New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-08-21

| III at time III the future, "ueH AHS
has ceased and there are no war prohts,
to tax these particular swollen fort
unes?
Would Tax Profits Heavily
$50 / insist that we proceed TO take
the largest share of these war prohts
that it is possible TO take in this con-
junction of affairs and to devote those
war profits to the prosecution of the
particular enterprise which itself
makes the war profits.
1.-THE distinguished chairman of the
Committee on Finance said: Who can
successfully attack the wisdom or
equity Of the bill? Certainly not as
applied TO this class of corporations
which, while it brings to the govern
nent a tax of "A per cent upon the
Fronts, leaves TO the common stock
holders-and they are the owners OF
the property-afte all expenses and all
taxes have been paid, net return OF
$50 share upon stock that represents
probably much less than so per cent Of
actual investment
Pause, please, and see just this al
gument of the majority Of the commit
tee submitted upon this bill. Who can
successfully attack the wisdom or the
equity OF the bill? | pass the economic
view, which. of course, will be given to
il By the great corporations with their
tremendous profits in this war, but the
wisdom and the equity Of the bill in
the amount that r. raises will be at
tucked and will be questioned, justly
attacked, legitimately questioned, by
the men and the women who give their
sons to the cause, and the men and the
- krVr har ta =
on their tea and coffee and their post
age and their little things Of everyday
life, taxed in order that a sum shall be
raised that may exc out the great sum
from these particular corporations that
have profited by the war.
Steel Trust Referred To
AIN the portion Of the remarks
quoted the chairman was speaking OF
the figures of the great steel corpora
ton, and refer TO this corporation not
in an invidious sense at all, but because
il has been used by way of example
upon this floor again and again in this
debate. Just imagine what we do! We
give TO the steel corporation dividend,
first upon its preferred stock. Then, /
use the language OF the distin-
guished Senator who is chairman
OF the Finance Committee, We per-
nit it TO pay all its expenses.
and all it's taxes of every kind and
every nature, and hen We give to this
steel corporation in our time OF stress
and in our time Of dire need, when
every mans heart is bleeding for his
loved ones that 60 beyond the sea, a
dividend equal to more than has been
Paid in upon its caoital stock.
+ba naon1a LAUGH N gcorp
Congress THAI deals thus tenderly with
war profits while dealing with such
severity with the common human clay
to be put up against the gun! To the
Steel Corporation is returned under the
bill nearly S300.000,000 war profits for
the year; not of ordinary profits, mind
you, but of war profits, computed un-
der the terms of this bill; Congress
hands to the Steel Corporation because,
forsooth, it has coined the blood and
the bone and the sinew of the land
into the dollars, the monstrous sum
of nearly S300,000,00O. Can you JUS
tify il? Can you justify it particu-
larly at this time, when you demand
the maximum human sacrifice?
"The distinguished Senator who is
chairman of the Finance Committee
says: But, truly, this is a war profit
tax Oh, no; this is no war profit tax.
This is tax by which you just touch
the war profits of those who have
grown wealthy out of the conflict. 1t
is but the shadow and shade of taxa
ton, with profits undreamed of still
remaining with the corporation.
England's Great Profit Tax
England to-day takes so per cent
I of the war profits there to run the
war. Do you realize how much we
: take based upon the minimum of 49,
/ 100000 war profits for the last
year? We take additionally under this
/ bill less than 20 per cent and Eng
/ land takes to-day so per cent of war
/ profits.
"Oh, the generosity Of the United
States, that Of an income Of SlO,OOO,OOO
| in time of stress will take s5,OOO,OO0
and hand back to the impoverished
possessor of that income S5,0O0,OOO as
WE'LL
"What a terrible thing it is, what
an assault upon business, what an en-
deavor to prevent the usual and ordl-
nary currents of trade from proceed
ing in the usual and the ordinary way
that we give back to man with an
income OF ten million dollars, hVe mill
ion dollarsl Think how cramped he
will be in h-s living in the next year
if he has only five million dollars upon
which he may for himself and his fam
Z lily obtain the necessaries Of life. A
generous Congress, indeed. ii is, tender,
indeed, of these incomes, which stops
with 100000 and never puts another
cent or another percentage by this bill
upon incomes that exceed 100000.
"Why Not Take Large Amount"
"Of incomes in this time. war profits
in this crisis, why should we not take
the largest sum that can be taken, the
largest amount that il is conceivable
may be taken, and not leave, OF course,
the recipient of the income in rags or
in tears or in starvation or in squalor?
| Why should we not take what we may
for the public defence and the public
veal? That we should take from these
swollen war profits the very highest
percentage as high as does Eng
land herself-it seems 10 me, goes abb
solutely without saying, and that we
should increase our income taxes pro-