Such are the proposals which we submit in regard to the organisation section of this problem.  I have carefully confined myself to that section.  I have not trespassed at all upon the other no less important or scarcely less important branches, and I am quite certain this Parliament will gladly devote whatever strength it possesses to attempting to grapple with these hideous problems of social chaos, which are marring the contentment and honour of our country, and which, neglected, may fatally affect its life and its strength.

FOOTNOTES: 

[15] Mr. Ramsay MacDonald.

III

THE BUDGET

THE BUDGET RESOLUTIONS (May 4, 1909) 277

THE BUDGET AND NATIONAL INSURANCE (May 23, 1909) 297

THE LAND AND INCOME TAXES (July 17, 1909) 318

THE BUDGET AND THE LORDS (July 26, 1909) 344

THE SPIRIT OF THE BUDGET (Sept. 5, 1909) 357

THE BUDGET AND PROPERTY (Oct. 7, 1909) 384

THE CONSTITUTIONAL MENACE (Oct. 9, 1909) 405

THE BUDGET RESOLUTIONS

HOUSE OF COMMONS, May 4, 1903

The Leader of the Opposition this afternoon told us that we were at the beginning of what would be a very complex and a very protracted discussion.  If that discussion continues as it has begun, the Government will have no reason to complain of it.  We have made extensive and even daring proposals.  Those proposals have been accepted and, on the whole, even acclaimed by the public at large, and they have not been substantially challenged in this House.  The Leader of the Opposition, it is true, devoted his reasoned and temperate speech to making a careful inquiry into the foundations and the character of certain of the taxes by which my right hon. friend proposes to raise the revenue for the year; and I gathered he accepted, with such reservations as are proper to all engaged in a large discussion, and as are particularly appropriate to a Party leader, the general principle of differentiation of taxation in regard to the amount of property, but that he demurred to and condemned differentiation in regard to the character of property.  The right hon. gentleman singled out for special censure and animadversion the two sets of taxes in relation to land and to the licensed trade.  He used an expression about some of the forms of taxation proposed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer which was a striking one.  He said that they diverged from the principles which have hitherto dominated civilised society.