Hands Off The Income Tax

Much has been said reccntly through the newspapers rclative to the income tax. At one time it is announced that the officials in charge of its execution are opposed to it and will not faithfully execute it; then it is asserted that the president will recommend its repeal and that it wil! be removed from the statute books; again that Senator Hill will renew his fïght against it and will prevent its collection by causing the withholding of the necessary appropriation for executing it. All of this vaporing no doubt has its inception with the few who would be delighted with its repeal. Unquestionably Senator Hill would gladly ally himseif with the New York money kings in opposition to the great body of the people who are vitally interested in the preservation of this just law, if anything could be accomplished thereby, but the large majority in congress in support of it and the very general favor with which it has been received by the people, will prevent its being ridden down by the plutocrats. The income tax is an indispensable feature of a sound revenue system, and it has come to stay. It is founded 011 justice and right, and the revenue which it will yield is needed to meet the necessities of the rovernment. L7 The law exempts $4,000 of income from the tax and levies but two per cent. on aniounts above that sum. It will oppress none, therefore, and will relieve many. It will place a larger share of the governmenta burdens upon those who receive the greatest amoant of governmen protection, and are best able to bear its expense, and will relieve to the some degree the great mass of the people who are least able to bear the load of taxation. There is absoluteiy no reason why the tax should be opposed by the great body of citizens. It will not touch at all the great working masses of the people. Of the farmers who have been obliged to bear the cost of protection, comparatively few will come under its provisions. A majority of professional men will not have to respond to its cali. In fact it is distinctively a tax upon acíumulations and a corresponding exemption of labor. It is a tax upon surplus instead of want. It rests upon and is opposed by those alone who have a superabundance. This class always believes in taxing everybody rather than itself, and through the potency of money and its power of hiding, always escapes paying its just share of taxation. The income tax is therefore a just tax and notice should be served on its wealthy opponents by the great body of peopie who are rightly entitled to the relief it affords, to keep hands off. Instead of its being repealed it should be graded and improved and made a permanent part of our system of taxation. The citizens of Louisiana have in augurated a movemqnt to secure from the government, if possible the sugar bounty which they woult have received had the McKinley act remained on the statute books. A meeting of the commercial bodies of New ürleans was recently held, at which addresses were made and resolutions passed asserting thejustness of the claim for the bounty on the erop of 1894 and 1895. It was the unanimous sentiment of those who would be benefitted, to the extent of $22,000,000, that the paynient of the bounty was a legal and moral obligation, and they propose to get it if possible. Here is a fine object lesson in the workings of the principie of protection. Let the motives to action in this inoveraent be examined from the standpoint of the public advantage to be derived from this expenditure of public funds. Are there any public interests to be subserved by it? or would it it be entirely for the advantage of private individuals and the building up of private fortunes? What public service have the six hundred sugar growers of Louisiana rendered that should entitle them to this large block ot the people's money ? Is there any more reason why they should be made the recipients of government bounty than there is for similarly rewarding the wheat and apple growers of Michigan ? It must be apparent that the spirit which actuates them is purely selfish, and that there is no element of general public advantage in it. It is the same with that which moves all protectionists in seeking government discrimination in favor of their products, vrz.: profits which the legitímate returns of their business will not give. The purpose is wholly niercenary, and is a misuse of public revenue that should never be tolerated in a free government. Comptroller of the Currency James H. Eckels, in an article in the current number of the North American Review, contends that our country can have no undisturbed and substantial prosperity to all classes until the whole currency and banking system of the country is formulated into one harmonious plan in which each part shall be absolutely sound in principie and the embodiment of monitary science. "American financiallegislation,;' he ieclares, "has been of the most perïicious character, and bad legislation n the field of flnance must always exert a destructive iufluence on business. There is scarcely a single act upon the statute book affecting our currency ystem which has not been placed here simply to meet some emergency that confronted the country at the time. in the belief that a difliulty migbt be bridged over." I After all the croaking and predictions of failure, the new bond issue seems not only to have been a success but its success, owing to the foresight of the administration, was assured from the start. The loan Was! subscribed for more than twice over and at the lowest rate of of interest, 2.878 per cent, at which government bonds were ever floated. The bonds were sold to a big syndicate at 117.077, and wil] bring into the treasury $58,538,500. It is also stated that this syndicate promised to draw no gold from the subtreasury with which to pay for them. The syndicate bid for the whole amount was the best bid of all for he government. The secretary of the navy, in his annual report, recommends the construction of three additional battle ships and twelve torpedo boats. On the point of "preparation for war in time of peace," he makes this significant comment: The latest and one of the most impressive lessons in all history is now being taught by China and Japan. A nation, the mostpopulous in the workl, able to put millions of fighting men into the field, is now, after suffering many disasters, scouring Europe and America for munitions of war. It reied upon its numbers. Now it is buyng discarded guns and discarded ammunition, whatever it can get, to aid n repelling the assaults of a people astly inferior to it in numbers. The chairman of the republican state central committee of Wisconsin announces, that he proposes to make a fight, during the coming session of the legislature, against the free pass evil which has made the legislature of that state notorious for years past. If this means as much as the anti-pass resolution adopted at the republican state convention of Michigan two years ago, at Saginaw, it will have mighty little effect on the obnoxious practice. During the last fiscal year the ralling off of receipts on account of postage stamps, stamped envelopes and postal cards amounted to more than $2,000,000. It is yet undetermined wherher the hard times have truck young lovers to the extent of a couple of millions, or whether thj salivary glands of the uation have become exhausted in attempts to make the new issue of postage stamps stick. If Col. Kolb, the defeated i lico-demo-populist candidate for governor of Alabama, persists in his crazy notion of having himself sworn in and seated as governor of Alabama tomorrow, he will probably be like the man who tried to go through a threshing machine, he will not be as handsome, but will know more. The syndicate which received the entire new issue of government bonds is retailing them out at n9, an advance of about 2 per cent. on the purcháse price. Acaording to the Director of the Mint Preston, the gold coinage of the past year was the largest ever executed. It amounted to $38,696,951.