The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1867-08-27
COLUMBLA.s
Tuesday Morning. August 27. 1867.
The calamlty OF Ta.at,on.. !.

The Calamity OF Taxation.
A prominent Northern ,financier
as published, recently, work ON
the public debt of the United States.
The author of the volume, which is
now attracting much attention in
Northern political and financial cir
cles. is a prominent member of the
dominant party, and it is to be
hoped that his views on this subject,
so ably set forth, will have q whole
some influence on the future legisla-
tion of that party. We extract few
paragraphs from the chapter under
the head Of Calamity of Taxation:"
tGreat as is the calamity of war,
ut is not so great calamity as the
oppression of labor by excessive and
perpetual taxation. The one bleeds
I part only of o single generation; the
other sends its consequences down
through successive generations, and
condemns the body of the people to
exhaust their life in earning n bare
and uncertain subsistence.
'sThe great mass of the human
family in all countries live by labor.
2 The number of those who possess in
come is small compared with those
who are dependent on wages, or on
the returns of some kind of daily
work. The highest function of Go
vernment is, therefore. to protect the
natural rights Of labor by every law
and practice necessary to make it suf-
6cient, not merely for the wants of
the body, but for the wants of the
mind also. The sufficiency of labor
to these ends enables the man to
gain that point Of self-respect without
which morality scarcely becomes a
part of action-below which there is
hardly motive of public duty, or
sentiment of social sympathy; but
in theirl place, selfishness and mis-
anthropy.
4.It may be affirmed that no Co
vernment is safely founded where
labor is not recognized as the pri-
mary interest of the State. The
State is then naturally divided against
itself. Revolution waits only for
popular intelligence to wake up, and
the State must fall"
He then proceeds to argue that the
public debt brings the United States
to this issue, and that labor, Mt the
present time. is oppressed in all its
branches. BY tho operation of ex-
cessive taxes, capital accumulates in
the hands of the few, and tends to
form wealthy class, which gradually
absorbs all the functions of the State,
and makes laws to perpetuate its own
rule. The consequences, Mr.. Gibbons
says, come at last to q focus, and fall
with crushing force on the heads of
the working people, who produce
and make every thing that is produced
in the country.
MIR. Gibbons, in another para
graph, alludes toaa recent circular
from the Secretary of the Treasury,
and says that if the State described
therein be allowed to continue, emo
thing i'll the future is more certain
than discomfort among the masses of
the people, embarrassment in the
public treasury, loss of public credit,
civil disturbance, disorganization,
repudiation. 1t is well, he remarks,
that Congress and our financial ma
nagers shall not DO suffered to lose
sight of the word that expresses the
end Of bad measures.
Such, in brief, arc the ideas and
predictions of this able writer, and
we again express the hope, that the
extensive circulation of his book will
have its proper influence over the
party of which he is prominent
member.
GENERAL AMNESTY. Herald,