Baton Rouge tri-weekly gazette & comet. [volume] (Baton Rouge, La.) 1865-18??, 1867-10-03
TAXING TO DEATH.

I
couragement to the minds of our
citizens, and we'll it might be, for the
picture it presents is fearful to con
template. The evil is sufficiently to
be deprecated, but more naturally to
be expected, when it has for its
sources the cess-pools of sectional
and political animosity. We are
aggrieved and complain of the hard
ships and injustice done us by the
Radical party, when the long roll of
assessments with their accompanying
imposts is unfolded to our startled
vision and the injunction is impera-
lively Numbered forth that every one
amenable to the tax must, within a
stated time, "walk up to the Cap
tain's Office and settle;" but what
must we think and how feel toward
those of our oa0n people and IN our
oaom midst, who get into office and
attempt to out-Herod Herod in those
grievous and insupportable infections
upon their already suffering and i'm
poverished fellow-citizens?
It has pleased the Police Jury Of
East Baton Rouge to go on step by
step in its unstinted course of taxing
the people, especially those residing
within the two city wards Of the
parish, until there seems to be no
bounds set to its arbitrary rule of
action in the premises For exam
pie, at it's session on the 9th ult., the
Jury adopted most Objectionable
schedule of license-taxes on trades
occupations and professions for the
year 1867. These taxes, if their en-
forcement be persisted in, will fall
with particular and most unjust
severity upon our city. Nearly every
calling Of high and low degree to be
found in Baton Rouge and which
could suggest itself to the fertile
brain or brains of whoever concocted
the schedule, is included in that
precious production of inventive
genius. Our merchants, bankers, sur
veyors, auctioneers, insurance COM
panies or agents, druggists, dentists,
(no doctors or lawyers-how is that
What an oversight even down to
our butchers, and the poor little
dealers in fish, vegetables, fruits,
coffee, etc, who are already taxed by |
the Corporation to an amount which
their scanty earnings can i'll afford |
them to pay-all these come in for
special mention in the schedule afore-
said, and are rated accordingly-the
range of licenses imposed varying
from five to fifty dollars.
Now, the question arises, what
right has the honorable Police Jury
thus to discriminate so grossly
against the interests of it's city con-
stituents The property holders and
business classes of the city already
pay more than one-half the taxes
that flow into the parish treasury,
besides having to pay an enormous
city tax.
There are twelve jury wards in
the parish, two only of which, are
within the corporate limits of the
city, showing disparity in point of
representation, which, as we have
already seen, is apt to work to the
prejudice and detriment of the city.
There were eight members of the
Jury present when the vote was
taken on the'adoption of the schedule.
Our two city members, Messrs. Louis
Kondert and B. 'T. Beauregard, were
the only ones who voted against its
adoption. They did their duty and
deserve well of their consciences and
their constituencies for it, and we
presume the six members who voted
the other way, no doubt felt they
were doing their duty to their con-
stituencies, yet, on the score Of