It was not the intention of the militia law
to apply the fines to anything else but the support of the militia,
neither do they produce any revenue to the state, yet these fines
amount to more than all the taxes: for taking the muster-roll to be
sixty thousand men, the fine on forty thousand who may not attend,
will be sixty thousand pounds sterling, and those who muster, will
give up a portion of time equal to half that sum, and if the eight
classes should be called within the year, and one third turn out,
the fine on the remaining forty thousand would amount to seventy-two
millions of dollars, besides the fifteen shillings on every hundred
pounds of property, and the charge of seven and a half per cent. for
collecting, in certain instances which, on the whole, would be upwards
of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds sterling.
Now if those very fines disable the country from raising a
sufficient revenue without producing an equivalent advantage, would it
not be for the ease and interest of all parties to increase the
revenue, in the manner I have proposed, or any better, if a better can
be devised, and cease the operation of the fines? I would still keep
the militia as an organized body of men, and should there be a real
necessity to call them forth, pay them out of the proper revenues of
the state, and increase the taxes a third or fourth per cent. on those
who do not attend. My limits will not allow me to go further into this
matter, which I shall therefore close with this remark; that fines
are, of all modes of revenue, the most unsuited to the minds of a free
country.
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