The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1903-07-17

The report was as follows:
Geo. w. Smith Esq.
President Merchants Association.
Dear Sir:-Your Committee on Public
Affairs appointed beg leave to report
as follows:
The first work presented to your COM
mittee which called for immediate &C
ton was the proposal under County
Government to re-establish the old sys-
tenn of levying license on the mer-
chants of the Territory both wholesale
and retail AS the business interests
of the country are already taxed in
other ways for all they can stand your
committee felt it incumbent on them
to combat this proposition with all the
vigor possible An interview was
sought and obtained With the Republi-
can Central Committee in caucus, with
the members elect TO the Legislature
and the views of your committee were
fully and freely expressed as opposed
to any such license We were aided in
this protest by Mr.. F. W. Macfarlane
and Mr. NJ A. Gonsalves and others.
who protested vigorously against any
such enactment. 1t was urged that the
burden already carried by the business
men was all they could bear. and that
a license for the privilege to do bust
ness was unfair and contrary to the
custom in vogue in the large cities of
81 s,.un hrlCinaGE
which called for and required police
supervision. 1t was represented that
il was unfair to license those doing
business locally while commercial men
from the mainland had free access to
our markets without taxes or expenses
of any kind.
We represented that we were taxed
on our real estate. our stock in trade.
and a tax on our incomes. That we
had to pay rents and clerk hire. That
we had to meet the demands of charity
and other subscriptions, and that COM
mercial concerns of the mainland were
us by the taxes imposed
pm US. they being absolutely free of any
We were listened to attentively and
but the consensus of opin-
ion was that a license of some sort
should be imposed, not only as a mat
Ter of revenue, but as a possible check
10 Oriental competition which was
considered as, and is, serious. We were
promised an opportunity to present our
5iews before the legislative committees !
Turing the session, but apparently this
promise was overlooked as we were
lever given an opportunity to appear.
1ut through the individual efforts of
your committee, the County bill was
passed levying a license of the least
nature, and which on the
whole may be benefit TO the business
men on the lines suggested already.
The law as it now stands reads that
IN the annual gross sales of less than
Ten Thousand Dollars the fee shall be
5000. For sales exceeding $4,000, and
lot more than 100000. the fee shall
De 500. For sales exceeding 800, 900
nd not more than 100000, the fee shall
'e $3.50. and for sales exceeding $500, 600,
he fee shall be $780, Your commit
ee feels that in view of the evident
etermination of the law-ma king bodies
o impose a license, the terms as out
med above are not as severe as they
night have been, and we would urge
hat the efforts of the Association be
ontinued looking to the eventual re-
cal of this tax. in conformity with the
ractice in vogue in the older and
anger cities of the mainland
INCOME TAX.
Our efforts were next directed to the
epeal or amendment of the Income
AK, a tax which, without doubt is the
lost Objectionable of any levied on the
usiness and other interests of the COM
lunity. Not that the business men (
f the Territory desire to shirk any just
TX levied for the interests of the coun-
~. but because they object to the
lquisitive and prying nature of the
lcome Tax law which is almost Who'll
paid by the business men whose {
ooks and accounts are arbitrarily {
pened for public inspection. 1t is
that a large percentage of
lose who should pay income tax es-