Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1891-01-16
SINGLE TAX DEPARTMENT.
RELIEVE THE FARMER.

n
!. der, than it does now. Land, under his
, system will continue to be owned by in
t dividuals precisely as it is now. 1t VII
1 descend to heirs and be devised to lega
5 tees precisely as it is now. Not a Sin
? gle law relative to land ownership ano
control now upon our statute books viii
be changed in carrying out his doctrines
to the fullest extent. A mans right
under the present system, to enjoy the
exclusive possession of a tract of land is
conditioned upon the payment of tax
upon its value. And so it will be under
the George system, without the slight
est change in the machinery now in use
for the assessment and collection OF
taxes on real estate.
Henry George simply proposes to re-
form our present absurd and barbarous
system of levying taxes, a system which
discourages enterprise and thrift and
encourages monopoly and greed.
Take the case of a young man here in
Texas, who, we will say, by working on
shares, has finally saved up little cap
ital, and who now proposes to become
the owner of farm of his own. He is
going to get a piece of wild land, break
it up, grub it, fence it and cultivate it,
household utensils, wife, plenty of
children and a little money. lie does
not dream of getting rich; he merely
hopes to secure a competency by faith
full work He looks around for loca-
ton. He naturally desires to settle near
town, where he will be handy to market,
and where his family can enjoy the So
ciety of neighbors and the benefits of
church and school privileges. He finds
just such town. He finds tens of
thousands of acres of vacant land all
around this town and close to it. Just
the kind OF land he is looking for. No
one is using it, and it lies there idle,
waiting for the hand of industry to be
applied to it. But he finds that the
spectators have got there ahead of him
They are keeping it for an increase in
value In order to get hold of
a hundred acre tract of this land
he must mortgage himself to
some Spectator. He must bind himself
to pay over to a Spectator all that he
can possibly save in excess of the barest
possibilities of life for term of years.
He feels that the land is already above
his means, so he turns away, drives out
twenty miles and buys hundred acres
out of thousand acre tract held by
another speculator, for which he pays
$500, and then settles down in the will
derness
His children can scarcely get to school
at all. 1t is miles to any church. He
has to haul his cotton five miles to the
nearest gin. He wastes great deal of
time on the poor roads between his
home and the town where he does his
marketing, hauling his produce over
thousands and tens of thousands of acres
OF land just as we'll adapted to raising
it as that which he has been compelled
to select so far away. He works to far
greater disadvantage than he would had
he been permitted to settle nearer town,
hence he produces less, and therefore
must buy less.
Now. why have the spectators seized
this vacant land and taken it out of the
reach of this Industrious farmer? Do
they propose to use it? Do they propose
to do any thing with it by which labor
can be employed, and the sum total of
the worlds wealth increased? Do they
propose to invest a dollar in the cultiva-
ton and improvement of this land? BY
no means. They propose that some one
else shall do the work and have tho
worry, and take the chances of the crops
failing. Yet they propose, nevertheless,
to get rich out of this land. How? By
holding it in idleness, by driving labor
OH from it, and compelling labor to pass
1t by and settle on far less eligible
and desirable tracts. One of these spec
ulators paid $1,000 for piece of this
land. 1t is now worth SIS, 900. Whose
labor has put an additional
value of $4,000 upon this
piece of vacant land? Not the labor
OF the present owner, nor the labor of
any previous owner, because no one has
ever done stroke of work upon the
land. 1t has resulted from the increase
OF population. 1t has been put there by
the community. The Spectator sells the
tract for IS, 600 and thus makes 81, 900.
he has not, however, increased the sum
total OF the worlds wealth one iota by
the transaction. He has simply drawn
to himself 81, 900 worth of wealth which
other people have produced-wealth
which labor has been compelled to paw
over to him for the bare privilege of
access to one of the gifts of nature
Well, our young farmer, after year's
hard work in fencing, breaking the sod.
and putting up buildings has add I'd $500
worth OF improvement to that hundred
acre tract of land. BY the sweat of his
brow he has actually increased the sum
total of the wealth of the world to the
extent OF $500. What happens now?
Why, the tax-collector comes around
and fines him for it by taxing these i'm
provements. He has to yield up to the
government in taxes on these improve
ments portion of the fruits of his indi-
vldual industry. He is robbed on ac-
count OF taxes on these improvements of
a portion of the values produced solely
by his individual industry. The com
munlty did not put this additional value
OF $500 upon his land. He put it there
by his own hard work. But who is put
ting values yearly on the vacant land
which the Spectator is hold
Jc l.