The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1894-04-06
QUESTIONS OF THE DAY.
Single Tax.

JOURNAL of Feby. 23rd, you assert
ed that 'TThey (the Single Taxes
declare that accumulations from
all other sources are gains attribu-
table to personal effort and as such
are sacred as property, which SO
ciety should not touch. F"
Where and when did the single
takers make such a declaration
TIT will be seen that our cores
pondent admits all this in his con
tention as he proceeds. In fact il
is the ground work of the single
tax doctrine. Take nothing for the
use of government but the rent OF
land exclusive of Improvements.
Every line in Henry Georges
works proclaims this doctrine
Ed Henry George certainly has
not and no one has more clearly
demonstrated that nearly all the
great fortunes which have been
accumulated in the last thirty years
are the result of special privilege Of
one kind or another. And oul
friend contends those colossal accu
mutations should not be subject tC
an Income tax because they cannot
be catalogued as trent. ED.
A man died in Pittsburg the
other day leaving $3,000,000. He
may or may not have been partic-
ularly industrious, skilful and
economical, but it was not by virtue
of these qualities that he got sc
rich. 1t was because he went tC
Washington and helped lobby
through bill which, by way OF
protecting American workingmen
against the pauper labor of Europe,
gave him the advantage of a sixty
per cent tariff. To the day of his
death he was staunch protection
list and said "free tradeH would ruin
our "infant industries. Evidently
the $3,0OO,OO0 which he was en-
abled to lay by from his own little
cherub of an "infant industry" did
not represent what he had added to
production. 1t was the advantage
given him by the tariff that enabled
him to scoop it up from other
peoples earnings. Exactly so.
And he did not secure his millions
from the rent of land, and in def
erence to the theory of single tax
his millions should go untaXed.
Nay, say we. Such fortunes should
be sailed not only by simple In
come tax but by a graduated In
come tax. The right of eminent
domain will Justify it. Such stu
pendons aggregations of capital are
a menace to society, and for the
public welfare part OF it should
be taken for the use of society
Ed.
This element of monopoly o
appropriation and spoliation will
when we come to analyze them, b'
found to largely account for all thu
great fortunes. Henry George
Social Problem, Lovell's Ed. pp.61.
You also misapprehend the posi-
ton of the single takers in reference
to the income tax; a majority of tia
single takers will endorse the fol
lowing from the pen of Mr.. JOSEPH
Dana Miller: ave have seen hoy
in England the income tax supplied
the place of a protective tariff. |
seems ungrateful to quarrel with
tax which has served such a goOt
purpose in the past and ma,
serve the same good purpos
aoain :; !; :; i And if thi
tax is to serve, as now seem
probable, as a battering ram to bea
down the gates where the steel raj
lords, the coal barons, the jut
baggers, and all the other chev
alters d'industrie levy toll upol
every Western farmer in his whea
field, upon every black son of tn
South in the cotton lands beneath
the broiling heat-then to quarre
over weapons seems an almos
criminal folly" And the singh
takers are beginning to come to us
since one of their leaders, Hon
Tom L. johnson, subscribes to tn
tax under protest (?), so say ye ell
All right, so that you come. W.
are reminded of an anecdote of on
of the "strong minded" women il
the early days of that crusade, VIII
was opposed to conventional cere