Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1891-02-05
SINGLE TAX DEPARTMENT.
TAXATION AND THE LAND VAL
CE TAX.

import to a nation as is the question OF
taxation, it is important that it should
be investigated and weighed not only in
its present aspects, but also in its his
torical features.
| therefore propose to present few
gleanings from history that may be of
especial interest to those who look upon
the land value tax as the ideal tax.
Space forbids giving more than a brief
glance at the subject: but it may serve
as guide to those who wish to go more
fully into the matter.
The historical study of the subject of
taxation is attended with some diff
Guilty, as most historians, while record
ing battles and court intrigues. have
paid too little attention to the economic
side of history.
The idea that the earth is the COM
mon heritage of man, is as old as hui
man intelligence, and the contributing
of individuals of wealth and services 30
the common good as old as society But,
SO far as [ can discover, the idea of max
ing every man contribute, not in pro-
portion to his wealth, but in proportion
to the value of natural or economic OPP
pOrtunitieS he controls, is matter of
modern history. Take, for instance,
the Jews. They had d system of land
tenure to which the lords of England
could give hearty assent; for the land
of family, even if it passed from pos
session, reverted back each fifty years.
They had system of taxation, but it
was a tenth of the actual product: not
of the potential product.
ID L.
highly developed systems of taxation of
property, occupations and individuals.
In renting of the ager publicus, or pub
lie lands, like the Jews they had some
thing akin to land value tax. In Rome
the tenant of the ager publicus gave a
tenth of the agricultural product to the
government called decumon. The oc-
cupiers of pasture lands paid tax on
their f1ocks called scripton, though the
rate is not known. The salt mines were
rented out and the rent or tax was called
salmon. The other mines We're also
rented out by the government.
But in passing, as we may naturally,
from Rome over to England, we find
that while the primitive England that
succeeded Roman domination had no sci
entific idea of land tax, yet they had
something that was akin, though it also
was based not upon control of natural
opportunities, used or unused, but upon
actual production. The ship tax, which
might be an exception, was proportion
ed to population. The Danegeld was
proportional to the cultivation. When,
after Norman conquest, the feudal sys-
tenn began to develop, the Danegeld or
hidage disappeared and the carncate
was employed, Norman term of SIM
liar import. Both the hidage and earn
cate, from which the tax looks its name,
were a crude measure of land. The
carncate was determined by what eight
pair of oxen and a pillow could cultivate
in one season. and was probably equal
to about one hundred acres.
Then came the scutage or shield tax,
which the knights, who were also land
lords, paid in communication of those OBJ
legations to the crown. This was also a
direct tax upon his whole property. AS
the English became more and more an
industrial people, large proportion of
the taxes very gradually shifted upon
the different forms of industry. Though
in 1892, a bad year, the Landlords
paid the whole tax"
AS the land owners We're also the rul-
ing classes it is easy to see how it was
they gradually transferred the burdens
upon industry, where it largely remains
to this day.
In Cromwelrs time 1656) a taxing act
was passed (see Stephen Dowelfs His
tory of Taxation, vol Ill, pages 76 and
~, which provides that
The tenants of houses and lands rated
to the tax are required to pay the whole
tax rate to use such houses and lands;
and power is given them to deduct on
payment of their rent SO much tax as,
in respect of rent, the landlord ought to
bear. This deduction all landlords, me-
date or immediate, according to their
respective interests, are required to al
low, upon receipt OF residue of rent. In
short, payment of the tax is consid-
cred pro tanto a payment of rent to the
landlord. Power is given to the divis-
ional commission to settle differences
between landlords and tenants.
The word rent, though, in this act is
used, not in the strict economic sense of
ground rent, but in the popular sense.
According to J. Thoroid Rogers
I LCouoHllC IIlei pIttdlibH Oh history,
p. 457), Cromwell's heavy direct tax was
thrown off as intolerable after the re-
storatiOn.
In 1851 the great English philosopher,
DR.. John Locke, published a pamphlet
entitled Considerations on the lower
ing of interest and raising the value of
money!
This contains, according to Dugald
Stewart, an eminent lecturer on political
economy the first part of this century,
the first written advocacy of a territor
ial tax, which was afterward developed
scientifically by the great French school
the founder.
The following extracts will show it's
tenor:
A tax laid upon land seems hard to
the land owner, because it is SO much
money going visibly out of his pocket;
and therefore, as an ease to himself, the
landlord is always forward to lay it on
commodities. But if he will thoroughly
consider it and examine the effect he
will find that he buys this seeming ease
at very dear rate. And although he
pay not this tax Immediately out of his
own purse, yet his purse will find it by
a greater want of money there at the
end of the year than that comes to, with
the lessening of his rents to boot, which
is settled and lasting evil that will
stick upon him beyond the present pay
ment.
He supports this position at length,
and concludes by saying: