Apportionment (politics)

“ No such apportionment can possibly be made without doing gross injustice to the many for the benefit of the favored few in particular states. Any attempt upon the part of congress to apportion among the states, upon the basis simply of their population, taxation of personal property or of incomes, would tend to arouse such indignation among the freemen of America that it would never be repeated. ”

“ But so long as a State's apportionment plan reasonably achieves, in the light of the State's own characteristics, effective and balanced representation of all substantial interests, without sacrificing the principle of effective majority rule, that plan cannot be considered irrational. ”

“ That the apportionment in the one case is made in relation to mileage and in the other to the value of capital 'used, invested or employed within this state' is of no significance, since the states have considerable latitude in the selection of fair methods of making apportionment. ”

“ On the other hand, where the great majority of voters are to be exempted from taxation, and where, accordingly, they will feel that they have no personal interest in governmental expenditures, they will be likely to take little or no pains to see that there is a fair apportionment of taxes which others must pay, or any economy in governmental expenditures for which others must provide. ”

“ If, in the changes of wealth and population in particular States, apportionment produced inequality, it was an inequality stipulated for, just as the equal representation of the States, however small, in the Senate, was stipulated for. ... "Moreover, whatever the reasons for the constitutional provisions, there they are, and they appear to us to speak in plain language. It is said that a tax on the whole income of property is not a direct tax in the meaning of the Constitution, but a duty, and, as a duty, leviable without apportionment, whether direct or indirect. ”

“ As I read today's opinion, registered voter figures are an acceptable basis for apportionment only so long as they substantially approximate the results that would be reached under some other type of population-based scheme of apportionment. ”

“ The public debt of the Union would be a further cause of collision between the separate States or confederacies. The apportionment, in the first instance, and the progressive extinguishment afterward, would be alike productive of ill-humor and animosity. How would it be possible to agree upon a rule of apportionment satisfactory to all? There is scarcely any that can be proposed which is entirely free from real objections. ”

“ The business which finds it worth while to offer the highest rent or the highest price for any piece of land will, as a rule, be able to command its use. And, with this as the governing principle, an apportionment is secured between shops, offices, factories, agriculture, between the immense variety of different employments covered by each of these broad headings; not a rigid unvarying apportionment, but one which constantly changes as economic circumstances change, and as the margin of transference between different occupations moves hither and thither. ”

“ A tax, indeed, cannot always, or often be apportioned with perfect exactness; as, in other matters of account, there will be fractional parts of the smallest coins, and the smallest denomination of money of account, yet, by the usual subdivisions of the coin, and of the denomination of money, the apportionment of taxes is capable of being made so exact, that the inequality becomes minute and invisible. But representation cannot be thus divided. ”

“ If it be said, that the principle of uniformity, established in the constitution, secures the district from oppression in the imposition of indirect taxes, it is not less true, that the principle of apportionment, also established in the constitution, secures the district from any oppressive exercise of the power to lay and collect direct taxes. ”

“ If congress shall hereafter impose an income tax in order to meet the pressing debts of the nation, and to provide for the necessary expenses of the government, it is advised, by the judgment now rendered, that it cannot touch the income from real estate nor the income from personal property, invested or uninvested, except by apportionment among the states on the basis of population. ”

“ More than one-half of the houses, all of those belonging to the poor or straitened, are thus relieved, while the other half, since the tax is an impost, not a quota, but an apportionment, is overcharged as much. ”

“ From the difficulty in making this valuation, the old congress were unable to apportion the requisitions for the supply of the general treasury, and were obliged to propose to the states an alteration of the articles of confederation, by which the whole number of free persons, with three-fifths of the slaves contained in the respective states, should become the rule of such apportionment of the taxes. ”

“ The apportionment of taxes on the various descriptions of property is an act which seems to require the most exact impartiality; yet there is, perhaps, no legislative act in which greater opportunity and temptation are given to a predominant party, to trample on the rules of justice. Every shilling, with which they overburden the inferior number, is a shilling saved to their own pockets. ”

“ These are sufficient, in themselves, to shake the foundations of any national government, when no common artificial rule is adopted to settle permanently the apportionment; and every thing is left open for debate, as often as a direct tax is to be imposed. Even in those states, where direct taxes are constantly resorted to, every new valuation or apportionment is found, practically, to be attended with great inconvenience, and excitements. ”

“ Thus, undue and disproportioned burdens are placed upon the many, while the few, safely entrenched behind the rule of apportionment among the states on the basis of numbers, are permitted to evade their share of responsibility for the support of the government ordained for the protection of the rights of all. ”

“ As pointed out in recent decisions, it does not extend the taxing power to new or excepted subjects, but merely removes all occasion, which otherwise might exist, for an apportionment among the states of taxes laid on income, whether it be derived from one source or another. ”

“ The other States would no doubt insist on a proportion, by right of representation. Their argument would be, that a grant, once made, could not be revoked; and that the justice of participating in territory acquired or secured by the joint efforts of the Confederacy, remained undiminished. If, contrary to probability, it should be admitted by all the States, that each had a right to a share of this common stock, there would still be a difficulty to be surmounted, as to a proper rule of apportionment. ”

“ Suppose no mode of valuation adopted, how are the quotas to be ascertained? In answer to this question, I state the following positions; first, that the object of the confederation was to make an equitable apportionment; secondly, that Congress will always, when they direct a valuation, do it in an equitable mode; and thirdly, that a valuation is, at present, impracticable, much less a valuation for times past. These things admitted, and the necessity of an apportionment being also admitted, the question answers itself ”

“ The apportionment theory is a mongrel one, a cross between desire not to interfere with State taxation and desire at the same time not utterly to crush out interstate commerce. It is a practical, but rather illogical, device to prevent duplication of tax burdens on vehicles in transit. It is established in our decisions and has been found more or less workable with more or less arbitrary formulae of apportionment. ”

“ The rule of apportionment is of this nature; it is radically wrong; it cannot be supported by any solid reasoning. Why should slaves, who are a species of property, be represented more than any other property? ”

“ Except as to the rule of apportionment, the United States have an indefinite discretion to make requisitions for men and money, but they have no authority to raise either, by regulations extending to the individual citizens of America. ”

“ Probably the benefits are in inverse proportion to the income or wealth of the individual, and the heaviest taxes would then have to be apportioned to those least able to pay. Most economists today agree that taxes should be apportioned according to “faculty” or ability to pay. It satisfies better our sense of fairness and is more readily applicable than the benefit theory. In the last analysis, of course, it may be said that taxation in general must confer real benefits upon society or it will not be tolerated. Here, however, we are concerned with a rule of apportionment. ”

“ I can conceive of no greater injustice than would result from imposing on 1,000,000 of people in one state, having only $10,000,000 of invested wealth, the same amount of tax as that imposed on the like number of people in another state, having 50 times that amount of invested wealth. The application of the rule of apportionment by population to invested personal wealth would not only work out this wrong, but would ultimately prove a self-destructive process, from the facility with which such property changes its situs. ”

“ If competition is excluded, and with it buying and selling, there can be no voluntary exchange of so much labour for so much produce; but there must be apportionment of the one to the other by appointed officers. This apportionment must be enforced. Without alternative the work must be done, and without alternative the benefit, whatever it may be, must be accepted. For the worker may not leave his place at will and offer himself elsewhere. ”

“ Impositions of this kind usually fall under the denomination of indirect taxes, and must for a long time constitute the chief part of the revenue raised in this country. Those of the direct kind, which principally relate to land and buildings, may admit of a rule of apportionment. Either the value of land, or the number of the people, may serve as a standard. The state of agriculture and the populousness of a country have been considered as nearly connected with each other. ”

“ The proper consideration of these, of an apportionment bill, and of the annual appropriation bills will require not only that no working day of the session shall be lost, but that measures of minor and local interest shall not be allowed to interrupt or retard the progress of those that are of universal interest. ”

“ Apportionment in itself prevents taxation of extrastate 'events' or portions of the business done, unless the apportionment is itself constitutionally invalid as not reflecting a sufficient approximation to what the state may be entitled, on the facts, to tax. ”

“ To accomplish that purpose, most States, like Wisconsin in the United States Glue case, and like Minnesota and Georgia in the cases here, have adopted apportionment statutes, applicable to situations where the taxpayer is doing business both within and without the State, which use, as one of the several factors, the total income of the taxpayer in measuring the part of the income that was derived from within the taxing State. ”

“ Whatever might be the merits of insistence on absolute equality if it could be attained, the majority's pursuit of precision is a search for a will-o-'-the-wisp. The fact is that any solution to the apportionment and districting problem is at best an approximation because it is based upon figures which are always to some degree obsolete. ”

“ When the instalment payments and profits of all kinds equal the face value of all the shares issued, the assets, over and above expenses and losses, are apportioned among members, and this apportionment cancels the borrower’s debt, while the non-borrower is given the amount of his stock. A man who wishes to borrow, let us say, $1000 for the erection of a house ordinarily takes five shares in an association, each of which, when he has paid all the successive instalments on it, will be worth $200, and he must offer suitable security for his loan, usually the lot on which he is to build. ”