The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-03-14
the term of direct taxes and valid only when apportioned among the states.

pealed to the courts for relief, would
 any court grant it? Not at all.
 The tax on interest of United States
 bonds, MT. Choate said, was tax on
 the bond itself, as in the case of rents,
 and therefore could not be legally col
 lected The interest on a bond issued
 by the United States or any other body
 polite, he said, was a part of the bond itself and inseparable from 1t. What
 value to me-" he asked, lis a bond of
 the United States payable thirty years
 hence but for the fact that in the mean
 time it promises to pay me interest
 semi-annually at the rate of three per
 cent.?"
 Concluding this part of the argument,
 MT. Choate insisted that he had estab-
 lished beyond controversy the proposi-
 tion that tax on rents is tax on
 lands, and therefore a direct tax. "The
 other side had our briefs two weeks, and the only answer or suggestion they
 have been able to make is that of the
 attorney general that the law taxes
 rents as money in a mans pockets and not as rents."
 MT. Choate sketched in most in
 teresting and instructive way the com promise made in the constitutional convention relating to the matter of
 taxation by which the states surren- dered to the United States the sole right to levy excises, duties and i'm ports and to control nd regulate com merce between the states and the right to levy a direct tax of revenue for the maintenance of tho government itself. It was by that bargain that the adoption of the constitution was bought, and the question now was, said MT. Choate, whether that bargain should be repudiated and the seaboard states should take back the price paid for it.
 Representation and direct taxation went in hand and hand, said MT Choate. It was the only thing that the framers of the constitution said twice in that instrument. What was the reason? It was that those men were fresh from the conflict over the
 injustice of taxation without repre- sentation and they proposed to prevent, as far as they could, the possibility of such an extent as is proposed in the present law, that the representatives of a large portion of the population should vote to compel the smaller proportior of population to pay more than their just part of the taxes
 Coming to the effects of the decisions of the court upon the propositions laid down by him MT Choate asserted that the question involved, that rents are inseparable from real estate had never been decided by the court. Our adver- saries," he continued, say there is no question here; that we have lost the case in advance under the decisions of the court Let's see" He then re- viewed the issues presented in the several cases referred to-, ending with | the Springer case. Tn that case" said Mir Choate, MT. Springer sued for the recovery of a years income tax, when | he was a representative of the outside | world not a representative in congress as he has been since and he averre9 | that he had earned $5O,OOO that year He was a lawyer and advocated his l own cause. Probably he was an ex- ceptlon to the rules which usually ob- tatns in those cases"
 There was nothing in tho pleadings ! in that case nor in the decision" said | MT. Choate, which precluded an af- frmance of the proposition for which | he contended."
 MT Choate then proceeded to give the court at considerable length, his | definition of the uniform clause in the Mir Garter, he said, had | explained it meant that the tax should | extend throughout the United States and related to the plan and method of collecting the tax. Counsel felt con strained to concede something to the phrase, but the attorney general in himself representing the august power of the legal branch of the government used the sponge and sweeping his arm across the face of tho instrument calm ly expunged the word as ''mere sur plusage."
 The meaning of the word MT, Choate said. was that in the levying of inn posts, duties and excises whenever done ther should be equal relations be- tween the government and each citizen 
 Justice White-Would not that con- struction destroy all specific duties provided in every tariff act?
 MT. Choate--We do not claim such a right. We do not say that every like ilIlGlS Sllill pdy tAiV SebiiiV Ae'NS OA | duty, or that every article of a. special class shall pay the same rate or that every article of a special class shall pay the same rate.
 Justice White-Do not all the de- eislons of a late court support the term equal and uniform" establish the fact hat you cannot tax a man with one lollar's worth of property at the same 'ate you do on ten dollars?
 Mr. Choate-I think not.
 Not a single decision had been found n either the federal or state books, Mr. Choate said, that varied from the meaning of the word conteded for by himself and associate counsel-that he tax shall be equal as between man md mann This brought him, MT. Jhoate said to the monstrous doctrine by the representatives of he government that the inequalities or supposed inequalities of a tariff bill ,ould be compensated for by irregulari ies in another form of taxation.
 "Is this court ready to go to that { ength?" he asked. Before leaving this branch of the case, MT. Choate said, here was an unvarying line of deci ions by state courts confirming the proposition contended for by him. And ( t was illustrated and strengthened by