"England Yet Shall Stand"
His deep-lined face white as a handkerchief, wizened Philip Snowden, Chancellor of the Exchequer, hoisted himself to his feet and. leaning heavily on his two canes, advanced to the great table in the centre of the House of Commons.
"I am about to discharge." said he slowly, "one of the most disagreeable tasks that has ever fallen to my lot."
The House, the packed galleries listened breathlessly. Everyone knew the gist of what he had to say. To save his country, the little Chancellor was about to saddle Britain, heaviest taxed nation on earth, with great additional burdens. Everyone knew that the Dole was to be cut 10%. Everyone knew that the wages of all government servants were to be slashed. Everyone knew that the income tax was to be raised. But how much?
Two days before in opening this emergency session of Parliament Dramatic Scot MacDonald had warned:
"Let me call attention to the magnificent helpfulness and good will shown us by New York and other American bankers from the beginning to the end. If this loan had not been made the pound sterling would have stumbled. It would have been 20 shillings one day and ten shillings the next. It would have tumbled without control. I am not scaring you. I am giving you history!"
Talking steadily for an hour, icily disregarding interruptions from his former Laborite colleagues on the Opposition bench, Philip Snowden now gave them the staggering figures.
The basic income tax rate was raised to 25%. Coalition Philip Snowden having restored in his 1930-31 budget the 6d lopped off the tax by Conservative Winston Churchill in 1925, last week restored the 6d which Conservative Baldwin cut away in 1923. The tax climbed back to five shillings in the pound. The surtax rate on all incomes over $9,720 has been raised 10% in all brackets. Exemptions have been cut to incomes of only $486 a year for single persons and $729 for childless married men.
Gasoline will be taxed 4-c- more a gallon. All entertainment taxes are raised to 16 2/3%. Tobacco will be taxed 1-c- more an ounce, beer 2-c- more a pint.
"You'd better hurry up, for you haven't got much time," said he to booing Laborites. "This increase on beer goes into effect tomorrow."
"To meet the estimated deficit of $359,640,000 this year, I have economies totalling $106,920,000; $66,582,000 from debt redemption; and $196,830,000 from new taxation--a total of $370,332,000-- giving me an estimated surplus of $10,692,000.
"The effect on next year's budget will be this: I have an estimated deficit of $826,200,000, toward which I now have economies totalling $340,200,000; debt savings of $97,200,000; new taxation of $396,090,000--a total of $833,490,000.
"These proposals are admittedly drastic and disagreeable. They are justified only by the regrettable necessity urged upon us by the present financial position of the nation, but I have received during the last few weeks the most amazing evidence of the willingness of men and women of all classes to make their contribution to this effort. . . ."
He ended with a ringing quotation from "England, an Ode," by a resonant rhymester even smaller than Philip Snowden, the late great Algernon Charles Swinburne:
All our past proclaims our future;
Shakespeare's voice and Nelson's hand,
Milton's faith, and Wordsworth's trust in this
Our chosen and chainless land.
Bear us witness: come the world against her,
England yet shall stand.
The little Chancellor sank back exhausted. Conservatives and Liberals were on their feet waving papers, cheering till the sound reached rainy Parliament Square outside.
Orders In Council. There was little that the Opposition could do, but Scot MacDonald and his National Cabinet took no chances. Having tried their strength and received a majority vote of 94 they made themselves a dictatorship so far as economy measures and financial bills are concerned. They slammed through a measure to put all emergency economy measures into effect by orders in council signed by King George without the necessity of formal legislative approval.
Laborites raged. Scot MacDonald's little old friend John Robert ("Johnny") Clynes turned to the Labor benches:
"I deny in anything he has said that he was speaking for Labor. We have known him until recently as a House of Commons man. He is now an Orders in Council man. This is more than an economy bill. It is a bill to suppress the Opposition, silence the minority and make a mere mockery of Parliamentary Government."
Seethings. Not all Britons took their new burdens as quietly as Chancellor Snowden suggested. Outside the Houses of Parliament little groups collected under their ringleaders shouting in unison "One, two three-- HANDS OFF THE DOLE!" and "One, two, three--WE STAND FOR THE WORKING CLASSES, DOWN WITH THE RULING CLASSES!" British bobbies did not charge but nudged them out of the square.
"The King Is So Generous!" King George and Edward of Wales's gestures of cutting $242,500 and $48,600, respectively, off their incomes (TIME, Sept. 14) were not entirely successful from the point of view of the Nationalist Government. They were warmly applauded by thoughtful people but the gesture called the attention of angry Socialists to the vast sums of money paid annually to the Crown.* In Scotland the news provoked something almost unheard of in British journalism, a personal attack on the royal family. Even more shocking to conservative Britons is the fact that Forward, the paper in which it appeared, is edited by one of His Majesty's former Ministers, Tom Johnson, late Lord Privy Seal, in the Laborite Cabinet. Excerpts:
Thank God
We have all been saved
From ruin
For the King
God bless him
Has once again
Come to our rescue
Like he did
In the Great War
When he fought
Fifty thousand Germans
At the back of the front
Single handed
He is so brave
And so thoughtful
He is going to do without
Fifty thousand pounds a year
And tighten his belt
Just to show
The unemployed
(They are so thriftless)
How to make sacrifices. . . .
The unemployed
Are so thoughtless
They do not think
That when the King dies
The Queen will just have
Seventy thousand pounds a year
And if the Prince gets married
His wife will just have
Thirty thousand pounds a year . . .
Now the King
Has so little
He will just wear
A loin cloth
Like Gandhi. . . .
Comparisons. In the U. S., observers mulled over the new taxation figures and made little tables to show the comparative burdens of British and U. S. taxpayers. Most striking case is that of a married man with two children and an income of $4,000 (-L-823). In the U. S. he pays no Federal income tax; in Great Britain he must pay $708.20. Other examples:
Income British Tax U. S. Tax
$1,500 (-L-309) $83.83 $0.00
$10,000 (-L-2,058) $2,208.87 $83.25
$20,000 (-L-4,115) $5,462.64 $588.75
Parliament Sidelights. As the doors opened for the emergency session Lady Nancy Astor captured her favorite seat for the session, a comfortable corner bench in the third row. Moon-faced Winston Churchill, no member of the Cabinet or leader of the Opposition, had no seat in the front row. Arriving late he could not even find a place in the back benches, had to squeeze in uncomfortably on the steps in the aisle. Finally some M. P.'s moved over, allowing arch-Conservative Churchill to squeeze into the seat occupied in the last session by bobbed-haired James Maxton, Labor's most fiery Left winger.
And Now? Almost perfunctorily, after an unexciting day of debate, the House of Commons passed the Economy Bill on its second reading: 310 to 253. Next, it was expected, would come discussion of a tariff. Reported leader of the movement was Liberal Sir John Simon, who had been wavering for many a month. Should a tariff eventuate, first to resign his job would be little Philip Snowden, stout free-trader.
*Exchange: $4.56=-L-1.
*Vacationing in Canada last week that ancient tennis player, Rt. Rev. Arthur Foley Winnington Ingram, Bishop of London, announced that he would be glad to give up Fulham Palace and live in a smaller house.
"My official income is $50,000," said he, "and my taxes, even before the new budget, have been $34,000."
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