The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1882-10-26
The Capitation Tax.

We have elsewhere referred to the Bour-
bon statement, industriously circulated
through the county, that the vote to be ia
ken on the 18th of November to repeal the
| capitation restriction or the ballot, is a vote
to repeal the cdpifataon tao lao. Those
who originated this falsehood know that
the proposition does not affect the capita
ton tar. But they have purpose in it. If
it were possible for them to defeat the con-
stitutional amendment. the present system
of defrauding the citizen out of his vote
would be perpetuated. 1t is part of the
Bourbon machinery by VIII ich the popular
will has heretofore been defe ated, and at
| the same time the Public Treasury robbed
of thousands of dollars. There are now
about one hundred thousand male citizens
tent in every way to vote. whose names
have never been listed by the assessors for
assessment. Ii they are not assessed the
capitation tax cannot be demanded of them
and if the assessors books do not show that
the citizen has paid his capitaton tax he
cannot vote. By the negligence or design
OF the assessors it is made impossible for
this class OF citizens to become qualified to
vote. and consequently the ballot is re-
fused him, and at the same time the public
treasury deprived of his captation tax. 1t
is the purpose of the Liberals to correct
these criminal wrongs-tO remove the
temptation for partizan assessors to neg
lect their duty to assess each male citizen
over twenty-one years age, and thus rob
him of his vote and the treasury of his capt.
tatiOn tax With this restriction removed,
laws will be enacted TO enforce the collec-
ton OF the captation tax, and give to the
public treasury for free school purposes at
least 100000 annually which they do not
now receive. Here in Augusta county
there are nearly 1900 male citizens whose
names do not appear on the assessors
books, and who cannot be called upon for
the capitation tax, nor can they vote, be-
cause through this neglect, they cannot
qualify themselves under the present law,
The capitation tax is not to be repealed but
iIS SOlICNth'H CtI Id Ill anu Tile inter
ests of the Public Free Schools advanced
by adding to the fund now collected for
them the thousands of dollars of which they
are deprived by the partizan manipulation
of the present law
The talsehood that the capitation TAG is
to be dispensed with and the bur-
dens upon real and personal proper
ty to that extent increased, is so trans
parent that there is no intelligent
man who does not comprehend it. The ef-
feet OF the removal OF the capitation tax
restriction on the ballot, will be to increase
the revenue from the capitation tax source,
emancipate the voter from an unjust en-
barrassment, fortfy the ballot, prevent de-
bauchery and crime in elections, and Sc
cure fair and honest expression of the pop.
ular will at the polls. No good citizen can
in reason oppose the repeal of this re-
striction, and it is the duty of every one
who values our elective system and desires
to check the alarming tendency to crime in
the present methods. to vote for the con-
stitutonal amendments, which are designed
to correct the evils named, and contrib
to the ends of good government,
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