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The object of the author has been to state the
principles of Revenue law in as readable and intelligible
a form as the subject-matter allows. No attempt is made
to be exhaustive, but in a number of places, the reader
is referred to the standard works on the various
branches of Revenue Law where a more detailed dis-
cussion or citation of authorities on particular topics
may be found.
The book is now in four parts : Part 1 deals with the
taxes on income and on capital gains. This part is in
four divisions dealing respectively with : (a) The taxa-
tion of the income of non-corporate bodies; (b) the
taxation of companies; (c) the taxation of capital gains
and (d) administration, assessment and back duty. This
section leads on to Part 2 dealing with estate duty.
Part 3 states the principles of stamp <iuties; and Part
4, entitled "Tax and Estate Planning" offers the
reader no more than a glimpse of the kind of problems
which commonly arise in practice in connection with
gifts, settlements, arrangements on divorce and sepera-
tion, wills, pension schemes, golden handshakes, etc.
For the Irish reader, there is considerable benefit in
using this book as an introduction to Revenue Law as
there is no Irish book which incorporates all the
different systems of taxation within the same compass.
But one must add immediately, that the Irish reader
must bear in mind the differences between British and
Irish law in this field. It is almost a full time job to
keep up with the changes in England and Ireland. For
instance we have no Capital gains tax but retain
Succession and Legacy duty (no longer found in
British law since 1949). Again we have no betterment
levy. The British system of capital allowance for ex-
penditure on Machinery and Pland has been restruc-
tured; also provision has been made to enable husband
and wife to have their earnings taxed seperately and
for disaggregation of the income of a child with that
of its parents. The book has a chapter and the new
method of changing income tax which will come into
force in Britain in 1973-74. Paragraphs 1482 and
subsequent ones deal with the reform of corporation
tax in Britain which is intended to remove the present
discrimination against distributed profits in 1972.
Also the treatment of post cessation receipts have
been changed in Ireland recently by the Finance Act
1970, chapter II. It should also be remembered that
schedules A and B have been repealed in Ireland by
the Finance Act 1969. For the purpose of income tax
in Ireland chapter 27 on controlled companies may be
read with one eye on section 20 of our Finance Act,
1965, as amended and enlarged by section 36 of our
Finance Act, 1971. The 4th part of the book gives a
short introduction to the business of tax and estate
planning. But, here the Irish reader need not read
Chapter 43 yet. It deals with the tax avoidance pro-
visions relating to "tax advantages" which do not apply
to Ireland.
Subject to these matters, this book may be recom-
mended as the only comprehensive introduction to
Revenue law available.
Brian P. Dempsey
Winfield and Jolowicz on Tort
edited by J. A.
Jolowicz, T. Ellis-Lewis and D. M. Harris; 9th edition;
8vo; pp. xlvii+692; London, Sweet & Maxwell, 1971;
paperback; £3.20.
This famous textbook was edited in the first five
editions from 1937 to 1950 by Sir Percy Winfield him-
self, and since then by one or other of the above-
mentioned editors. Whereas the 6th 7th and 8th
editions each contained over 800 pages, it is satisfactory
to note that Mr. Jolowicz has managed to mention
all
the most modern dicisions up to last July and yet in
reducing the compass of the book by nearly 150 pages.
This in itself is a remarkable feat for which the learned
editor deserves our congratulations. The learned editor,
following the excellence of the previous edition, has
deemed it wise to state the law as it is rather than as
it should be. The standard of printing is as usual
excellent. This edition is essential reading for the
practitioner and the student.
C.G.D.
Beyond any Reasonable Doubt?—A book of murder
trials by Kenneth E. L. Deale; 8vo; pp. 194; Dublin,
Gill & Macmillan, 1971; £1.95.
The learned author of this work is well known to the
legal profession not only as the eminent Circuit Judge
of the Eastern Circuit, but as the outstanding author
of
Irish Law of Landlord and Tenant.
This is the
second occasion on which the author has ventured to
describe criminal trials, and his literary style will
ensure the attention of the reader from beginning to
end. Seven murder cases have been selected; four of
the accused were convicted and executed, and two
women (Ha nah O'Leary and Mary Anne Cadden)
as well as Thomas Kelly were reprieved. The Convic-
tion of Edward Kelly and of Edward Gorman (1924)
was quashed by the Court of Criminal Appeal because
the evidence of identification was most unsatisfactory.
The first case, that of David O'Shea (1931), certainly
justifies the question mark in the title. Not only was a
Guard who had taken no notes hidden under a bed
allowed to describe an alleged conversation between
the accused and his sister but Mr. Justice Hanna on
very slim evidence introduced the question of necro-
philia (rape on a dead woman) in his charge.
The case of the dismembered body of Patrick
O'Leary (1925) reminds one of the rather similar case
of Kirwan in the bogs of Offaly; the accused brother
and sister were found guilty, although they declined to
give evidence and did not make a statement. Patrick
Kelly was charged with murdering his co-lodger in
Boyle in 1936; although subject to long cross-examina-
tion, he was convicted a first time before O'Byrne, J.
the Court of Criminal Appeal heard three unavailable
witnesses to the effect that Henry was alive on 12th
September 1935 (although he was supposed to be
murdered on the 10th). In the second trial held before
Hanna, J. the jury disagreed. In the third trial the
accused was convicted a second time, but the death
sentence was eventually commuted. John Fleming was
accused of murdering his wife in Drumcondra by
administering strychnine poison and attacking her with
a hammer, he was eventually convicted and hanged.
Mary Anne Cadden's trial, which took place in 1956,
is the only relatively recent case in the book; she was
tried before McLoughlin, J. for murdering a woman,
by having caused her death as a result of performing
an abortion; as she had previously been convicted, the
result was a foregone conclusion despite Ernest Wood's
eloquence. Throughout, the learned author has sustained
our interest, although perhaps some of the more grue-
some details might have been omitted. Let us hope that
Judge Deale will next produce a book about famous
modern Irish defamation cases.
C.G.D.
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