Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1881-03-09
The Double Taxation OF Mortgages.

le may remember the slight difficulty-the |
unpleasantness" attending the removal |
II a much greater injustice, that Of African |
lavery and he may remember, too, who op- |
,osed that removal. All profitable injustice
has its advocates, and you will find those
advocates everywhere, from the rum shop TO
he pew,--not to say the pulpit. The fact
s, as the matter now stands, that there is
comparatively little genuine double taxation,
because the creditor escapes his share. This
being the case, it is easy to see who those
ire who stand in the way of legislation in
ended to relieve the debtor class from over
,axation. The attempt to secure single
,axation, shared proportionately between
lebtor and creditor, would, if effective, tax
5he holder of the mortgage for the amount
If it, and tax the debtor only for his actual
act interest in the property. This the cred
tor don't want, and won't have, so long as
he can succeed in fighting it off.
So impossible has it seemed in Massachu-
sets to secure this justice against the
power of the creditor class, that new prop
osition has been broached, and is advocated
by the Springfield Republican. This is,
that all money loaned on mortgage shall be
exempt from taxation, the expectation being
that lowered rate Of interest, equal to the
amount of the tax, will follow, and the
debtor, though still nominally paying taxes
on all his holding, will recoup himself indi-
rectly by getting his loan at a lessened in
terest. But it is so impossible to make the
debtor class believe in such roundabout
relief, that the moment this proposition is
brought forward they lose all interest in the
matter. The political economists, or many
of them, teach that such would be the re-
suit, and it might be so where capital is 80
abundant that the supply exceeds the de-
mand. 1t would never be so, we think, at
least not for a long time, in any Of the rural
districts. City capital is not attracted toward
farm mortgages, except at usurious rates,
approaching ten per cent. Western farm
mortgages pay this, and the farmers can live
awhile under it, so long as free immigra-
ton is continually putting up the value of
their land. But under such rates nearly all
this gain in value goes to the money-lender.
In rural New England the exemption of the
loan from tax would not have the slightest
effect on the interest rate-if for no other
reason, because the taxation is now evaded +,
by process " as easy as lying" Under the
new tax laws in New Hampshire and Ver-
mont, strictly enforced, it might be different,
but we have never yet had much success in
this country in making moneyed men pay
their just taxes, and we may be pardoned
for believing that most of them will find a
iloio out or Tile new Iaws-oi win sot tiiorn
changed so they can.
But the whole principle of exempting
property of any sort from taxation is wrong.
The new rchool of political economists favor
laying all taxes upon real estate, asserting
that in this way the tax will be easily and
cheaply collected, while the burden will be
equalized by an adjustment of the value Of
real estate to this burden. A farmer writ
ing to the Springfield Republican, in reply to
this view of the question editorially ex-
pressed, was curious enough to ask why such
a rule would not work both ways. He pro
posed that all farm property be freed from
taxation, and that the city people get their
equalization in lower prices for farm prod
ucts. The absurdity of this proposition
was manifest at once, because it is well
known that the price of farm products in
New England is not fixed by the cost Of
production, but by the price of the same
grown elsewhere. And the farmer was ther
justified in asking why the case might moi
be similar in regard to the interest ON money
We suppose it is impossible in any state
controlled as Massachusetts is, by the rich
men, to get such wrong as this one righted
The class of laws that benefits the rich al
the cost of the poor,--that class of laws
which has made Ireland and England 9
heaven for the rich and hell for the poor,-
is being continually added to and strength
ened all through the eastern states, north
and south. This growth of the aristocracy
of wealth in political power will eventually
(strange as it may now seem) bring New
England, New York, Pennsylvania, and al
the old slaveholding states into close politi
cal alliance. The same purpose to keeI
down the black working man, and max,
him a mere instrument of wealth-acquisi
tion for the rich landowner, is shared
through the states where large money capi
tai has accumulated in reference TO tn,
working men Of the north. No laws di
rectly for the benefit of the poorer classe,
Except as paupers) can now be passed il
any eastern state, from the Gulf of Mexico
to the bay of Fundy; nor can any existing
law pressing unequally upon the poor b'
modified in their behalf. This is true, ever
in Vermont and New Hampshire. Ou
usury laws are never enforced, and are openl,
violated by every bank and every capitals
in the two states. No law to relieve debt
ors from injustice, such as this of tn
double taxation of mortgages, is ever favor
ably entertained in our legislature. A yer,
large part Of that body, and usually ma
jority Of the senate, are men in full sympath,
with the money interest. OF the rest it i
always easy to be-fog, be-fool, or buy u
enough to make majority. We must lool
to the free west to initiate all movements o
reform in this direction. Even in the ives
it is getting more and more difficult t
make headway against the power and gree
of wealth. The philosophic observer is a
most compelled to believe that the freedom
of man is yet far from being secured i
America. The wrongs and blunders of tn
old world are repeated heie on a waste
scale. Popular education has been SUI
posed to be a bulwark against all this. Tha
is at least doubtful. Christianity is bu
wark against it, but when will majorit
of the voters OF America be practical Chri
tians
Improvement on New England Farms.
A writer in the Home Farm says "Sixt
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