Juliet signal. [volume] (Juliet [i.e. Joliet], Ill.) 1844-1???, 1864-05-03
Taxing the Poor.


Wretched indeed are the serfs and vas
sails of those misg0verned lands, where a
handful Of men compose the privileged or
ders. mouopolizing political power, diver
ting to their pecunisry emolumeut, and
feasting, 10 luxurious idleress, Cd the fruits
of the hard earnings of the poor, but more
wretched will be the condition Of the peo-
pie of this country when the party in pow.
er shall have completed their tax laws and
cobtrivances for wringiug the very crust
from the hard hand Of toll.
As enormous as most be our taxes,if the
country would be saved from financial
ruin, the Abolition majority in Congress
are planning to have them raised from the
agricultural and the laboring classes
The system of raising revenue by an
Indirect tax oI articles of consumption,
throws the burden upon the laboring and
producing classes, and not upon the weals
thy. The tax on the necsssaries of life
fulls dispropOr tiOnately on the laboring
immense majority Of the nation.
Whether our Abolition rulers will patch
up a system of taxes that will not bear
aln2st exclusively upon the working men
of the country, is yet to be tested but it
ia a lamentaSle fact that at present the
workiDgmen men are made to bear the bur-
dens of the Government. Poor, struggling
laborer, striving to keep up responsibility,
! by decent regard to custom, AMI health
by the cravings of appetite, is haunted by
the greedy tax gather, while the holders of
government securities are exempt f,om
| taxation. Thus millions upon millions of
dollars 10 the hands of the wealthy pays
not one cent for the support Government,
State or local institutions.
And while the producers and working
men are compelled to hear the weight of
furnishing this miserable Administration
with the means for prosecuting it's exteu-
sive and unwarranted plans, they are also
taxed to build up sort Of scrip nobility in
this country. The discount on our paper
money, including greenbacks and all,
must be paid by the poorer classes. Al
ready this species of money has deprecia-
ted nearly fifty cents on the dollar, and
hence every article necessary to support
/ life has gone up two or three hundred per-
cent The talk about the advance of gold
is all nonsense. Gold is not capable of
huctuation. 1t is the only true standard
of value, and consequently stands still. -
1t is the paper promises that fuctuate.
Hence it must be apparent to the most
obtuse minds that working men are taxed
about fifty cents on every dollar. Indeed
the labor of the country, to-day, is stagger
ing under the load of difficulties which the
finances in their present state, have pro-
ducod. If the wages of the working man
advanced in proportion to the depreciation
paper money and the increase in the prices
of articles Of necessary consumption, the
evil would not be SO great, but this is not
the case.
The fact is, cur financial system is al
wrong, the offspring Of proAagscy ant
corruption. But thank Heaven, the day ii
coming when the people, the bone and sin
ew of the country, the down. trodden. over
taxed despotically ruled American work
ingmen of to-day, will hold these pape
money patricians responsible for the mis-
cries they have brought upon the country