Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1891-02-13

SAN. NuCFtloie. Gllc liiItl uOlNleTS 1nuSu.
And whether it We're not better for him
to have it laid directly. where it will at
last settle. than to let II come to him
by the sinking of his rents, "Eich when
they are once fallen every one Knows
are not easily raised again. let him con.
slider.
The farmers of New England might
we'll ponder those lines. They might
find in abandoned fields. lowered farm
values Il striking confirmation of their
truth.
In 1862 the real estate tax. or land tax
including the improvements. was re-im-
posed, p:obablyin measure as u result
of the teachings of Locke. 1t was as
sessed at four shillings on the pound;
valuation. This tax. though it fell
some years to only a shilling on the
pound, remained in force until the time
of Pitt, who in 179S made it perpetual
and redeemable at four shillings on the
pound at the valuation of 1892. This
tax remains to this day: and though
originally it was placed upon land and
| improvements. it has in the course of
time resolved itself into a tax on econo-
mic. or ground rent only. and the only
direct tax which that rent now bears in
England. According to the same Dugald
Stewart in 1896 Mr.. John Asgill. in !
treatise entitled. 'Several assertions
proved in order to create another spe-
cles OF money than gold and silver" adj
vocates the same opinion with respect
too territorial tax. This treatise was
in advocacy of a land bank proposed
to the House of Commons in 1898 by u
DIR. Hugh Chamberlayne. l will make
but brief quotations:
| Man deals in nothing but earth. The
merchants are the factors OF the world
to exchange one part of the earth for
another. The King himself is fed by
the labors of the OK: and the clothing of
the army and the victualing of the navy
must all be paid for to the owners of tha
soil as the ultimate receivers.
Stewart also quotes Jacob Wander
bits pamphlet, Essay to make money
plentiful" published in 1884
1T all taxes We're taken off goods and
levied on andsand houses only, the gem
tlemen would have more net rent left
out of their estates than they have now
when taxes are almost wholly levied on
goods. That land gives all we have.
would be self-evidcnt. if we did not i'm
port many goods which are the produce
OF other nations But this makes no
alteration iii the case. since the quantity
OF foreign goods which we import can
not continually be of greater value than
the goods we export; because this in
the end must exhaust our cash, and so
put an end to that excess rThereforo
the goods we import stand only instead
of those we export: and consequently.
the land gives not only all we have of
our own produce, but virtually all we
receive from other nations. - x
That the land must pay all taxes in what
manner soever they may be levied: /.
proposition which might perhaps be as
suned as virtually implied in a self-evi-
dent truth, that what gives all must
pay all.
Mr.. Vanderbilt goes on to elaborate
. his views regarding taxation at length
| Thus, commencing with Locke, we have
really the crude presentation of the sin
. gle tax upon land stated in the Language
: of that day. But there was soon tt
: arise in France /; school of economists
4 the physiocrats. characterized by great
5 scholarship and wonderful intellectual
l ability, unsurpassed in unseltish devo
f ton to humanity, which should bring
, economics into scientific form, and
| should urge with great earnestness and
power the import unique or single
taN.-James Middleton. New Orleans,
La, in The Standard.