The Revenue

Abstract

As in treating of the army my aim was simply to point out what were the principles determining the relation of the armed forces of the country to the law of the land, so in treating of the revenue my aim is not to give even a sketch of the matters connected with the raising, the collection, and the expenditure of the national income, but simply to show that the collection and expenditure of the revenue, and all things appertaining thereto, are governed by strict rules of law. Attention should be fixed upon three points,—the source of the public revenue—the authority for expending the public revenue—and the securities provided by law for the due appropriation of the public revenue, that is, for its being expended in the exact manner which the law directs.

See Hills and Fellowes, Finance of Government (2nd ed., 1932), and May, Parliamentary Practice (16th ed., 1957), oh. xxiv and xxviii.