The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1896-08-21
THE S|NGLE-TAX IDEA.
A Letter From George w. Loehr
Explaining the
System.
Believes 1t Would, if Put in Opera.
ton, Be of Incalculable Benefit
to Taxpayers.

10 taxpayers.
The following letter has been received
from G. w. Loehr regarding the single
tax:
To the Editor Daily Morning Caty-sIR: The
| impartial position taken by The CALL in fully
and truthfuliy publishing all articles pertain
| ing to the public welfare prompts me in adj
| dressing you this letter, hoping it may be the
means of establishing IN the minds of the
public the benefits resulting from the system
! OF which it speaks.
AS "a rule man seldom rises above his envi-
ronments. The evolution of humanity to
! higher civilization has been struggle be-
| tween ignorance and superstition on one side,
and a few, who have with the aid of reason
and the courage OF their convictions risen
above their surroundings ana stood forth as
everlasting heroes in the turmoil of progress.
Those who have had the courage to do this
have been termed "cranks," and the works
they have written found but few readers. The
world was not yet ready for the reforms which
| they advocated; it needed practical illus
traton OF the evils that would result from
continuation of our landed system before the
world was ready to see and then adopt the
measures advocated. The immense strain
between capital and labor must of necessity
find its only relief in the measures herein ad-
vocatod.
Now that the true political science known
as the 'single tax" (Which, by the way, is
misnomer the system being really no tax
at all) is making such rapid strides, and must
without a doubt take its place among the
form measures in coming elections a few
words on what it is and what it is expected to
do will not be amiss at the present moment.
A large number of reform measures are
being advocated in regard to taxation, nearly
all having a tendency to the same end, name
ly: taxation OF land values only for all COM
munity purposes.
To the ordinary thinker it mast stand to
reason that the more thing be taxed the
more tendency there is to discourage it. The
natural tendency of everything, animal and
vegetable, is to grow in perfect freedom. This
is divine law OF the Creator and an I'M
answerable argument. By putting an iron
band around young tree you retard its
growth. 1t is well-known fact that the Chi
nese women retard the development of their
feet by compression. Even the human mind
that grand faculty that distinguishes US from
the animal and makes the nearest approach to
our Maker, develops in ratio to the amount
of education it receives. Therefore it follows
that in freedom, and in freedom only, can any
thing develop and attain its highest perfec-
ton. The prosperity of any people is meas
ured by their intellige nee and their means and
facilities OF production. Therefore, to tax or
fine that which tends to prosperity is 10 dis
courage production, and to discourage produc-
ton is to lower wages and to increase the price
of commodities and the necessaries OF life.
This is the policy the world has been follow
ing since time immemorial, and the only rea-
son to-day that political economy is being
given the attention that it is is because we
have gone to the end of our rope. and If we
don't retrace our steps, we will hang ourselves.
We stand on the brink of our civilized world;
the ne xt step westward takes us to the pagan
world that we ran away from thousands of
years ago. Surely no one can be SO foolish as to
think that this world could not support
larger population than it at present has.
The cry OF overproduction is sometimes
raised, and yet we see hundreds aye, thou
sands, of people whose hunger and wants are
not appeased. There must be some lncon-
sistency here. Surely there can be no. over
prod uction when people have not enough food
to eat and enough clothes to wear. / should
rather call it underconsumption.
We have now come to that point In our in
vestigation where we must seek the reason
why, in q country of such large area. with
nominal population, land ground able TO produce
nearly everything the world desires, men are
earn their daily bread, and not finding it; and
when they do, receiving such wages as will
hardly support themselves, to say nothing of
their wives and families.
A great fault of the human family to-day,
when starting out on reform measures, is to
battle with effects and neglect the primary
causes of the evil What man, be he the most
uneducated tiller of the soil, would start out
to eradicate weeds by cutting them off at the
surface OF the ground, would he not dig down
and remove the roots and yet all the great
reform parties, temperance people and labor
organiZationR are all fighting effects, all
claiming to be right. while the ''ignis fatuusn
is Turing them on to their own destruction.
What then is the primary cause of the evil
that is to-day filling jails and our insane asy-
lums, making prostitutes OF women and plac-
ing premium upon drunkenness and suicide,
while the products of industry are taxed to
their utmost to keep up this damnable retro
grade movement OF our civilization Are
these the results of mans development in
freedom, or are they the results of present CON-
ditions over which he has, or thinks he has,
no control? Cannot this entire brood of evils
be laid at the door of poverty and want. the
result of bad laws? Anything, therefore, that
will better mans condition will certainly
lessen crime. Such state of affairs is what
the single tax will bring about 1t has already
been shown that taxing thing has ten
dency to discourage it, hence we are going to
stop taxing industry and production. because
these are the mainStays OF existence, and to
discourage them is to say that we have no
right to that which nature decreed should be
ours, but our entire revenue for all commu-
nity purposes, we propose to take from land
values created by reason OF the presence OF the
community.
This will be direct tax on land values as q
loca ton The reason We claim this to be no
tax is that the sum required by the COM
munity must be equal to the value which they
give to land by reason of their presence and
industry. BY thus letting the land values
furnish the entire revenue as before shown,
we naturally tend to discourage land specua-
ton which has been the curse of mankind in
all ages, the worst of all CANDLES 1t will also
have the effect of throwing thousands of acres
of good land at present held out OF use for
speculative purposes on the market at the
annual rental value, according to its location,
for when by taxation you destroy speculative
value in land no one Will hold land except for
its best use, in doing which he must employ
labor and use material, both Of which Will
assist in solving the labor problem.
Regarding the wages of labor / would say
this, that the natural tendency OF man is to
work for himself in preference to working for
some one else. With the land open to produc-
ton, and every man able and willing to apply
his labor to natural opportunities, labor would,
as consequence, become scarce. Capital, I'M