Salt tax

“ I look upon a salt tax as a curse—as something worse than a political blunder, great as that is—as an impiety, in stinting the use, and enhancing the cost by taxation, of an article which God has made necessary to the health and comfort, and almost to the life, of every animated being—the poor dumb animal which can only manifest its wants in mute signs and frantic actions, as well as the rational and speaking man who can thank the Creator for his goodness, and curse the legislator that mars its enjoyment. ”

“ At present, there remain but two countries which suffer both evils, our America, and the British East Indies. All others have got rid of the monopoly; many have got rid of the tax. Among others, the very country from which we copied it, and the one above all others least able to do without the product of the tax. England, though loaded with debt, and taxed in every thing, is now free from the salt tax. Since 1822, it has been totally suppressed; and this necessary of life is now as free there as air and water. She even has a statute to guard its price, and common law to prevent its monopoly. ”

“ One unpopular tax was the gabelle, or salt tax, which compelled every person to bring a fixed quantity of salt every year, and made them buy it of certain people who alone had the right to sell, and charged enormous prices. ”

“ The opponents of the Bill declared that a compensation tax upon the salt trade would severely injure the industry and act as a restraint upon trade; they put forward expert witnesses to contend that if the brine—which they contended was produced by rainfall percolating through the superincumbent strata and reaching the salt—was not pumped out, it would run away to the sea, and the consequent subsidence of land and injury to property would not be arrested. ”

“ It is a clincher. It nails up, and crushes every thing. It shows that Congress was determined that the salt duty, and the bounties and allowances, should be one and indivisible: that they should come, and go together—should rise and fall together—should live and die together.
6. In 1807, Mr. Jefferson being President, the salt tax was abolished upon his recommendation: and with it all the bounties and allowances to fishing vessels, to pickled fish, and to salted beef and pork were all swept away. ”

“ The people must have it for the provision trade; and the duty upon that kind of salt is a grievous burthen upon them, without being of the least advantage to the salt makers.
"Mr. B. said, there was no argument which could be used here, in favor of continuing this duty, which was not used, and used in vain, in England; and many were used there, of much real force, which cannot be used here. The American system, by name, was not impressed into the service of the tax there, but its doctrines were; and he read a part of the report of the committee on salt duties, in 1817, to prove it. ”

“ That is to say, if a person is protected in the manufacture of salt by the law, which imposes a heavy tax on all foreign salt imported into the country, the manufacturer or producer of grain is at once placed by the law in a condition of inequality with him, and in a double sense if he be a consumer of salt; for not only is the price of the home manufactured salt increased by the imposition of the tax, while the price of the home grown grain is not proportionately increased, but the producer of the grain is obliged to pay the increased price for the salt 169which he consumes. ”

“ The sun-made salt is chiefly used in the Great West, in curing provisions; the Liverpool is chiefly used on the Atlantic coasts; and thus the people in different sections of the Union pay different degrees of tax upon the same articles, and that which costs least is taxed most. A tax ranging to some hundred per cent. is in itself an enormous tax; and thus the duty collected by the federal government from all the consumers of the sun-made salt, is in itself excessive ”

“ She loves the house where there is milk for the sink as well as for the children and the cat. Years ago, when some people were advocating a tax on salt, they did so on the ground that no one need suffer since at present everybody puts on his plate several times as much salt as he ever uses. Hence, if we were more careful with the salt, such a tax would be a tax not on salt but on wastefulness. ”

“ A tax on Salt is an odious measure, hated by all people and in all time, and justly, because being an article of prime necessity, indispensable to man and to beast, and bountifully furnished them by the Giver of all good, the cost should not be burthened, nor the use be stinted by government regulation ”

“ The local taxes on flour, bread, and macaroni are as high as 10 or 15 per cent of the value, and the state tax on imported wheat is nearly 50 per cent of its value. The consumption of sugar has decreased one-fourth since heavy duties were imposed to protect native beet sugar, and it averages barely over five pounds per head. The consumption in the United States is sixty-five pounds per head. The iniquitous salt tax raises the price of salt from eleven pounds for two cents to one pound for two cents, and the peasants sometimes cook their corn meal in sea water, although this is smuggling. ”

“ As to the first point, the state of the finances in India no doubt requires all the care and economy that can be exercised; but to imagine, as many people seem to do, that it has exhausted its taxational resources, is ridiculous. The salt tax, taking the price all over India, is lower than it was fifteen years ago, and this could be raised without hardship to the people. ”

“ It is, however, difficult to understand why this matter should be pressed unless it be on the ground, apparently maintained, that the poverty of [pg 041] the people should exempt them from any of the burdens of taxation—a theory beautifully generous to the people but fatal to the maintenance of any government. The salt tax does certainly seem cruel in its severe pressure upon the very poor; and yet it is the only one whereby this very large part of the community can be reached at all, and made to contribute its mite to the State which protects it. ”

“ Salt is an absolute necessity to the people, to the very poorest; they must have it or die. But the tax upon it which for many years they have been compelled to pay has been much greater than the cost value of the salt. Under this taxation the quantity of salt consumed has been reduced actually to one-half the quantity declared by medical authorities to be absolutely necessary for health. ... "Another cause of India’s impoverishment is the destruction of her manufactures, as the result of British rule. ”

“ When a house burns or is swept away by a flood, the tax is always remitted.
All salt is made by evaporating sea-water ; and the " works " are so easily accessible and salt is such an indispensable commodity that this government, like most oriental ones, finds it a reliable and lucrative source of revenue. The tax is levied on the actual amount produced, and amounts to about four per cent ad valorem. This seems small compared with the ten per cent levied on cereals, but it must be remembered that in the case of the latter nature does by far the larger part of the work. ”

“ In reference to spirits, every effort should be made to discourage their sale, however much the revenue may suffer in consequence. The salt-tax has been so productive that it has been kept up in a manner which has borne heavily on the people. ”

“ Having thus ventured to suggest some measures which seem calculated to secure and promote the public health, we may be allowed to glance at the impolicy of any tax which has a tendency to deprive the lower orders of those articles which are essential to it; the salt duties immediately suggest themselves as a lamentable instance of such impolicy: salt is to the poor an indispensable part of their diet ”

“ In Great Britain, the principal taxes upon the necessaries of life, are those upon the four commodities just now mentioned, salt, leather, soap, and candles.
Salt is a very ancient and a very universal subject of taxation. It was taxed among the Romans, and it is so at present in, I believe, every part of Europe. The quantity annually consumed by any individual is so small, and may be purchased so gradually, that nobody, it seems to have been thought, could feel very sensibly even a pretty heavy tax upon it. ”

“ And, furthermore, by virtue of the ordinance of 1680, each person over seven years of age is expected to purchase seven pounds per annum, which, with four persons to a family, makes eighteen francs a year, and equal to nineteen days' work: a new direct tax, which, like the taille, is a fiscal hand in the pockets of the tax-payers, and compelling them, like the taille, to torment each other. Many of them, in fact, are officially appointed to assess this obligatory use of salt and, like the collectors of the taille, these are "jointly responsible for the price of the salt." ”

“ The evaporation of salt is exceedingly laborious. The apparatus is costly, considering the annual output, the cost of fuel is heavy, and the goods are marketed only in spring and autumn. For these reasons a heavier tax than four per cent would kill the business. This tax brings about ninety thousand dollars into the treasury. ”

“ About one uniform price is put on the whole, and the purchaser has to submit to the imposition. This results from the effect of the tax, throwing the article, which is nothing but ballast, into the hands of salt dealers. The importer does not bring more money than the salt is worth, to pay the duty; he does not come prepared to pay a heavy duty on his ballast; he has to depend upon raising the money for paying the duty after he arrives in the United States ”

“ He wished not to have a compulsory tax, but a tax which persons might pay or not. If they did not like to pay the tax on sugar, they might do without it.
Mr. Cooper said he was against any additional duty on salt or sugar, though he and his constituents (as well as his colleague and his constituents) should bear no part of the burden, as they made not only sufficient for themselves, but for sale. Indeed, he said, a duty on salt exported out of the United States, would produce revenue, as a considerable quantity was sent into Upper Canada. ”

“ They had to buy it of the government. The poor use salt sparingly over there even now, and you may remember that the heavy tax on salt was one cause of the awful French Revolution.
In our country nearly every state has salt deposits of some kind. Virginia furnishes lots of rock-salt. The most important salt springs are in Onondaga County, New York, and furnish nearly half of what the country uses. The state owns them and gets a royalty of one cent a bushel. Michigan produces about twenty million bushels a year. ”

“ Droitwich, in Worcestershire, which is situated nearly in the centre of the county, has been celebrated for the production of salt from its brine-springs from the time of the Romans, who imposed a tax on the Britons, who, it appears, worked the mines; and also made salt a part of the pay of their soldiers’ salarium, or salary.32 Ever since, this inexhaustible fountain of saline water has continued flowing up, and yielding salt in undiminished quantities. It is very likely that the manufacture is coëval with the town itself ”

“ The economic importance of salt is further indicated by the almost universal prevalence in ancient and medieval times, and indeed in most countries down to the present day, of salt taxes or of government monopolies, which have not often been directed, as they were in ancient Rome, to enable every one to procure so necessary a condiment at a moderate price. ”

“ The great advantages which must ultimately accrue to this nation in its fisheries, agriculture, manufactures, and commerce, from a late remission of the odious and impolitic tax upon salt, are incalculable. ”

“ First imposed in 1286, in the reign of Philip IV., as a temporary expedient, it was made a permanent tax by Charles V. Repressive as a state monopoly, it was made doubly so from the fact that the government obliged every individual above the age of eight years to purchase weekly a minimum amount of salt at a fixed price. ”

“ In most European countries a tax is laid on salt; and the coarser as well as the finer crystals are therefore often dried so as not to pay duty on more water than can be helped.
The brine used in the salt manufacture in England is very nearly saturated, containing 25 or 26% of sodium chloride, the utmost water can take up being 27%; and it ranges from 38 to 42 oz. of salt per gallon. In some other countries the brine has to be concentrated before use.
Saltmaking is by no means an unhealthy trade, some slight soreness of the eyes being the only affection sometimes complained of ”

“ Taxation oppressive both in quantity and quality: demanded, on pain of eviction and imprisonment, to be paid punctually and rigidly in cash, instead of optionally or occasionally in kind, or flexible, according to the variations of the seasons; moreover, levied on salt, raising the price of this necessity of life at least ten times, often much more; when precisely an abundant supply of salt, with the climate and diet of India, is a prime need for men and cattle. ”

“ Since then, for Bengal Proper, the supply of the condiment has been obtained chiefly by importation, but in part by private manufacture under a System of excise.' (Balfour, Cyclopaedia, 3rd ed., s.v. Salt.) At present the Salt Department is controlled by a single Commissioner with the Government of India, The fee payable for a licence to manufacture salt is fifty rupees. It is inaccurate to describe the limitation imposed on the manufacture of salt as a monopoly. Any one can sell salt, but it can be made only under licence. ”