fficult. The
Opposition will always say that it is unnecessary, is uncalled for, is
injudicious; the cry will be echoed in every constituency; there will
be a series of large meetings in the great cities; even in the smaller
constituencies there will mostly be smaller meetings; every member of
Parliament will be pressed upon by those who elect him; upon this point
there will be no distinction between town and country, the country
gentleman and the farmer disliking high taxes as much as any in the
towns. To maintain a great surplus by heavy taxes to pay off debt has
never yet in this country been possible, and to maintain a surplus of
the American magnitude would be plainly impossible.

Some part of the difference between England and America arises
undoubtedly not from political causes but from economical. America is
not a country sensitive to taxes; no great country has perhaps ever
been so unsensitive in this respect; certainly she is far less
sensitive than England. In reality America is too rich; daily industry
there is too common, too skilful, and too productive, for her to care
much for fiscal burdens. She is applying all the resources of science
and skill and trained labour, which have been in long ages painfully
acquired in old countries, to develop with great speed the richest soil
and the richest mines of new countries; and the result is untold
wealth. Even under a Parliamentary government such a community could
and would bear taxation much more easily than Englishmen ever would.

But difference of physical character in this respect is of little
moment in comparison with difference of political constitution. If
America was under a Parliamentary government, she would soon be
convinced that in maintaining this great surplus and in paying this
high taxation she would be doing herself great harm. She is not
performing a great duty, but perpetrating a great injustice. She is
injuring posterity by crippling and displacing industry, far more than
she is aiding it by reducing the taxes it will have to pay. In the
first place, the maintenance of the present high taxation compels the
retention of many taxes which are contrary to the maxims of free-trade.
Enormous customs duties are necessary, and it would be all but
impossible to impose equal excise duties even if the Americans desired
it. In consequence, besides what the Americans pay to the Government,
they are paying a great deal to some of their own citizens, and so