A final determination of the question was imposed upon Parliament by the pressure of the manufacturing and commercial classes arising from a decision in the case of R. _vs._ Lumsdaine, in 1839, looking to the taxation of personal property. In consequence, an act was passed (3 and 4 Vict., c. 89), and has remained in force until the present time, exempting an inhabitant from any tax "in respect of his ability derived from the profits of stock in trade or any other property, for or toward the relief of the poor." Thus it is that the English local taxation has managed to keep clear from the bog of assessing personal property, and the annual value of immovable property, such as lands and houses, within the parish has come to be selected as the simplest and most practicable basis for assessments. The history is of high importance, because the basis of the poor rate was adopted as the basis for all other rates levied in local taxation. Whatever confusion has been introduced has arisen from other causes, such as the constituting poor-law unions containing more than one parish, the levying of county rates, a county having a boundary other than a parish or a union, and the assessing for rates by parish officers who acted independently of each other. Many efforts have been made to introduce a uniform system of assessment, but without success. One of the clearest thinkers on this subject was Sir George Cornewall Lewis. In appearing before a committee on taxation, in 1850, he said: "We have never recognized the principle of having one valuation for all the different rates. If that principle were once admitted, the inducement to have an accurate and complete valuation would be at its maximum, because then you would know that whatever charge might be imposed it would be imposed upon that valuation, whereas if there is one assessment for one rate and another assessment for another rate, and an amended assessment for a third rate, no one cares much about making any assessment perfect. This is one defect of the present system of valuation."