Portage sentinel. [volume] (Ravenna, Ohio) 1845-1854, 1853-04-13
rank Taxes and Bank stock.

Rank Taxes and Bank Stock.
citizen of this county, desiring to purchase /
. few shares of Bank Stock, demanded of dis
Banker of this place, the price of stock
in the Ravenna Branch Bank He was told that
it was worth tsoenty per cent. premium, and could
be had for no less amount.
This, from an outraged, abused and crushed IN
stituton, tells tale of bank prosperity clearer
and stronger than all that newspaper reasoning
could produce.
Now dividend of 20 per cent. on two hundred
thousand dollars, would, of course amount to
forty thousand This amount, therefore, of forty
thousand dollars year, is taken from the laborer,
the producing class, and pocketed by the banker,
without any consideration whatever
There is no one, who will pretend to say, the
bankers propose to offer any remuneration for the
profits of their institutions-hence, there is the
large amount of forty thousand dollars, swindled
cut of the pockets of the aborer and the industr-
Gus producer of the State.
A certain emperor of China, says Franklin,
once decreed heavy punishment for indolence.-
II will have" said he, "no idIeness in my domin-
ions; for for every who is idle, there is one,
who is compelled to labor more than his share, to
support the idle one.'' So with the Bankers, for,
for every dollar they depesite in their pockets, a
dollar 3 worth of labor has been thrown away, by
some one or more of the industrious laboring
class.
But, say they, we give fair and honest com
pensation for our profits we advance our capital
at legal interest," and discount notes and bills at
fair and living rates. So says the usurer who has
beggared household and ruined the hopes and
fortunes of families by the score So, too, says
the pawn-broker, who has taken advantage of ne
cessity, and robbed the unfortunate of all their
substance, and yet they say, the law permits it.
| Shylock, the Jew, required, but that which was
"nominated in the bond, d,''-he had not transgress
ed the law of Venice, and very probably had paie
his taxes. The usurer, the pawn-broker, the
gambler, the private banker and the broker, al
are required to pay tax, and never dream of at:
tempting to resist its payment. Shall the banks
of Ohio, who boast profit of tacenty per cent. be
excused from the payment of theirs! They say
our Charter prescrbes the mode by which We
shall be taxed What is it : that the banks shal
pay but six per cent. upon their profits; and it, by
pdlu OiuCtIS, Iue pfOuts
should be nothing, their taxes would just be nine
ty-four per cent. less than nothing.
Now, the people of Ohio, never gave Legis
lature any such authority would permit them te
barter away their right to tax the property within
the State. For if Legislatures have the power tt
; excuse the banks from the payment of their tax
J es, they can release the burthen from any othe
: property and plunge the State at once into ire
trievable bakruptcy and reputation. Hence tn
absurdity of the bare-faced attempt to defraud thu
people of the State.
The Constitution requires that the burthen o
taxation shall be borne by the banks and the cit
izen in equal proportions.
Shall it be said, that A., B. and c., may de
poste their capital in vault and by calling it
bank, issue their notes to three times the exten
of it, to circulate as money, without drawing in
terest, and then be exempt from taxation! Sup
pose nine-tenths of the people of Ohio go int
the banking business, where will your State rev
enue be raised, if banks shall pay upon the prof
its merely, and they to be the judges of the exten
: of profit and the amount of constructive salarie
# paid to their officers, to curtail the amount to b
d assessed. The people should reflect on thes
: things and endeavor to sustain the law, and Sc
it carried out.