The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-09-22

-,,,, sxstems of financing corporations th., hordholders and stockholders are all os them iii sense joint investors anu a co,poratiun income tax ought 10 iieiuuo them all CDder the conditions tiia' eA- isted with reference to the cohs,i.u.ion' 1t seems to me clear that the corpora.,on tox is an equitable burden. one reaching active business, not too heavy to retaro if but enough to collect a substantial rev onue from those who are successful in business.
 "ft is a tax easily collected, one that no col rora ton can escape, one In WHICH perjury cannot play any important part at all in an effort to escape
 Income Tax.
 Another feature of it is that incident aliy 1t will give the federal government an opportunity to secure most valuable information In respect to the conduct of corporations, their actual financial condi- ton which they are required to show in general terms in a public return. In addition the law provides the means un- der proper limitations of Investigating fully and in detail their course of busi- ness.
 This is to be done only after the com- missioner of internal revenue shall have have ascertained from evidence that their 
 Up tn this time we have no adequate statistics concerning our corporations. Even the stockholders, whatever their right may be to know the course of busi- ness of corporations are generally in a state of complete ignorance and any in strumentality by which the corporation shall be compelled to disclose the accur acy in a general statement. of their con- ditlons ccreinly makes for the public good 1ndiret tly it would help very much in another revision, whenever that shall come. beca use corporations engaged in business said to be affected by the tariff will have on record in Washington their exact financial condition from year to year in ,he matter of their incomes, their expenditures and their debts
 Having said this much with respect to the corporation tax as it is, want to say the income tax amendment as proposed by Congress to the state.
 Assuming the constitutional authority to having been given, I am opposed to a general individual income tax, except in times of great national stress. I am opposed to it because of the difficulty al- ready alluded to. that it puts such pre- nlums on perjury as to have led other governments to abandon that method of levyng an income tax and of imposing the tax wherever possible on the source of income in the hands of those who are not ultimately to pay it. The in stance I have already given of an in- crease of 100 per cent in the proceeds of the tax levied in England when changed from a personal tax to one upon the sources of the income, like our cor operation tax, Is most forcible argn- gment in favor of the propostion-that the ginuuisitorial feature of an income tax levied directly, upon the person tele graphed with the inevitable opportunities for escape from the tax by use of per jury, makes 1t desirable of possible to avoid such a direct method of levy ing an income tax.
 National Tax Law.
 But I am most strongly in favor of addition by the states of the amendment authorizing Congress to impose an in come tax without apportioning 1t among the states according to population; and I am strongly in favor of this because in times of great stress of war or some other calamity were to visit this coun- try and we should need to strain our re- sources, the income tax would be one of the essential instruments by which we could collect large amount Of money to enable us to meet the exigencies It has been so in the past, for during the civil war it was understood that the levy of an income tax without apportionment was constitutional and such tax was levied and collected. And l consider it in the constitutional as at present con strued an element weakness on the part of the central government not to be able in times of emergency to levy such q tax.
 ..Of course, 1t will be said by those who are opposed to the income tax that there will be a disposition to impose a direct income tax merely as means of collecting ordinary income taxes in nor mai times and that no distinction should be made in the constitution by which the power to levy such tax can be limited to times of emergency should