes of our farmers being unable to maintain a competition with those of neighbouring countries. I do not give so much weight to tithes; but, still, they must not be forgotten; and when a Report to the House of Commons, made in 1803, states the whole rental of the kingdom of Great Britain at 28 millions, you will perceive, that if we take the tithes at Mr. Arthur Young's esti mate of 1792, the tithes amount to more than a-sixth of the whole rental. Indeed, they must amount to a great deal more; because the tithe consists of a tenth of the whole of the produce of a farm; and, of course, it is a tenth of the rent, the labour, the taxes, the capital, the manure, and all other out-goings, and of the profits into the bargain. So that the tithe of the produce cannot, I should suppose, be less than a-fourth of the rental; and, of course, that they amount to about 7,000,000l. in England and Wales, at this time; Scotland paying no tithes. But, then, it must be observed, that the Church does not receive more than the half of this sum. The rest is the property of lay persons. It is, in fact, pri

vate property, and is sold, or rented, as other private property is. Upon the subject of tithes, therefore, I shall not enter into any comparison between your country and ours. All the world knows, that you have no tithes, and no compulsory payments on account of religion of any description; all the world knows, that the Episcopalians, the Quakers, the Catholics, the Presbyterians, the Baptists, the Lutherans, the Calvinists, the Methodists, the Menonists, the Moravians, the Dunkards, the Swenkfelders, the Seceders, the Unitarians, the Swedenburgers, and many other descriptions of Christians, each condemning the opinions of all the others; together with Jews and Deists, who laugh at the whole of them, have their assemblies in your country; and that any one of them, or even of Atheists, may become your President, Vice-President, or a Member of the Congress, without any question being asked him with regard to his religion; while it is equally well known, that no man can be a magistrate, or fill any office of trust in England, unless he first give a test of his being a member of the Established Church, the head of which Church is the King, who has the absolute appointment of all the Bishops and Deans, and of the greater part of the beneficed Priests. These facts being merely mentioned, I need add nothing further on the subject, except that

we have many persons punished in England, for publishing works on the subject of religion, while you have no such punishments; and, we have recently seen a man imprisoned for eighteen months, and put in the pillory, for re-publishing a work here, which had been first published in your country. Which system is best, and which worst, it is not my present object to inquire. My business, upon this occasion, is merely to state facts, which no one can deny, leaving it to the reader to form opinions and draw conclusions.

We will now, then, return to the taxes, which we will take in the aggregate, on both sides of the Atlantic; and then, taking the population of each country, we shall see how much we pay per head, and how much you pay per head. There must be a little confusion here, in our part of the statement, because we have regular poor-rates, by law, in England and Wales, while Scotland has no such law, though there are collections there also for the support of the poor. This, however, cannot be accurately come at. I will, therefore, leave it wholly out, and look upon the poor-rates of England and Wales as raised upon the whole of Great Britain. I will here leave out the shillings, pence, and farthings.

Amount of Taxes paid into the Treasury

£.

Great Britain.

74,027,583

Paid to the Taxgatherers for collection and management..
Amount of Poor Taxes

3.504,938

7,896,556

But now, in taking the aggregate of your taxes, you will see the necessity of my including those which are raised upon the people in the several States, for the support of the several State Governments, which taxes, of course, form an addition to the taxes paid to the general Government of the United States. My materials for ascertaining the amount of these State taxes is not quite so perfect as I could wish. Yet I have means to do it to the satisfaction of any one, whose object is that of arriving at truth. In 1805, Benjamin Davies, of Philadelphia, a man of great research and of great accuracy, published, in his " New System of Geography," an account of the revenues and expenses of eight of the States; correct information from the other States, on this head, not being apparently at his command, or within his reach. This, however, is quite sufficient for our purpose; for no reasonable man will suppose, that these eight States, and those the principal ones, do not furnish a fair criterion whereon to found an estimate of the whole. His account stands as follows, in dollars and cents, or hundredths of a dollar.

It appears from Benjamin Davies's account that these taxes, or rather these resources, arise, in many cases, from the interest of stock, of which the States are the owners, and which make part of the public debt in America. In other cases they arise from the sale of lands belonging to the States. He represents New York State to be owner of 2,000,000 of dollars, in stock, and to hold numerous shares in canals, &c. &c. But I shall suppose, that the whole of this money is raised in taxes upon the people, and paid out of their pockets. It will then come to this, that each inhabitant of the American Republic pays, in this way, and on this account, 26 cents, or hundredths of a dollar.

You have also, in the great towns, some poor to assist. I am quite in the dark upon this head, except as far as observation of some years ago can guide me. This item, therefore, I will take at a guess; and, if I allow that the poor cost nearly as much as the State Governments, no one on this side of the water, at any rate, can complain of the estimate. I therefore take the State taxes, including poor taxes, at 50 cents, or halfa-dollar a head upon the whole of your population. I know that you will say, that this is a monstrous over-rate as to your poor taxes. But I am resolved not to be complained of on the other side. As to road-rates, turnpikes, watching and lighting, and paving and watering, of cities and towns, I do not notice these in either country, seeing that they are for the immediate benefit of those who pay them.

We will now return to our comparison between the distribution per head, of our taxes and of yours.

Our year's taxes, including poor taxes, we find amounting to 341,716,308 dollars. Our population in Great Britain, in 1803, was as follows: