Taxpayer money

“ Can any man believe sir, that if $23,000,000 per annum were now levied by direct taxation, or by an apportionment of the same among the states, instead of being raised by an indirect tax, of the severe effect of which few are aware, that the waste and extravagance, of the unauthorized imposition of duties, and appropriations of money for unconstitutional objects, would have been tolerated for a single year? ”

“ It is not the poor man who opposes the payment of those just debts to which we owe our independence and political existence, but the rich miser. Not the poor, but the rich, shudder at the idea of taxes. I have no dread that Congress will distress us; nor have I any fear that the tax will be embezzled by officers. Industry and economy will be promoted, and money will be easier got than ever it has been yet. ”

“ Another difficulty in the way of doing perfect justice in the operation of this plan of reimbursement is found in the fact that the money to be appropriated therefor was contributed to the Federal Treasury for entirely different purposes by a generation many of whom were not born when the direct tax was levied and paid, who have no relation to said tax and can not share in its distribution. ”

“ The next power mentioned is the "power to borrow money on the credit of the United States." Although Congress may, under the power to lay taxes and duties, raise money to any extent, a large amount may sometimes be wanted before it can be raised from the regular income or revenue of the nation, or even before it could be raised by a direct tax, which would be burdensome to the people. ”

“ It is an undoubted fact, that, in all government, it is extremely difficult, on the spur of the occasion, to raise money by taxes. Nor is it necessary. In a commercial country, persons will always be found to advance money to the government, and to wait the regular operation of the revenue laws. It depends on the security of the taxes, and the certainty of being refunded. This amendment does not diminish the security or render the fund precarious. The certainty of repayment is as well established as if the government could levy the taxes originally on individuals. ”

“ Thus a continuation of our present revenue system would soon result in the receipt of an annual income much greater than necessary to meet Government expenses, with no indebtedness upon which it could be applied. We should then be confronted with a vast quantity of money, the circulating medium of the people, hoarded in the Treasury when it should be in their hands, or we should be drawn into wasteful public extravagance, with all the corrupting national demoralization which follows in its train. ”

“ The efficiency of the government service cannot be impaired by a taxation of the agencies which it employs for such service, and, as one of the most valuable and best known of these agencise is the borrowing of money, a tax which diminishes in the slightest degree the value of the obligations issued by the government for that purpose impairs pro tanto their market value. ”

“ But those who have vested their capital in manufacturing establishments can not expect that the people will continue permanently to pay high taxes for their benefit, when the money is not required for any legitimate purpose in the administration of the Government. Is it not enough that the high duties have been paid as long as the money arising from them could be applied to the common benefit in the extinguishment of the public debt? ”

“ While the Treasury is in a state of extreme embarrassment, requiring every dollar which it can make available, and when the Government has not only to lay additional taxes, but to borrow money to meet pressing demands, the bill proposes to give away a fruitful source of revenue—which is the same thing as raising money by loan and taxation—not to meet the wants of the Government, but for distribution—a proceeding which I must regard as highly impolitic, if not unconstitutional. ”

“ It is authorised to raise money to any amount, and in any way it pleases. If then, the capital embarrassment in our present government arises from the want of money, and this constitution effectually authorises the raising of it, how are the taxes to be lessened by it? Certainly money can only be raised by taxes of some kind or other; it must be got either by additional impositions on trade, by excise, or by direct taxes, or what is more probable, by all together. ”

“ Congress has passed no tax statutes which compel me to conclude that it intended to reward ingenuity in paper work by granting multiple tax deductions for a single money payment to discharge a single corporate obligation. ”

“ Bounty certainly implies a payer as well as a receiver, and when it is bestowed by a government, it implies taxation on the people, considerably exceeding its amount, on account of the misfortunes to which public money is exposed, and the expenses of collection. ”

“ The people are forced to pay taxes into the city treasury only upon the theory that such money shall be expended for public purposes, or purposes in which they all have a direct and practical interest.
The logic of this position leads directly to the conclusion that, if the people are forced to pay their money into the public fund and it is spent by their servants and agents for purposes in which the people as taxpayers have no interest, the exaction of such taxes from them is oppressive and unjust. ”

“ But it is impossible to conceive on what principle the power of appropriating public money when in the Treasury can be construed to extend to objects for which the Constitution does not authorize Congress to levy taxes or imposts to raise money. ”

“ As all the taxes raised from the people, as well as revenues arising from other sources, are to be applied to the discharge of the expenses, and debts, and other engagements of the government, it is highly proper, that congress should possess the power to decide how and when any money should be applied for these purposes. ”

“ If every good citizen could be brought to see that his private interests are closely linked with public affairs, he would take more interest in the local politics of his town and county, and so have a voice in the expenditure of taxes by selecting the best men to do the work for him.
Taxes are forced contributions levied on citizens to provide money for public expenses, such as law and order, schools, charities and public institutions.
All tax laws are made by the men who pay the taxes. ”

“ It is inconsistent with the genius of popular government that any species of private property should be exempt from bearing its proper share of the public burdens. Government bonds and money should be taxed precisely as other property, and a graduated income tax should be levied for the support of the government and the payment of its debts. ”

“ It is poor policy to gather taxes at the beginning of the year which will not be disbursed till the end of the year. Let the people use their funds till they are wanted at the [570] treasury; and if the taxes do not then come in as fast as wanted, it is better to issue what are called in England exchequer-bills, and in the United States certificates of indebtedness, to be redeemed at the end of the year from the proceeds of the taxes, than to let the people's money lie idle in the treasury. ”

“ It must be confessed that our apparently endless resources, the familiarity of our people with immense accumulations of wealth, the growing sentiment among them that the expenditure of public money should in some manner be to their immediate and personal advantage, the indirect and almost stealthy manner in which a large part of our taxes is exacted, and a degenerated sense of official accountability have led to growing extravagance in governmental appropriations. ”

“ The taxes charged with the interest of the public debts proving often deficient, the shortest way of discharging the arrears has been often taken, by adding them to the principal, and paying compound interest for money.—Is it a wonder, that a nation which has been so careless in contracting debts, should have done so little towards discharging them?
[110] That is, in other words; there is no one who would not be glad to lend to government on any higher interest than that which he can make in the funds. There is no one, for instance, who would not be glad to lend 75l. at 4 per cent. ”

“ They may levy, assess, and collect an annual tax to defray the current expenses of their local government, but such tax shall never exceed for any one year one-fourth of one per cent., and shall be collectible only in current money. And all license and occupation tax levied, and all fines, forfeitures, penalties, and other dues accruing to cities and towns, shall be collectible only in current money. ”

“ They must use the public money in the treasury and under their official control in one way, when the supreme power has directed them to use it in another, and they must raise more money by taxation when the same power has declared it shall not be done.
The parties prosecuting the suits do not, in direct terms, ask for the payment of the bonds and coupons they hold. ”

“ Besides, the accumulation in the Treasury of currency of any kind exacted from the people through taxation is justly regarded as an evil, and it can not proceed far without vigorous protest against an unjustifiable retention of money from the business of the country and a denunciation of a scheme of taxation which proves itself to be unjust when it takes from the earnings and income of the citizen money so much in excess of the needs of Government support that large sums can be gathered and kept in the Treasury. ”

“ It is one of the open secrets of finance that in almost every system of taxation the indirect overcrow the direct taxes by many millions, and have a knack for levying on the small resources of insignificant persons which direct taxes have never learned. They know how to coax pennies out of poor people whose names have never been on the tax-collector’s books. ”

“ Shall we be bettered by the alternative proposed by gentlemen—by levying taxes in specific articles? How will you dispose of them? Where is the merchant to buy them? Your business will be put into the hands of a commissioner, who, having no business of his own, will grasp at it eagerly; and he, no doubt, will manage it. But if the payment of the tax be left to the people,—if individuals are told that they must pay such a certain proportion of their income to support the general government,—then each will consider it as a debt; he will exert his ingenuity and industry to raise it ”

“ Those who wished to traffic on the public property were in fact laying a tax on that public, for they were diminishing, by so much as they forced States' Notes out of circulation, the public revenue, for if the States, in consequence of a diminished revenue by the effect of Bank paper, have to make loans, those loans must in the end be repaid by the public—which would be a taxing of the public for the benefit of private individuals. ”

“ Those who pay the money directly to the tax collector are not only not interested in opposing a tax which they so easily shift from their own shoulders, but are very frequently interested in its imposition and maintenance, as are other powerful interests which profit, or expect to profit, by the increase of prices which such taxes bring about. ”

“ It was to enable taxpayers to keep their books and make their returns according to scientific accounting principles, by charging against income earned during the taxable period, the expenses incurred in and properly attributable to the process of earning income during that period; and indeed, to require the tax return to be made on that basis, if the taxpayer failed or was unable to make the return on a strict receipts and disbursements basis. ”

“ There is no illusion about the payment of a tax exaction. Each tax, according to a legislative plan, raises funds to carry on government. The purpose here is to tax earnings and profits less expenses and losses. ”

“ The equitable distribution of the costs of government through the medium of an income tax is a delicate and difficult task. In its performance experience has shown the importance of reasonable opportunity for the legislative body, in the revision of tax laws, to distribute increased costs of government among its taxpayers in the light of present need for revenue and with knowledge of the sources and amounts of the various classes of taxable income during the taxable period preceding revision. ”

“ The relation between money and politics generally-and more particularly the cost of compaigns and contributions by prospective officeholders, especially judges-involves issues of far-reaching importance to a democracy and is beset with legislative difficulties that even judges can appreciate. But these difficulties can neither be met nor avoided by spurious interpretation of tax provisions dealing with allowable deductions. ”

“ It being the usage to provide money for these purposes by annual appropriation bills, the President is in effect directed to expend so large an amount of money within so brief a period that the expenditure can not be made economically and advantageously.
The extravagant expenditure of public money is an evil not to be measured by the value of that money to the people who are taxed for it. They sustain a greater injury in the demoralizing effect produced upon those who are intrusted with official duty through all the ramifications of government. ”