The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1913-04-01
PEOPLES FORUM

r of The Virginian:

To the Editor of The Virginian:
sir,--Your editorial of Wednesday, Grab
bling and Grasping Land" is the greatest cues
ton of today in Virginia, but you mentioned
only farm land The right to land (access
10 the means of production) is needed by all the
people, Every one should own his home in our
Your words are very good as far as they go,
but why do you put so much stress on inducing
settlers TO come from the outsider You seem to
forget that we have quite lot of boys and
girls born here In Virginia We have no race
suicide" here, but the virile stock Of Piedmont
Virginia is still producing families of four to
ten
evil we have of letting our best men and women
leave the state, driven away by the social
taboo" again manual labor, by that hidden
power known as land monopoly"
People who do not know the local conditions
wonder why so much Virginia land goes begging
at absurdly low prices. 1t would take a vol
umne to tell the many reasons for this strange
condition, but the professor of economics would
say that much of this low-price land is DE
low the margin Of cultivation that is, there Isl
much better land that is being only partly
used that no wise man should put his labor on
such undesirable land until circumstances and
community needs shall raise the low priced
land above the margin of cultivation"
Now Virginia has quite lot of good land
Also though it is in spots, we can beat the
Illinois corn belt in bushels of corn We can
raise better wheat than Matoba, in spots Our
apples better than Hood river fruit, Our
blue grass is better than Kentucky. in places but
most of these desirable spots such gold
mines for the fortunate owner that they are
sirable land the social and commercial
centers that is making rich the owners.
Since the War Between the States the chan
neIs of trade have changed entirely the old
cial and commercial centers. and there has been
"A corresponding shift of land values. hut few
people realize the why and the wherefore of 1t
all
Some shrewd men have become rich by sim
ply buying. holding ON to the title to such
land which the community needs, or wills need
1t is idle to talk of men selling their land
at less than it's value from philanthropic mo-
tives but the community should wake up and
realize that the people have rights in all such
increase in land values see in and around
the cities.
No law can compel man to sell his land, but
the community has a right to appropriate to the
public use that portion of land values that is
the result of the presence of population. That
is the people can put the tax assessments on
such land so high that the speculator would be
eliminated, and the only who could af-
ford to hold any desirable land. farm, a
lot for house factory, would be he who need
ed ii to- for himself.
Why not tax land values instead of taxing
business and industry? Strange to say taxing
land has the opposite effect TO taxing capital
Taxation ecares capital away. and diminishes
production by labor. but taxing land stimulates
production, for the owner must it or sell it
to some who will use IT,
This is the way to build UP virginia, and to
get and keep a self-supporting population.
stop taxing the products of labori
Don't tax capital,
Tax the rapidly growing land values that are