THE BUDGET, 1925.

By PHILIP SULLEY.

The Labour Government, which last year had the opportunity, left it to a Tory Government to bring in a Socialist Budget. Increased benefits to the many become the increased burden of the few. That is the effect of Mr Churchill's Budget as it must appear to persons with incomes of £800, or £1000, or over; and to-day £800 is truly a living wage to those who can only in irony now be called the better classes. To the professional man, whose capital is training and brains, the financial outlook has to-day become more difficult. Already he has to pay for so much of which he has no share. Education of the working-classes and those attending State schools, Old Age Pensions, the Dole, and other deficits of the Insurance Scheme, and more is now to be added in these directions. The rebate he will receive on his own direct tax may not be as good as at first sight appears, seeing that the weekly-wage earner will now generally cease to make even a small contribution to the Income Tax, and the small trader and employee will be in the same position. The trader generally, having less responsibility, will benefit far more than the professional man. The wide extension of the Old Age Pension, to be paid without limit as to means of the insured persons, and shortly at a lower age of sixty-five, will also increase the burden of the Income Tax payer. Matters would appear to be moving in such a direction that the new generation may see Parliament forced to make Old Age and Widows' Pensions general, to be applied for by all who wish. Looking over the other provisions of this great Budget for great it is in its proposals, and still more in its possibilities-one sees little that will benefit the professional and similar classes. Certain articles on which reductions of duty are given will, like tea and sugar last year, presumably at once rise in price; while luxuries, if the articles under the M'Kenna Duties are to be so considered, will also advance beyond the actual amount of these duties. The reduction in Income Tax will clearly be very welcome, and especially to those with Earned Income, whether exceeding or falling short of the £1500 at which the new limit of one-sixth is placed. The retired elderly professional man, or his widow, over the age of sixty-five, will certainly be grateful for the fact that an income from Investments, not exceeding £500, is to be treated as earned, with a concession of onesixth, by way of a small pension at sixty-five as a balance to the workers. Before the Budget becomes a Finance Act it is to be hoped that an effort will be made, in view of the Insurance

benefits conferred on workers, to restore the old concessions of Life Insurances to the Income Tax payer, and thus enable him to make better provision for the future, in which he is to receive no help from the State. The increased Death Duties, starting at £12,500, must operate in the lower stages very hardly on those who leave moderate amounts, while throughout they add further to the almost insupportable burdens resulting from the death of an owner of property. The relief of Super-Tax, declared to be corresponding and equivalent to the new Death Duties, may prove to be so in the main, but certainly not in individual cases. When a death occurs soon, or in the course of a few years, after this change, the saving in SuperTax cannot correspond with the capital loss involved by the increased Death Duties. There is a further matter in connection with this direct taxation, as to which the Chancellor may not have received full and correct information from the official source. Has he been informed how much of the great yield is due to direct payment of the year's income, and how much is still the result of the new system of running a small-tooth comb over every Tax District and recovering fines, penalties, and back duties wherever an undercharge or a mistake has been discovered ? This source of extra revenue cannot continue to be exploited much longer. The question of the re-introduction of the Gold Standard, and of its effect on our position in regard to American Debt and American Trade, may be left to financial experts, but the ordinary man would have preferred to get back his sovereign, instead of a piece of paper, when by reason of improved trade and smaller cost of living, that little but much - desired object had purchasing power more in accord with past memories. The Finance Bill will be very keenly and eagerly scrutinised, and the Finance Act will probably shew even greater divergencies from its original form than in any ordinary year. The Budget obviously presents exceptional scope for the activities of the legal profession.

While dealing with the question of taxation, the time is opportune for pointing out the necessity, as well as desirability, that the present Government, so strong and fairly sure of a continued existence for some years, should give Scotland a much-needed new Valuation Act. There is shortly to be introduced into the Commons a Rating Act for England to provide a general system of valuation of land and property for the whole kingdom, to supersede the various methods, some of them haphazard, which now exist. This is to apply to all counties and burghs, London excepted, as since 1869, under the Metropolis Valuation Act, this has had a Quinquennial Valuation which has proved effective and equitable, and

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given rise to very few complications or legal difficulties. For many years now, in the administration of this Act, the local committees have had the assistance of the District Tax Officers. Whether this arrangement is to take effect for the rest of the country under the new Act cannot yet be stated; but as regards Scotland, there can be no question that our own Act, dating from 1854, is now obsolete in many respects and ineffective. It was always deficient through its very simplicity and lack of sufficient direction. From 1854 right up to 1895 it was possible to rent a piece of land on a lease of less than twenty-one years, erect on it a small or great industrial concern, and pay rates on the rent of the land alone. While this anomaly was at last removed, the instruction in the Act that the value of any subject should be arrived at by ascertaining the rent, or probable rent, that would be paid by a willing tenant to a willing owner, has proved increasingly difficult in the case of large subjects, industrial or for public benefit. These are rarely, practically never, let to a tenant, and the Assessors have in the Act no proper ruling or guidance in arriving at the valuation. In recent years the Contractor's Principle has been relied upon to a considerable, but not universal extent, and has gradually received the somewhat reluctant acceptance of the High Court, which has repeatedly stated that its sanction is given only because no better method is authorised, or can at present be devised. The result to-day is a mass of anomalies. Some Assessors do not appear to have adopted the principle as yet; with others it would seem to depend on the amount which the local rating authorities are prepared to expend in technical assistance to the Assessors, who are neither architects nor engineers, and usually have had no special preliminary training for their duties. The amount of valuation is decided by the local authorities sitting as an Appeal Court, whether reasonable or even considerate towards industry and employment in their area, or anxious to relieve land and other subjects of some part of the heavy burden of rating by placing the fullest

anything like unfairness. Surely such a purely Scottish matter should not be left to the ordinary parliamentary authorities and draughtsmen, it must be the result of full enquiry and discussion in Scotland. This should be by means of a Royal Commission which would take evidence from owners of all classes of property, industrial, institutions, and concerns for public use and benefit, which are never let, and also ascertain the view of the great rating authorities, and presumably the Assessors. It is understood that this question has already been raised and brought to the notice of the Secretary for Scotland.

AMERICAN PROHIBITION LAW.

Since the passage in 1919 by the Act of Congress of the National Prohibition Act, the State District and Circuit Courts all over the United States have been, and are still, busy with a quite appalling number of cases in regard to its enforcement. In due course much of the litigation must pass through the Circuit Appeal Courts and the Federal Courts on its way to the Supreme Court at Washington. It is a gorgeous" time in all the States for the lawyers, and it bespeaks a golden period for the Scottish Bar and the solicitor branch of the legal profession, if and when prohibition becomes law here. If?

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Naturally, vested interests have endeavoured by every means to assail the validity of the 1919 enactment. Its well-known object was to prohibit the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from, the United States and all territories subject to its jurisdiction "for beverage purposes." It made compulsory in every State of the Union what many States had already enacted for themselves. The measure became at once intra-State and inter-State. Its legality has been, and is being, challenged in every conceivable manner, not only on the ground of alleged constitutional defect on the part of in its language.

at present is inequality and unfairness, since it is inequitable that some of these subjects should in one or more areas be rated far more highly than those in others. One has only to read through decided cases of the past five years to see how great are many of these increases, and how difficult it is for Assessor, Rating Authority, or Judges to arrive at a basis which could be generally accepted and applied, and how necessary it now is in this special direction, as in many others of minor but considerable importance, to have an Act with clear rulings which will secure equal treatment and prevent

It has been argued that the Congress had no right to interfere with the liberty of the subject in the matter of private commerce. But the judicial affirmance of the power of Congress in the matter has been based upon the precedent of the Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, by which slavery was abolished after the Civil War and following upon the Emancipation Proclamation of President Lincoln. Up till then "black" life was regarded, in the Southern States, at least, as no more than a chattel," - a phase so

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It has been a privilege to read some instructive judgments over Prohibition prosecutions and cognate matters by Judge Rellstab, of Trenton, New Jersey, one of our distinguished American Bar visitors to this country last autumn. Closely reasoned, the constitutional question is maintained by him in favour of the validity of the Act by citations from Blackstone and Story, and from the opinions of that great American judge, Chief-Justice Marshall. name carries the greatest weight in the House of Lords. In fact, it was once the good fortune of Lord Guthrie, as senior counsel, to win a Scottish appeal by apt reference to one of Chief-Justice Marshall's decisions supplied to him by his junior, by delving into the American reports cited by the great Benjamin in his work on "Sale." The lesson for juniors is: "Be industrious. Leave no stone (or report) unturned."

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But what is intoxicating liquor"? The Act states that it includes "alcohol, brandy, whisky, rum, gin, beer, ale, porter, and wine, and, in addition thereto, any spirituous, vinous, malt, or fermented liquor, liquids, and compounds, whether medicated, proprietary, patented, or not, and by whatever name called, containing of 1 per cent. or more of alcohol by volume which are fit for use for beverage purposes. It is this definition of " of 1 per cent." that absolves the enactment from the charge of ambiguity. It is "the sting." It is not necessary that anyone should be inevitably drunk upon a beverage of such strength. It is the absolute bar on sale or manufacture and otherwise that is the aim of the measure, and the project is total abstinence. It may be hard upon the subjects of the States, especially as during the war, by the Volstead Act, the minimum strength was 3.4 per cent. in volume. Mr Justice Harlan, of the Supreme Court of the United States, in sustaining the Kansas Prohibition Law, said, as we find from one of Judge Rellstab's opinions: We cannot shut out of view the fact, within the knowledge of all, that the public health, the public morals, and the public safety may be endangered by the general use of intoxicating drinks; nor the fact, established by statistics accessible to everyone, that the idleness, disorder, pauperism, and crime existing in the country are, in some degree, at least, traceable to this evil." So, under the authority of the Congressional Act, we find that intoxicating liquors, if not reported to the Government agents, may be seized in any

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The following article was written as an attempt to explain to the general public what feudal casualties are and what has been done by Parliament to abolish them. It has, however, been described as rather technical for the general reader. The inference, therefore, is that it may appeal to lawyers, or at least to students of law. With this warning it is brought before the profession with apologies for all explanations embodied therein which lawyers do not require.

At the outset it should be explained that the title of this article is not in any way connected with loss suffered by a body of men or vassals who fought for their superior or overlord in feudal times. The English dictionary gives various meanings of the word "casualty," and the one selected for the present purpose is chance or what happens by chance." The law dictionary states that casualties are certain emoluments arising to a superior which, as they depend on uncertain events, are called casualties.

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At school we were grounded in the feudal system, and were compelled to learn that all the land of Scotland belonged to the King, who gave grants of lands to the nobles in return for their services in defending the throne. To enable the nobles to get together a body of men whom they could lead in war, the nobles in turn gave grants of land to vassals of their own. The nobles were called Crown vassals, and all superiors after the Crown were called subject superiors. There was no limit to the number of subject superiors, and thus one could not only be the vassal of a subject superior, but also be a subject superior oneself. In ancient times, when the chief occupation of man was warfare, the return to superiors for grants of land was military service; but as civilisation progressed superiors were wont to stipulate in charters for payment of a feu-duty in money, grain, fowls, sheep, oxen, or certain services, such as carting fuel to the mansion-house or castle. The feuars were also "thirled" to certain mills on the superior's estate; that is, they were bound to carry their grain to certain mills to be ground on payment to the tacksmen of the mills of the usual perquisites called “ multures and sequels." At one time superiors required to have vassals on whom they could count as men-at-arms, and accordingly when a vassal died or was killed, the lands he owned or held under his superior fell back into the hands of the latter, so that he might make a new grant of them to another faithful adherent. When there was no vassal in the feu it was held to be vacant, and when the superior had a vassal in the lands or the feu, the latter was held to be "full." It was in

prove the death of the last-entered vassal, that is, the previous owner who had paid a casualty. It was also enacted in 1874 that, in future feus, casualties or fines could only be stipulated for if the charters specified the amounts thereof and the dates of payment. Hence arose the name "duplicand" of feu-duty, because superiors were in the habit of stipulating for payment every twenty years or so of two years' feu-duty or one year's feu-duty over and above the original feu-duty. Relief duties due by heirs and compositions due by singular successors still remained in connection with feus granted prior

accepting a new vassal the superior stipulated for payment of a fine consisting of a year's free rent of the lands. As this was an occasional payment which only became demandable by chance or at uncertain times it got the name of " casualty."

In the days when might was right and the masses lived under the protection of a great feudal aristocracy, these casualties would be paid because there was no help for it. The feudal system served its day and generation, and many philosophical writers have taken the view that casualties should not have been exacted when times changed; but the feudal lords who sat in Parliament and made the laws still adhered to the year's rent being paid on a vassal's death if the successor in the feu was what is called a singular successor that is, a successor in a single piece of heritage-as distinct from an heir who is known as a universal successor that is, one who succeeds to all the lands of his predecessor. Superiors were accustomed to stipulate for payment of a double feu-duty in the year when an heir got what is technically called an entry" to the lands, which is another way of saying when he became the proprietor of or the vassal in the feu. The payment made by an heir was called "relief duty," because it relieved or freed the lands from the hands of the superior when a death occurred. In order to relieve the lands from the superior's hands, anyone who was not the heir of the previous vassal required to pay a year's rent. The heir's casualty or fine is called "relief duty," while the singular successor's casualty or fine is called a composition," because it is composed of the gross rent less certain deductions for repairs and public burdens, etc.

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legal rights, and taxed or fixed the casualties at certain sums, as was done by the city of Edinburgh when the new town was in course of formation.

It cannot be denied that the exaction of casualties from lands is a remnant of the ancient feudal oppression, and for very many years they have been unpopular. It was only in 1914, however (a year of unhappy memory!) that Parliament decreed that all casualties should be held to be extinguished and discharged within fifteen years from 1st January 1915, and that superiors should receive certain compensation in respect thereof. The compensation is calculated in the manner provided in the Act, and to many people the arithmetical formulas required to bring out the compensation are puzzling. Since the beginning of 1915 notices to feuars or proprietors to redeem casualties and duplicands have been sent broadcast over the country. A great deal of the land of Scotland (which, of course, includes dwellinghouses) has been already freed from the burden of casualties, and many law agents or solicitors for superiors have established special departments in their offices in order to carry out, in the time allotted by Parliament, the provisions of the Act called the Feudal Casualties (Scotland) Act, 1914. This name is, no doubt, familiar to many a benighted house-owner who has despaired of understanding the sets of figures furnished and the technical expressions in the letters accompanying them. Sometimes the householder wrote an angry letter and requested explanations in plain English. Sometimes he asserted that Parliament had no power to interfere with a contract made between him and his superior with which he was perfectly satisfied. In the main, however, it has been conceded that heritable property should be disburdened of casualties or duplicands so as to make the transfer of land more simple, and proprietors are, more or less willingly, either paying a capital sum to their superiors or commuting such capital sum into an additional annual feu-duty. If the capital sum be paid, the casualties are referred to as being redeemed; but if an additional feu-duty is constituted, they are said to be commuted.

As shewing that the feudal system can give rise to a pretty incident, the writer would remind readers of the visit of the King to the borders a year or so ago. There a certain laird presented His Majesty with a red rose in acknowledgment of holding his lands or estate from the Crown, and His Majesty graciously accepted this homage from his loyal subject. It should be added, however, that the red rose was not the only return the loyal subject required to make to the Crown. Lands feued direct by the Crown are also subject to casualties, but the successors of the nobles who originally got the grants of land only require to pay as casualties one-sixth of the old valued rent of their lands-a sum quite inconsiderable compared with the free rent of lands at the present day. Subject superiors have, however, not meted out to their vassals the same consideration which the Crown is meting out to them. The Crown certainly did not calmly agree to accept one-sixth of the old valued rent as a casualty, and the matter was the subject of lengthy litigations in the Courts. The Crown lost, mainly because the House of Lords sidered that the practice of exacting a modified casualty had gone on too long for making a change.

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As has been indicated, sometimes solicitors receive angry letters in reply to the notices to redeem casualties, but sometimes the replies made by proprietors contain a good deal of humour. In the course of the last ten years the writer has collected samples of humorous replies, and in the hope of brightening an article on a subject usually described as dry as dust, he gives the following extracts from replies to notices to redeem casualties and relative covering letters.

Although they can only be visualised mentally there are two estates in land the estate of superiority, which attracts the feu-duties and casualties or duplicands; and the estate of property, which attracts the rent. A notice, etc., having been addressed in error to Mrs " A,” her husband replied that his wife had no separate "estate" and that he had been hunting for one for himself for years.

It is usual for solicitors to ask house proprietors to send their title, and this request produced the reply: "My title hitherto has been plain 'Mister.'"

from whom I used to get an occasional bottlein the past?

To one bottle of aqua 12s. 6d. Here the honesty and simplicity are evident. What is behind your camouflage?"

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A feuar with a classical bent wrote in reply to a communication he could not understand in this vein : In the old days when we were struggling to get on top of the irregular French verbs, solace was given by the assurance that the English language was the most difficult to acquire-and this was disbelieved by 99.5 per cent. of the class. Your communication of the 20th inst. proves that the 99.5 per cent. were wrong."

In one case the solicitor's reference to casualties produced this sarcastic rejoinder : "The only casualties lately affecting my household were minor injuries to my bicycle and illness of my wife. The former were repaired at a cost of 3s., the latter at a cost of not less than £3, and therefore I consider the latter of the more importance. I give these domestic details as I am under the impression that you desire to make me your confidant and I wish to reciprocate."

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An owner of a house merely replied to the demand made upon him thus: Your letter surprises me. I had a notion that the feudal system had long since lapsed."

Conveyancing (Scotland) Act, 1924.

I think Mr Fortune has done well to call attention to the confusion, if not risk, likely to be caused by the omission in the new forms of assignations and discharges of bonds of a short description of the security subjects.

If confusion is likely to be caused in the General Register of Sasines, where there is a trained staff and a search sheet, what is likely to happen in the Burgh Registers of Sasines, where there is neither a search

sheet, nor in many burghs, even an index of names ? In my own Burgh Register, although I have a complete index of names, I am already having considerable difficulty with such deeds, and I am suggesting to the members of the profession here that a short description of the subjects be inserted in such deeds.I am, etc.,

J. L. ANDERSON.

MR JAMES FRAME, a well-known Greenock solicitor, died on 29th April at his residence, 32 Esplanade. Mr Frame was in his seventyfifth year and had been in failing health for some time. He was a native of Lanarkshire.