The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1895-02-13
ligently directed and the product placed

ligently directed and the product placed
where 1t is wanted.
The presence of community necessarily
produces land value.
Why, then, are the farms Of New Eng
land abandoned in the midst Of dense popu-
lations? The community gave no value to
those acres, because there was no profit in
using them. There are probably sand-bar-
rens in New Jersey, within SO miles of New
York city, not worth 81 an acre. The value
or land, therefore, does not depend on prOx-
unity to population, but to productivity-in
usefulness to mani d.
But the community wouldn't produce
wheat or any other product to the value of
a cent if some individual did not spend his
individual labor on it.
1 hope Mr. Hodgson sees the difference.
He also says that land value, like all other
values. is the result of labor. OF course in
a certain sense. but in a different sense
Other values result from the labor spent in
producing the valuable thing. Land values
do not result from the labor spent in pro-
ducing the land, does it?
Think 1t out little more carefully, Mr..
H., and then let know where you are at.
OF course there is unearned increment
in railways, etc, but it is in the monopoly
OF right of way; not in the ties, rails, cars
or engines.
(The valuable thing produced is not the
lahd but the food necessary for human life
that can be raised on it. No man can eat
the earth. The only thing that gives value
to the land is the fact that from it, by
human labor, can be produced something to
eat or something to wear. Wherein is the
dlHerence between labor using the very sub
stance of the soil, to produce wheat, and
labor, using the iron to make a useful
tool or weapon? And why will the argu-
ment that applies to one not apply to the
other? And if man can not own the land,
now can he own the ores of the EARTH or
the timber, or the clay, or the stone, or the
lime, or the sand, or the water that springs
from the earth, or, in short, anything?I d.
Critics who point to the abandoned farms
OF New England as an argument against
the single tax, forget that these farms have
been abandoned under the present system of
taxation, that taxes the farmer on every
thing he does to make his farm useful and
earn a living.
Many of those farmers would be abso-
lutely free from all tax under the single
tax system, for the reason that the bare
land has no value to tax.
c. J. BUELL.
(Now look at the inconsistency of this
The farmer abandons his farm because the
taxes, under the present SYSTEM are too
heavy for him to bear; but he would stay
on the farm if you piled everybody else's
taxes on the land including his farm!
And the Single Takers propose to pile all
admits that you could not collect any taxes
| from the farms of New England, because
| no man can live on them and make a liv-
| ing.
The trouble in America today is not to
| get land, but to be able to occupy it profit
| ably. Three-fourths of the farmers of this
| state would trade their farms tomorrow
| for ten dollars acre cash. The thing we
| are short of is not land, but prosperity The
| speculative owners of property in our great
| cities are being slowly devoured by taxes
and assessments, and would gladly sell for
one-half what the land was worth five years
| ago. And now Mr.. Buell. proposes to take
the taxes off the only men who are making
money-the money lenders, the railroads,
land owners-so that some poor man may
| crawl under the overwhelming burden and
| make home there.
| And this fad is being used by the Demo-
| cratic party, through the help of Henry
| George, to divide up the Peoples party and
| lead honest men away from real reform
That's what George was brought here for
| last fall; and he led off thousands of men
| to vote the Democratic ticket, which has
| never adopted the Single Tax platform,
| and never will; for it is as much under the
| control of the plutocracy, in this state as
| the Republican party. l. d.