ABSTRACT
T HE demand for a Capital Levy is supported by three main arguments, of which the first is the supposed impossibility of raising by taxation the four hundred millions or so a year which are re quired to pay the interest on the War Debt. This argument, which is not much more than a statement of opinion, may be left for future consideration. The second and more serious argument is that as young men have been compelled to sacrifice their lives in the war, stay-at-home people shall be compelled to sacrifice part of their property. As thus stated the theory has much plausibility. It is only the particular application of the theory to which objection can be taken. One aim, indeed, of this book is to shew that this principle ought to have been put into opera tion at the outbreak of the war. If it had
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been, we should not have heard anything about a Capital Levy. Undoubtedly when the war broke out the Government and the House of Commons, as the persons responsible for bringing Great Britain into the war, should have explained beyond all, possibility of misunderstanding that to take part in such a war meant sacrifices, and heavy sacrifice too' on the part of every one in our country. For some persons, i.e. our soldiers and sailors, the sacrifices must be infinitely greater than those of the majority who stay safely at home, but that fact merely makes it an obligation of honour for the rest of us to do what we can. Every one who is left at home and does not absolutely starve to death is better off than the men in the trenches. We ought to have adopted the principle that no one should be better off financially than the fighting men and their families : in some cases the principle was in fact adopted, e.g. by the tribunals under the Compulsory Service Act, who have insisted that men ex empted from military service shall undertake specified work for a labourer’s wage. Thus one wealthy man, who was exempted in this way by a tribunal, undertook to work as
T H E C A P IT A L L E V Y 71 an agricultural labourer at 25s. a week, and other men have had to give up their former occupations-e.g. teaching-and do manual work. No one suggests that these men have any grievance, people are much more inclined to say “ How lucky they are to escape the discomforts, the cold, heat, hunger, fatigue, and the risk of wounds and death, which are inseparable from the soldier’s life ! ” Quite true, they are lucky, and so are all the rest of us.
