Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-03-05

We shall next learn that no sound gov
ernmental system can escape an infusion of
plumber and iniquity, and that therefore it
is the part of wisdom to make express
provision for the legitimation of limited
amount of robbery and rascality. There
is evidently no feat Of impudence too
arduous to be attempted by those who
have surrendered themselves to the tide of
Communism which is threatening to swamp
this community. They can find reasons
for any conceivable folly or act of inius-
tice, and when they are driven to admit
that their purposes actually involve the
very thing they have been disclaiming from
the beginning, they coolly turn round
and undertake to show that after
all that thing is unavoidable. 1t
is plain enough that if double tax
alton is resolved upon it viii be
easy to find such excuses for it as are
likely to be thought valid at least by those
who make them but there is another con-
sideration involved in this subject, about
which legislators do not seem to concern
themselves at all, and that is, the conse-
quences of the introduction Of double take
ton upon the we'll being of the commu-
nifty. It is now admitted that the minority
revenue bill does involve this mode of
taxation. As to the theory that double
taxation of property is different thing
from double taxation of persons, it may
pass in such debates as have been had
recently at the Capitol, but it does
not demand serious refutation. The
state of things the public have to deal
with is plain enough. Double taxation
is deliberately thrust upon them, and
they are told that it is good
thing. They are told, that is to say, that
it is right and just to make some property
and some people pay twice as much taxes
as others. Now, without entering upon
the moral bearing of this principle, we
will examine its business tendencies.
People are governed in business by cal
culation of the profits to he derived
Every new impost placed by Government
upon any business or industry therefore
tends to discourage investment in that di-
rection, unless evasion of taxation is easy.
In the latter event the collection of the
special tax proves impossible. In the
former case it drives capital into other
channels, and consequently Injuries the
community by restricting the range of It's
enterprise.
The assumption that double taxation will
ever be patiently submitted to, is fatal
defect in the average legislative argument.
1t Is possible for the Government to
drive capital out of certain grooves by i'm
posing discriminating taxes upon its en-
ployment in these particular ways but it
is not possible for Government to compel
men to keep their capital in enterprises
which its inequitable laws have deprived
of their legitimate returns. Double taxa
ton, it must be remembered, is in its
simplest form proposition to levy an extra
tax of SO much per cent. upon whatever it
is laid upon. If the ordinary tax rate is
two per cent, double taxation exacts four
per cent. But it is obvious that this
doubling of the tax rate must result in the
destruction OF the business upon which it
is levied, and for the reason that men will
not put up with profits two or any other
per cent. below what they can obtain in
undertakings free from this invidious
impost. As the case stands, with the
present tendency towards the decline of
the rate of interest, it is evident that
a double tax may easily make all
the difference between profit and
loss and that one consideration aaght
to demonstrate the faulty and the
futility of the proposition. To say that
no system OF taxation can avoid "the
ss semblance of double taxation" is there
fore equivalent to maintaining that no sys-
tenn of taxation can avoid destroying some
benefcialand salutary lines of enterprise and
investment in fact, that no perfect system
can be framed which does not involve the
absolute confscation or elimination of
some important agencies of civilization
Apart from all ethical considerations, it is