An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith (ebook reader with highlighter txt) 📖

deduction of one-fifth of the tax; so that for

such land he pays only eight instead of ten per cent. of the

supposed rent.

 

A land-tax of this kind is certainly more equal than the land-tax

of England. It might not, perhaps, be altogether so certain, and

the assessment of the tax might freqnently occasion a good deal

more trouble to the landlord. It might, too, be a good deal more

expensive in the levying.

 

Such a system of administration, however, might, perhaps, be

contrived, as would in a great measure both prevent this

uncertainty, and moderate this expense.

 

The landlord and tenant, for example, might jointly be obliged to

record their lease in a public register. Proper penalties might

be enacted against concealing or misrepresenting any of the

conditions; and if part of those penalties were to be paid to

either of the two parties who informed against and convicted the

other of such concealment or misrepresentation, it would

effectually deter them from combining together in order to

defraud the public revenue. All the conditions of the lease might

be sufficiently known from such a record.

 

Some landlords, instead of raising the rent, take a fine for the

renewal of the lease. This practice is, in most cases, the

expedient of a spendthrift, who, for a sum of ready money sells a

future revenue of much greater value. It is, in most cases,

therefore, hurtful to the landlord; it is frequently hurtful to

the tenant ; and it is always hurtful to the community. It

frequently takes from the tenant so great a part of his capital,

and thereby diminishes so much his ability to cultivate the land,

that he finds it more difficult to pay a small rent than it would

otherwise have been to pay a great one. Whatever diminishes his

ability to cultivate, necessarily keeps down, below what it would

otherwise have been, the most important part of the revenue of

the community. By rendering the tax upon such fines a good deal

heavier than upon the ordinary rent, this hurtful practice might

be discouraged, to the no small advantage of all the different

parties concerned, of the landlord, of the tenant, of the

sovereign, and of the whole community.

 

Some leases prescribe to the tenant a certain mode of

cultivation, and a certain succession of crops, during the whole

continuance of the lease. This condition, which is generally the

effect of the landlord’s conceit of his own superior knowledge (a

conceit in most cases very ill-founded), ought always to be

considered as an additional rent, as a rent in service, instead

of a rent in money. In order to discourage the practice, which is

generally a foolish one, this species of rent might be valued

rather high, and consequently taxed somewhat higher than common

money-rents.

 

Some landlords, instead of a rent in money, require a rent in

kind, in corn, cattle, poultry, wine, oil, etc. ; others, again,

require a rent in service. Such rents are always more hurtful to

the tenant than beneficial to the landlord. They either take

more, or keep more out of the pocket of the former, than they put

into that of the latter. In every country where they take

place, the tenants are poor and beggarly, pretty much according

to the degree in which they take place. By valuing, in the same

manner, such rents rather high, and consequently taxing them

somewhat higher than common money-rents, a practice which is

hurtful to the whole community, might, perhaps, be sufficiently

discouraged.

 

When the landlord chose to occupy himself a part of his own

lands, the rent might be valued according to an equitable

arbitration of the farmers and landlords in the neighbourhood,

and a moderate abatement of the tax might be granted to him, in

the same manner as in the Venetian territory, provided the rent

of the lands which he occupied did not exceed a certain sum. It

is of importance that the landlord should be encouraged to

cultivate a part of his own land. His capital is generally

greater than that of the tenant, and, with less skill, he can

frequently raise a greater produce. The landlord can afford to

try experiments, and is generally disposed to do so. His

unsuccessful experiments occasion only a moderate loss to

himself. His successful ones contribute to the improvement and

better cultivation of the whole country. It might be of

importance, however, that the abatement of the tax should

encourage him to cultivate to a certain extent only. If the

landlords should, the greater part of them, be tempted to farm

the whole of their own lands, the country (instead of sober and

industrious tenants, who are bound by their own interest to

cultivate as well as their capital and skill will allow them)

would be filled with idle and profligate bailiffs, whose abusive

management would soon degrade the cultivation, and reduce the

annual produce of the land, to the diminution, not only of the

revenue of their masters, but of the most important part of that

of the whole society.

 

Such a system of administration might, perhaps, free a tax of

this kind from any degree of uncertainty, which could occasion

either oppression or inconveniency to the contributor ; and

might, at the same time, serve to introduce into the common

management of land such a plan of policy as might contribute a

good deal to the general improvement and good cultivation of the

country.

 

The expense of levying a land-tax, which varied with every

variation of the rent, would, no doubt, be somewhat greater than

that of levying one which was always rated according to a fixed

valuation. Some additional expense would necessarily be incurred,

both by the different register-offices which it would be proper

to establish in the different districts of the country, and by

the different valuations which might occasionally be made of the

lands which the proprietor chose to occupy himself. The expense

of all this, however, might be very moderate, and much below what

is incurred in the levying of many other taxes, which afford a

very inconsiderable revenue in comparison of what might easily be

drawn from a tax of this kind.

 

The discouragement which a variable land-tax of this kind might

give to the improvement of land, seems to be the most important

objection which can be made to it. The landlord would certainly

be less disposed to improve, when the sovereign, who contributed

nothing to the expense, was to share in the profit of the

improvement. Even this objection might, perhaps, be obviated, by

allowing the landlord, before he began his improvement, to

ascertain, in conjunction with the officers of revenue, the

actual value of his lands, according to the equitable arbitration

of a certain number of landlords and farmers in the

neighbourhood, equally chosen by both parties: and by rating him,

according to this valuation, for such a number of years as might

be fully sufficient for his complete indemnification. To draw the

attention of the sovereign towards the improvement of the land,

from a regard to the increase of his own revenue, is one or the

principal advantages proposed by this species of land-tax. The

term, therefore, allowed, for the indemnification of the

landlord, ought not to he a great deal longer than what was

necessary for that purpose, lest the remoteness of the interest

should discourage too much this attention. It had better,

however, be somewhat too long, than in any respect too short. No

incitement to the attention of the sovereign can ever

counterbalance the smallest discouragement to that of the

landlord. The attention of the sovereign can be, at best, but a

very general and vague consideration of what is likely to

contribute to the better cultivation of the greater part of his

dominions. The attention of the landlord is a particular and

minute consideration of what is likely to be the most

advantageous application of every inch of ground upon his estate.

The principal attention of the sovereign ought to be, to

encourage, by every means in his power, the attention both of the

landlord and of the farmer, by allowing both to pursue their own

interest in their own way, and according to their own judgment ;

by giving to both the most perfect security that they shall enjoy

the full recompence of their own industry ; and by procuring to

both the most extensive market for every part of their produce,

in consequence of establishing the easiest and safest

communications, both by land and by water, through every part of

his own dominions, as well as the most unbounded freedom of

exportation to the dominions of all other princes.

 

If, by such a system of administration, a tax of this kind could

be so managed as to give, not only no discouragement, but, on the

contrary, some encouragement to the improvement or land, it does

not appear likely to occasion any other inconveniency to the

landlord, except always the unavoidable one of being obliged to

pay the tax.

 

In all the variations of the state of the society, in the

improvement and in the declension of agriculture ; in all the

variations in the value of silver, and in all those in the

standard of the coin, a tax of this kind would, of its own

accord, and without any attention of government, readily suit

itself to the actual situation of things, and would be equally

just and equitable in all those different changes. It would,

therefore, be much more proper to be established as a perpetual

and unalterable regulation, or as what is called a fudamental law

of the commonwealth, than any tax which was always to be levied

according to a certain valuation.

 

Some states, instead of the simple and obvious expedient of a

register of leases, have had recourse to the laborious and

expensive one of an actual survey and valuation of all the lands

in the country. They have suspected, probably, that the lessor

and lessee, in order to defraud the public revenue, might combine

to conceal the real terms of the lease. Doomsday-book seems to

have been the result of a very accurate survey of this kind.

 

In the ancient dominions of the king of Prussia, the land-tax is

assessed according to an actual survey and valuation, which is

reviewed and altered from time to time.{ Memoires concurent les

Droits, etc. tom, i. p. 114, 115, 116, etc.} According to that

valuation, the lay proprietors pay from twenty to twentyfive per

cent. of their revenue; ecclesiastics from forty to fortyfive

per cent. The survey and valuation of Silesia was made by order

of the present king, it is said, with great accuracy. According

to that valuation, the lands belonging to the bishop of Breslaw

are taxed at twentyfive per cent. of their rent. The other

revenues of the ecclesiastics of both religions at fifty per

cent. The commanderies of the Teutonic order, and of that of

Malta, at forty per cent. Lands held by a noble tenure, at

thirty-eight and one-third per cent. Lands held by a base

tenure, at thirty-five and one-third per cent.

 

The survey and valuation of Bohemia is said to have been the work

of more than a hundred years. It was not perfected till after the

peace of 1748, by the orders of the present empress queen. {

Id.tom i p.85,84.} The survey of the duchy of Milan, which was

begun in the time of Charles VI., was not perfected till after

1760 It is esteemed one of the most accurate that has ever been

made. The survey of Savoy and Piedmont was executed under the

orders of the late king of Sardinia. {Id. p. 280, etc. ; also p,

287. etc. to 316.}

 

In the dominions of the king of Prussia, the revenue