Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-09-06

1
localities that much the advantage of them.
tinue totax, and we should not. If St.
Louis, Cincinnati, Louisville and other
4 points viii levy and rigidly enforce On
their trade, money, manufactures, etc, the
tax we to-day pay IN Memphis, and let rs
not enforce any, will guarantee to take
millions upoa top of millions Of their trade.
and money to DO it with from them the en-.
suing season, and If they will continue il for
the next ten years, l viii guarantee TO show
you real estate or unmovable property at
4 Memph more valuable than at st. Louis,
a real estate that will pay q much larger
rental, and viii show You town with
more people, more trade, more money and
more ev rytbiBg that is desirable. This
may sound as an extreme, but il Is not
| further I will say if yon will levy and
enforce snd collect, the tax that is sought
to be collected in Memphis to-day, on Che
money trade, ETC., ETC., of the great city of
New York, and you charge no tax in Bos.
ton, Philadelphis or Baltimore, I viii
guarantee to transfer In q short time hun
dreds of millions of the trade, money, etc.
of New York to these cities; and IL she
win Icontinue it five or ten years / will
guarantee to show you in either of these
| cities more trade, more money and more
| PEOPLE than in New York. sriy-
l will guarantee to depopulate her more
efectuslly and more permanently than o
plague ever did city, and impoverish her
more effectually than ever o war did.
Yes, will hurt her infinitely worse than a
fire that might burn every house from Cas-
| tie Garden, from river TO river, to Central
Park. will make It entirely safe for wonl-
| en- snd children to cross Broadway at CITY
Park Aston House, Wall street or elsewhere
without the protection of policemen. /
will reduce the value of the real estate Of
MIR. Astor from $100, 100000 (it issaid to be
worth 100000, 000) to $25, GOO, 600 or Sl0,-
| DOC, 900, and perhaps even less, and the
estate Of every other real estate or immova-
BILE property holder in the 8 me ratio; but /
cannot say that l will greatly injure the
movable property man, for he NAV go to
Boston, Philadelphia or Baltimore and do
| quite as well as be did in New York city
with bis money, goods, etc. The truth
is it would entirely bankrupt the
great city, for the demand for her immoVa-
bic property would Lot be sufficient to pay
5 rental sufficient to pay the interest on her
city, county and State debt. do not think
these assertions on the extreme, or the pic
ture overdrawn; and if SO, how can we of
Memphis expect to build up large city
under rate and system of taxation that
would pull down large city alresdy built;
and If the picture is not overdrawn, and
even say 1t is overdrawD by 80 per cent,
who would be the injured party In New
York by the enforcement of such law
Would it be Mr.. Clafiin, Arnold & Ccnsta-
Bile, Chittenden, or jeffrey q Sons-mer-
chants who, for aught know, rent their
louses from Mr.. Astor; or would it be Mr..
Aston, the great real estate owner of New
York; in other words, would it be the nova
bic property nan, with his goods,
money! &c, who can take it
and 90 to Boston, Philadelphia,
or elsewhere, and perhaps do quite as good
business as he did in New York, or would
it be the immovabe property or real estate
man who has to stay where &c is and pay
bis city and county debt without tenants or
rental from his property? Hence I say,
that of all the men of our State who should |
object to oppressive, and, to Jllow the prin- |
ciple, I viii say any taxation at all on money,
merchandise OF trade, manufactures, ETC., |
1t is the men who own the real estate or |
immeyable property. His p1 si.ions should |
be this: He should say to the thousands of |
men 10 the civilized world, with their money |
ia their pockets looking cut a favor BILE To- |
cslity to go to banking, merchandising, |
manufacturing or farming, ETC., come locate |
ON me; will not Cypress you; come to
TIE, for l can't go to you, and we must |
come together or l am worth nothing, and |
knowing this will not tax you and Cypress
you; other localities make you pay taxi
will not, consequently l offer that ad-
vantage over other localities. Hereto
fore it has been the merchant who hiss
done the complaining about the tax levied
on him; he is not the one TO do it; 1t is the
real estate man, and the writer being one of
those men owning real estate almost en-
tirely, say nineteen-twentieths of what he
owns being in farms and other kinds Of re-
atty or immovable property, and not own
ing dollars worth OF merchandise of any
kind for sale and not being a lender Of
money, but on the contrary borrower, and
not being manufacturer of any kind and
not being the owner of machinery except
steam saw mill and steam cotton gin es-
Enlistment, but being what is known as
plain farmer or planter by profession or oc-
cupstion, thinking he sees his interest in
the system be is advocating, consequently
therein is to be found the moving cause
of this letter.
contend that this system viii tighten
the burdens Of taxation on real estate, and
after very short time the rate of taxation
will really be less. To illustrate further,
will say what 1 said to q prominent real
estate owner Of Memphis in a converse
ton On this subject short time ago. He
said to me: Do you say that such mer-
chant or banker shall make from 10 to 10
per cent on their capital ard pay no tax,
AID make only 6 or 8 per cent on the
houses they ara occupying and Pay all the
tax? Yes, says |, You seek TO tax them
and that is the reason you ges no larger
per cent on your property. Says |: Ii they
make 100 per cent per annum on their cap
ital you should not want them to pay
made 100 per cent per annum, next
year you would have forty applicants for
the house they are doing business iE, and if
you should, you would certainly get a full
rent for it, more than the extra tax, and as
only one Of the forty could get the house,
and the other thirty nine would be unac-
commOdated, and if your tenants should
be making this large per cent it is reason
able to presume thag hey would be sking
it or something near it all over town; con-
sequently there would be near the same
number of applicants for every house in
town, but as only the pre- sent tenants or
their number could be accommodated with
houses, the result would be that you would
not only get the most exorbitant rents for
all the houses in town, but you would have
demand for the hundreds and thousands
of vacant lots throughout the city to build
store houses on; they would either buy
them or offer you such enormous rents as
would induce you to build them houses on
lois that you have been paying taxes on for
years aud received no rental from.
Soon there would be houses going
up all over the city, block after block.
The brick maker would have more than he
c uld do, the lumbermsn would have more
orders than be could fill, the carpenter,
bricklayer, stone mason, foundryman, and
ali descriptions of mechanics and laborers
would have more than they could do, so the
builders would have to write 10 Cincinnati,
st. Louis, Chicago, and elsewhere for me-
chanicS, ard they would come in by the
thousands and when these new corners got
their storehouses, then they would want
resider ces for their families and they would
be to build also, and then there springs upa
demand for the thousands of vacant lots