The daily Green Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1861-1865, 1862-03-29

The universal tax bill IS making slow progress
in its way through che House of Representa-
tlves at Washington. It's daily cutand slashed
and amended, and the COMMITTEES Of the W hole
rises, reports progress, and asks leave 90 sit
again. It is getting along fast enough, bow
ever, and if delay could kill it altogether, and
substitute for it some better and more nearly lust
system, the country would, for once, have rea-
son TO be grateful for Congressional speech~ma-
king. 1t is 40 longer u wonder that the Com
mltteo OF Ways and Means kept the bill ard
irs provisions secret, in the process of lncuba-
ton 1t they had made public their progress,
ana needed the suggestions Of men just as wise
Us themselves, they would never have reported
so clumsy work We took occasion, some
time since, to say that, in our Judgment, the
true theory OF taxation was to tax property,
and we still hold TO that opinion. 1t may not,
however, be practicable in the present case,
though the only possible objection 80 it is, that
the whole tax would be imposed at once, and
paid in one instalment, and SO would touch
more sharply the pocket nerve. We suppose
that desire to avoid irritating this sensitiveness
Of every one about paying taxes as such, first
led to the idea Of indirect taxation. And the
Committee seem to have enlarged upon this idea
pushing it TO it's logical results. They doubt
less thought that, if indirect taxation should
have preference at all, the more articles they
could find to tax, the less of the burden would
have 10 be borne by each article and the easier
it would be to delude the public into the belief
that the tax was net much of q burden after
al, and cause them after little to be insensi-
bic to it altogether. 1t is not impossible that
this theory is well enough, but the difficulty in
its practice is, that it makes the system cum
bersome, complex, expensive, and oitentimes
vexatous.
But the inequality OF the tax is one Of its
most glaring defects. 1t is proposed by it to
raise Il revenue Of 100000, 600 The direct
tax oc 500, 200, 900 laid at the extra session. is
to continue. This direct tax is, of course, ap-
portioned among the States in proportion to
their representation in Congress. But the in
direct tax cannot be apportioned at all in that
way. Now by the tax bill neither negroes nor
cotton arc made to contribute to this source of
revenue, and the House refused to incorporate
into the bill q provision that the master of slaves
should pay into the treasury IL stipulated sum
for every negroe to whom he claimed title, or
from whose labor he received an income. We
have Mt seen any reason given for thus exempt
ing shareholders from paying their proportion
OF the burdens Of the war into which thew
have precipitated the country. And the tax
which is recommended on newspapers and on
knowledge, is most unequal in its operation, the
slave-holdlng States contributing out of all mea-
sure less, in proportion to their representation
of this revenue, than the free States 1t vas
no idle boast of Virginian Representative in
Congress SOME years since, that no newspaper
was printed in the district which he represented
and throughout the whole territory of the Re.
public 1T Is iair estimate to say That nine tenths
OF the tax on newspapers will be drawn from
the citizens of what are now the loyal States Of
the Union. This fact of itself ought to be
enough to open the eyes OF Congress to the glar.
ing injustice of any tax on newspapers, even il
there is willingness among the members Of
that body to make knowledge dearer, more of a
luxury, and as necessary consequence, LEST
generally diffused than now.
In another respect the bill is defective in mol