Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 January 1894 — Cost of British Defenses. [ARTICLE]

Cost of British Defenses.

Tne British empire spends as a rule upon defense Irom 9250,000,00 Q to 9250,000,000 a year, of which the military expenditure of India, with the indirect expenditure for the sake of India on mobile land forces at home, forms the largest Item. Almost the whole of this vast sum is expended out of British loans or taxes under the control of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, and out of Indian taxes under the direct control of the Houso of Commons through the Secretary of State, who is a member of the government of the day. This expenditure, although vast, although open to the reproach that it does not do more than maintain a fleet slightly superior to that of France, and an army of very small numbers, is a flea bite as compared (in its ill effect upon the wealth of the nation) with th# military expenditure of Italy, or, in a le.-s degree, with other continental powers. The evidences of the overpressure of taxation in India itself, many as they are. are slight in compa.ison with those which are present in the case of Italy, and it may be assumed, therefore, that, while'the taxpayers of the United Kingdom and of India may make their voices heard in insisting upon bel ter value for tbeir money, the expenditure will not in itself be brought to an end by bankruptcy.