The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1890-03-07


exercise For Great Britain her revenue
system seems to me an exhibition Of states
uanship of the highest order. The members
of parliament receive no pay for their serv-
ices. but her cabinet ministers-the advisers
of her majesty, who are ex-officio members
receive large salaries, as do her judges and
other officers. Hers is not niggardly gov
eminent, but it is not wasteful The rich
taxpayers have much to say about the pub
lie expenditures, and they are careful to see
to it that they are neither INSTRUCTED nor
extravaganza.
OUR STATE, CITY AND COUNTY TAXES
This revenue system, admirable as it is for
Great Britain, is not suited to the United
States Our government, while govern
ment of the people and for the people, and
sovereign in the exercise of its constitu-
tional powers, is also government of states.
Each state is entitled to two senator's in the
Federal congress and at least to one repre-
sentative, and to as many more as it is en-
titled to by its population; SO that the little
state of Delaware and each of the states re-
Gently admitted into the Union, with its
single member in the house, has the same
numerical strength in the senate that the
great state Of New York has with its thirty
four members Each state has also q govern
ment OF its own-a governor, q legislature,
q supreme and other courts, and all officers
which are needed to perform official duties in
independent states. Except SO far as the
powers Of their legislatures are limited by
the Federal constitution they are sovereigns.
Each has the power to determine what shall
be the qualification of voters and the manner
in which elections shall be held; each has the
power to contract debts for internal inn
provenents and for other purposes.
Each has, of course, power to tax for the
support of its state government. By each au-
thority is given to its cities and counties to
levy and collect taxes for the payment of
their current expenses, and so freely is this
authority exercised that in some states the
state, county and city taxes amount to near
| ly per cent. upon all real and personal prop
erty. A large part of the personal property
escapes taxation, and the real estate may be
undervalued; but taxes are heavy in all the
states, in some burdenSome. If to tho state
and county and city taxes the indirect taxes
to which consumers are subject by protective
duties upon imports were added, it might be
said that there lis no civilized nation in the
world in which the aggregate Of taxation is
SO high as in the United States. 1t might be
| said also that there is no other country so
able to bear it.
| Now as states, counties and cities are sup
ported by direct taxation upon lands and per-
| sonal property, and these taxes are as heavy
| as large part of the taxpayers are able to
bear, the Federal government must be MAIN
ly supported by duties upon imports. Taxes
upon incomes have been resorted to and might
be again in periods Of emergency, but SO diff
| 6cult was it, and would be again, to make
such taxes equal, where incomes are SO uncer-
tain and are SO easily concealed, that it may
be regarded as fixed fact that neither in
come taxes nor taxes upon the states will be
again resorted to by the Federal government
1t therefore follows that upon import duties
must the chief reliance of the government for
revenue be based.
WAY FREE TRADE Is IMPOSSIBLE.
| Considerable revenue will, as heretofore, be
derived, under an internal revenue system,
from taxes upon domestic manufactures, es-
pecially whisky and tobacco, but the main
reliance of the government must, as has al
| ways been the case, be upon tariff, and as
| the public expenditures are large, and are
more likely to be increased than diminished,
| the tariff can never be a low one Besides
| the people willingly bear taxation upon what
they use, while they would rebel against
much higher taxes if directly assessed
Free trade may be among the things hoped
| for, but it is one that never will be realized
by the people of the United States. Every
intelligent man in tho United States knows
| this, and yet there are men in high places
and managers of influential public journals,
who speak of those who favor a reform of the
| tariff as being free traders or tariff smashers
| As, therefore, from absolute necessity, there
must be tariff, it is of the last Importance
that it should be SO framed as not to be I'M
| necessarily burdensome upon consumers nor
at war with useful branches of domestic in
dustry, nor a bar to free exchanges with for
eign countries. It has been clearly shown by
the advocates of tariff reform that the pres
emit tariff is not of this character; that it is
unnecessarily burdensome to the great body
of the people; that it is at war with many
branches of domestic industry; that it is a bar
to international trade. It was created as a
war measure, in great national emergency,
to strengthen the credit Of the government,
and to secure large revenue. These objects
having been accomplished, it should long since
have been subject to thorough revision to &C.
commodate it to the changed condition of the
country.
| The question, therefore, which for years
has demanded, and now imperatively de-
mands, the attention of congress is not be-
tween q tariff and free trade, but whether the
tariff should be mainly for protection or
mainly for revenue; in other words, whether,
| in the imposition Of duties, revenue should be
the object and protection the incident, or
whether protection should be the object and
revenue the incident. As my opinion upon
this great point has been fully and frequently
expressed, I am not disposed to repeat it.
would only remark in passing that as large
revenues must be derived from duties upon
imports, it will be very difficult SO to modify
the tariff that it will fail to be protective. l
proceed, therefore. to examine what Mr..
Blaine says about the effects Of tariff legisla-
ton upon the public welfare. He takes
broadly the position that not only has the
country been prosperous under protective
tariffs, but that the reverses to which it has
been subject in its onward and upward career
have been, with single exception, the legit-
| innate CONSEQUENCES of an abandonment of the