Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1867-06-14
Debt and National Tax.
alton.

When the Democratic party had contro
of the Government of the United States
from the Administration OF JACKSON to tina
of BUCHANAN, not one cent of tax wa
raised from our citizens except for tarif
duties, for the support of the General Gov
ernment. Now, under the six years of Alb
olition rule, every man, woman and chilt
in the United States, it is estimated, ar
forced to pay, on an average, sixteen dol
/ lars towards defraying the expenses of tn
United States Government. Over sixteel
Thousand articles, including almost every
thing In common use, from the match tina
the good housewife uses to kindle her fire
and the tea she makes, to cheer her sinking
spirits, up to the coffin that hides from view
all of her that is mortal, has to pay tax
thereby enhancing its cost to the consumer
So fearful Is this tax, and so careful wa
the author of the law to draw within it
net everything that would procure money
to feed the extravaganza of Congress, thai
the London Times. the great organ OF the
most fearfully taxed nation in Europe, sale
with much truth, that when Mr.. CHAsE's
internal revenue bill went into effect, il
embraced "a complete inventory of every
thing upon the earth, above the earth and
beneath the EARTH"
In what we used to call tax-ridden Eng
land, but about sixty articles of common
use are taxed against the sixteen thousand
in the United States. 4aGI9 T2.TE-g8
The difference in this respect between
the two countries, lis thus properly al
luded to by the Neto York Times, which
says:
"The relative influence of the two sys-
TENS upon enterprise and industry may be
readily understood. One system is eco
nomical in its administration, affords mar
row scope for fraud, falls lightly upon the
working classes, and is scarcely discerna-
BILE in the movements of capital or the op-
erations of industry. Our present system,
on the contrary, requires an army of office
holders to manage it, provides endless OPP
portunities for evasion and fraud, cuts
down the comforts and even the necessa-
ries of the million, and deranges and dam
ages every industry in the land"
In further criticism upon the miserable
and short-sighted policy of its party finan-
ciers, for the Times is Republican, it adds
"Instead of so distributing it that it
should be felt in the least possible degree
that it should leave enterprise untram-
meled and labor comparatively at liberty
the system which is in operation makes it.
self visible everywhere, and forms drag
from which no device of industry can es-
cape. 1t permeates every branch of pro-
duction, crippling its power, and fostering
the evils which make themselves manifest
in depressed trade and the discomfort that
pervades the working classes"
2 Why the United States is thus tax-rid-
den, can be seen In the fact that, when the
present party came into power, the Ma
tional debt of the United States was but
little over sixty-six million of dollars-on
the first day of April last, it was fraction
over two billion, five hundred and twen-
ty-three million, four hundred and twenty
eight thousand dollars!!
We give below the rise and progress from
the end of BUCHANAN's Administration to
the first of April last, as follows: