The Ouachita telegraph. [volume] (Monroe, La.) 1865-1889, 1874-12-18
COLLECTION OF TAKES.

COLLECTION OF TAXES.
The gross misruie which has cons
trolied the maci,inery of our State |
government since 1868, is rapidly Gull
n,inating, through the agency ofenforc-
ed payment OF high taxes, in the gen.
eal bankruptcy Of the people. 1t will
not be denied, that, so far as property
may 60, the people Of this State are ans
solvent as they were six years ago,
when the taxes due the Statewere equiv
aient to cash on the spot; but ON account
Of the plundering system under which
the people have lived and the inevitable
refusal OF capitalists to afford aid, prop
erty has deprecated to a nominal value,
and theiudustry fthe country no longer
affords revenue equal to more than
scant subsistence, II that.
To the citizen Of State non-re-con-
structed 1t may appear strange that the
taxes OF Louisiana this year can not be
paid, because In such State the taxes
are insignificant. But this very reason
affords the clue to our troubles. Here
taxes are enormously exorbitant-for
no better reason than that the robber
gives,-and the industry Of the country
has been parslyzsd by lack of capital,
begotten by . systematic course of plum
der unknown in State governed by
intstlIgence, wealth and honesty. Our
people have labored assiduousiy and
lived frugally, II not uigardly, for years.
Aud yet the result is, general shabbi-
ness, poor habitations, exhausted farms,
and absolute poverty to meet the de-
mands Of the most urgent debts.
But whatever the people Of other
States may think, 1t is, questioniess, .
fact with the people of this State, that
they are brought face to face with pow
erty and confiscation. They cannot
meet the demands of the collector of
taxes, II they would, and the result will
DO wholesale auction Of property to
money sharks, or, under Radical laws
(no one bidding,) the ownership of the
property by the State. The extent of
this prospective dispossession of hard
WOE king men Of their homes, very few
know. Like an insiduous infection,
the work Of confiscation, through
taxation, has been going on, for the
benefit of rascally demagogues, until
scarcely q household In the State is not
afflicted.
More than Ave years ago we warned
the, people what would be the result of
the Radical policy of gradual eonasca-
ton, and urged combination against
tho scheme. Our warning went un-
needed. More than we anticipated,
are the bitter fruits of Radical misrule
showing themselves in the tax burthens
piled aud heaped upon. Taxpayers.
The reality Is worse than we ever dream
ed of; for we see Woodworking men
sold out of house aud home aud driven
to y life of vagrancy under the remorse-
less exactions Of a Radical government
In Louisiana.
We may be- asked for plan to stay
the approach ofconhscation. Nomeans
OF escape seems feasible, unless it be In
a combination of those who eau, as we'll
az those can't, pay taxes, against the
INDUSTRIOUS disasters about to be visited
upon the producing classes by high
taxes. There Is no rejecting citizen
who can fail to see the ultimate finan-
ciai ruin Of this State under the present
high cost of living and the enforced
sale OF homes and houses for taxes. He
must be a lunatic who does not see to
what extremities the poor, as well rs
many esteemed wealthy, are daily be-
ing driven, nor to what miserable val
ues property is'coining. And the poor
Taxpayer knows too we'll how rapidly
he Is going down-grade, with all his fru-
gality and labor, to ask why his home
Is about to be wrested from him. He
sees the Dispossessor demanding his
fareside, his property about to be sacri-
feed, aud his wife and children about
to be driven from house and home; and
that Is all the reason, couse or philoso-
ply under which he can act.
And thus comes the question, out Of
a Gun full to OverfloWing, what are the