II.   Instruments & Transactions

Excise is a form of Duty or Imposition first issued under the Corporate Securities standards of instruments and writing first formed under the Westminster laws of Great Britain from the 17th Century as a form of penalty laid by an act of parliament for the benefit of the sovereign upon alcohol or other goods or activities considered morally questionable or extravagant.

The key elements of Excise since its invention in the 17th Century are: Immorality, Sovereign Power, Dispensation, License and Duties:

(i) Immorality is the first and key element of Excise whereby ordinary activities needed to be questions as morally reprehensible, vulgar or evil. Thus, where society was ambivalent, specific groups of ignorant and gullible zealots needed to be trained to generate and promote calls for prohibition; and

(ii) Sovereign Power is the second key element where the crown or sovereign proclaims a moral supremacy over an question of moral behaviour and may grant special dispensations in the form of licenses for a fee; and

(iii) Dispensation is the ecclesiastical authority issued by the sovereign and the power behind the license to perform an act otherwise considered immoral, unlawful or illegal; and

(iv) License is the recording of the Dispensation and the permit to perform the act under certain conditions otherwise considered immoral, unlawful or illegal; and

(v) Duties are the payments required in association with the Permit.

In terms of the early general history of Excise:

(i) Beginning under 12 Car.2. c.23 granting to the king an excise on Beer, Ale, Cyder and strong waters for the life of the monarch; and

(ii) The connection between the duty and the life of the monarch and excise continued under 12 Jac.2. c.11 in granted to King James for life; and

(iii) 2 W. & M. c.3. granted to King William and Queen Mary during their lives; and

(iv) 1 Ann. c.7 granted to Queen Anne for her life; and

(v) 1 Geo.1. c.1 granted to King George 1st during his life.