The interior journal. [volume] (Stanford, Ky.) 1872-1881, 1875-03-26

paid by the industrious classes. That
the use OF whisky and tobacco Is often
abused signifies nothing. The important
thing is that far too large a proportion
Of the working mans daily wages goes 70
pay the tax on whisky, lager beer and
tobacco, and that the Governmcnt gets
far too little of the money which ID ex-
tortcd from him under cover of the tar
on these articles. Sugar, from which
the Government derived revenue Of
nearly ssj. .ooo, 900, and from which, an
der the newt tax bill 1t win derive tariff
ofover S42- -000- 600 at n hoarily inereeeed-
cost to the consumers, IL q luxury Of
univeral use, and ia even more indis-
Pensable to the working man than
tobacco or beer are 10 him. Cheap
cotton and wooden goods, on
which a heavy tax must be paid to
the Government and a far heavier
tax to monopolist producers Of these
articles, are almost wholly used by the
people who must go comfortably or
scantily clad, according as the price Of
cloth Is high or low. And 50 with bread
stufls drugs for the sick, and other srti-
cles Of absolute necessity to all classssof
our population. The labor of the coum-
try is oyertaxed, not to- promote
the industrial prosperity of the
country, but to benefit the few mon
opolists who assume 90 represent its
industry. OF the $50, 600, 600 of customs
and internal revenue taxes not presented
in the above table, the laboring man must
pay the greater amount for the use Of
crockery, glassware, imported spirits and
ale, il he uses these; soap, starch, fancy
goods, cheap mixed silk goods, leather
goods, and numberless minor articles, all
Of which the Government taxes heavily.
Without knowing the cause Of hard
times the working man feels their pinch.
He is taxed in roundabout way at least
two dollars where the "pauper' laborer
Of England is taxed but one dollar, The
English laboring man is taxed only in the
use Of tea, coffee, spirits and tobacco, b
while his American cousin must pay
taxes on everything he or his family use
except tea and coffee, which a Radical
Congress has refused to tax only to the
end that it might have an excuse TO tax
him the more heavily on other articles
of necessity. But the worst of this sys-
TEN is that the amounts paid to the Gov
ernment do not nearly represent the
whole nor the halt Of the taxes paid by
the people. For every dollar that
is paid 10y the people to the Govern
ment by reason Of the tax on
cotton and woolen goods, for instance
't least ten dollars is paid to monopclist
of these articles who, with
their fellows in other branches of pro-
iuction, claim to represent all that is
worth fostering in American industry.
Their claims have been only too freely and
fully allowed by the party which but,
ately surrendered control Of Congress. .
The condition in which they leave the :
country is a serious one. Democrats 2
who are elected to the Forty-fourth
Congress cannot too soon set about the
earnest study OF the problem which they
IRE called upon to solve in removing the
evils and the abuses bequcathed them
for removal That problem is to distrib-
ute the burdens oftaxation more fairly,
md, under the saving principles of Hard
Money and Free Trade, cause them to
rest more lightly on all classes than they
now rest on any class under the perni@
,ious enactments OF party welded to
iscal ard financial theories which belong
% past ages Of barbarism or of blind
popular delusion rather than to the latter
lalf of this lusty nineteenth centzry.