The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1890-10-03
NOTICE TO SUBSCRIBERS.

it would be of no concern to those who did
improve. The administration of govern
ment is not intended to specially favor any
class of industries, and it certainly is not
to encourage idleneSS or speculation.
Instead of discouraging labor and thus
reducing the basis of wealth from which
all taxes must be drawn, the single tax
would constantly enlarge this basis by OPP
ening natural opportunities that are closed
today, and by relieving labor and capital
of all restriction. Instead of vacant lots
staring at the idle laborer, dwellings and
factories would spring up at the bidding
of liberated capital and labor. Instead of
line of old rookeries disgracing the most
valuable land in Baltimore, blocks of mod
ern buildings of fitting capacity to produce
the wealth possible to this land would
adorn our great thoroughfares. The pros
porous leaseholders would buy their land
from ground rent owners willing to sell,
for untaXed capital would find better in
vestment elsewhere.
Instead of miles of waste land tring the
eye along the railroads and highways
through the most valuable land in the
county, pleasant fields and farm houses
would beautify the landscape on either
hand. Instead of tenant farmers, or what
is worse, mortgaged farmers, reluctantly
eXpending their labor on permanent i'm
provements in the soil, or on buildings and
fances, the land would yield its increase to
its owner whose willing labor would not
be unrewarded for his honest care and toll.
The tax gatherer would not fine him for
painting his buildings, lining his land,
mendlng his fences, or digging clutches.
lie would not be punished for making two
blades of grass grow where one grew be-
fore.
One of the greatest results would be
the rapid increase of individual holdings
Citizens of Maryland, if you want to per-
petuate this great republic, the first essen
tlal is that the voters shall have a stake in
the country! Beware lest the very method
Tor the support of our government shall
prove the means of destroying it.
Unfortunately for American institutions
our fathers We're led into continuing the
methods of taxation instituted by the
crown, and thus, while disclaiming all
such tendencies, they innocently were Sc
uuced into the very system of taxation
that by its operation ignores the status of
the individual, and tends to Capitalization
and government by a preferred class. We
rejected a king, but retained that form of
taxation by which kings exist. We asserted
the equal right of every man, and declared
that government was by the consent of the
people, and then put in practice system
for the support of government by which
the citizen Is UNCONSCIOUS of his obligation
or benefits. The charge that indirect tax
alton by tariffs is the most expensive sys-
tenn is answered by its advocates with the
statement that the individual pays the tax
ing it, and that the burden is thus uncon-
sciously borne by the people.
Such system was apropoS to the reign
of Louis XVI, when it was held that the
problem of taxation was chow to pluck
the goose without making it suuawk."
The wretched peasantry of France may
have been regarded as geese by those who
plucked them, fit only to feather the nests
of their superiors, but the American citi-
zen is supposed to have his government
serve him, and not he serve the govern
ment.
BY this system of plucking the uncon.
sclous goose the people permit waste of
their savings that would be impossible if
each one knew what he was paying into
the treasury, and also what value he re-
celved In services of government.
, The direct taxpayers of Baltimore,
through their association, complain if u
few Thousand dollars are wasted by the
city administrations; but the indirect tax
payer, VINO unconsclously pays three times
as much as IS necessary to support the fede-
raj government, ignorantly laughs at the
waste of millions in pension corruption,
river and harbor jobs, subsidy steals and
d multltude of schemes the design of
which Is primarily to exhaust the surplus
and maintain system of taxation which,
While quitting the treasury, at the same
time extracts from the unconscious masses
twice as much more for the special enrich
m ent of II favored few.
1t Is the ideal system of Alexander
Hamilton, who favored u monarchy, and
held that the preservation of the govern
ment required the maintenance or an in
nuentlal body of selected families, whose
private interests would insure conserva-
tive administration of public affairs
But the system of tariffs was not the
only mistake of our fathers in following
monarc hic al methods of taxation.
The support of state and municipal
m a. IS frnr Z baAS,
The taxation of personal property, in
come OF trades people, licenses to do bus-
ness and special taxes on corporations are
all copied from the Old World forms,
which aimed to relieve great landlords
and insure that class the leisure and wealth
necessary to develop these superior beings
VINO govern the common people. The Pc
cullar exemptions enjoyed by the nobility
OF England and Russia are intended for
this very purpose and are entirely consist
ent with arlstocratic government.
The common people, "the pork" as Ham
llton termed them, are not deemed capable
OF government, and as the alleged superior
class Is not usually made up of persons
who are specially endowed with qualities
OF nature that fit them for governing 9TH
ers, they are graciously provided with leis-
ure and wealth by exemption from taxa
ton on their immense estates, which, for
the same purpose, had been granted them
by the crown and entailed, so us to pre-
serve the privilege to the title If the priv
llege ceased the title would disappear and
1T Is momentous truth that il the priv
llege continues i'll this country the titles
Will certainly follow.
And so, while the land is taxed nomi-
nally Tor appearance sake, the burden of
government rests upon the goods, chattels
ana consumption of the people, and the
landed classes i'll Europe, while receiving
all of the value of the services of govern
ment, virtually pay nothing, and are en-
abled to rack rent this very value to the
people, who have already paid for it, and
That nearly double because of the eXpen-
sive character of indirect taxation
In our own country we have followed
their method of supporting an aristocracy,
and 1t is only meet that we should initiate
their customs and nobility. We are raising
a distinctly landed class in America; the
wealth of the millionaires is mostly in
land, while our people us a mass, both in
Guy ana country, are rapidly becoming
landless. The once independent farmer is
becoming the mortgaged slave, and
larger and larger number of our city popu-
latlon are hopeless of ever owning piece
OF what they tondly sing as Our Coun-
try"
If the adoption of the single tax on the
value of land would cause the land specu-
lators to sell what land they could not use,
and SO enable the willing workingman to
Duy land and use it, would it not be for
the good OF the people? If the exemption
OF all forms of wealth from taxation would
attract capital and encourage its perma-
nent Investment, thus causing demand
for labor and II healthy relationship of
labor and capital, would not this be for the
the single TAX, the number of individual
tree holders of land WOuld Inc increased