War, land taxand stamp tax," said he, "are sedatives which must calm its ardour.
Having secured the passage of the excise tax as a permanent source of income, Hamilton turned to meet the most pressing national obligations.
Even more odious than either the stamp tax or the tax on slaves was that on "improvements" in property.
To these people it meant not only a tax on liquors, but on candles, salt, vinegar, and other forms of domestic manufacture.
Not many years had passed since Samuel Johnson in his dictionary had defined it as "a hateful tax levied upon commodities and adjudged not by the common judges of property but wretches hired by those to whom it is paid.
To put a tax on a still and its product was to them equivalent to taxing their hand-mills and the meal or flour thus produced.
So little in evidence is an external tax that the people are sometimes beguiled into questioning whether the producer or the consumer pays the tax.
Open as the space seems, it is better than the treacherous shelter of these boughs.
The revolution of Nature had dissolved her lighter terrors as well as her wonted ties.
The government of the country was supported by it, for the financial system was founded on a tax paid by the proprietors of the land for the use of the public sluices and aqueducts.
Of some, notwithstanding a weight of evidence, the stupendous biography musttax their admirers' credulity.
Illinois the farmers had driven off the tax collector?
Furthermore the government itself, unless it can tax the wealthier classes for it, cannot out of such an impoverished source wring sufficient means to provide adequate schools and school equipments.
But the border chieftains seldom chose to abide in person a siege of this nature; and I have not observed a single instance of a distinguished baron made prisoner in his own house[41].
The reader is requested to compare this curious account, given by Lesley, with the ballad, called Hobble Noble[35].
They were, in truth, during the time of peace, a kind of outcasts, against whom the united powers of England and Scotland were often employed.
The borderers had, in fact, little reason to regard the inland Scots as their fellow subjects, or to respect the power of the crown.
Their vengeance not only vented itself upon the homicide and his family, but upon all his kindred, on his whole tribe; on every one, in fine, whose death or ruin could affect him with regret.
Two of these, a stamp tax very similar to the famous one of 1765, and a direct tax, greatly excited the people.
In the first place, Congress could not lay a tax of any kind, and as it could not tax it could not get money with which to pay its expenses and the debt incurred during the Revolution.
Illustration: Stamps used in 1765] The money raised by thistax was not to be taken to England, but was to be spent in America for the defense of the colonies.
But the question was never tested until 1819, when Maryland attempted to collect a taxlaid on the branch at Baltimore.
The Stamp Tax; the Direct Taxand Fries's Rebellion, 1798.
One proposed that Congress should have power for twenty-five years to lay a tax of five per cent on all goods imported, and use the money to pay the Continental debts.
But the state banks did not do so till 1865, when a tax of ten per cent was laid on the amount of paper money each state bank issued.
At that time, 1764, no such thing as an internal tax laid by Parliament for the purpose of raising revenue existed, or ever had existed, in America.
The chief tax was the stamp duty on paper, vellum, etc.
To relieve the company, and if possible tempt the people to use the tea, the exportation tax was taken off and the company was given leave to export tea to America consigned to commissioners chosen by itself.
Taking off the shilling a pound export tax in England, and charging but 3d.
The direct tax was the first of its kind in our history, and was laid on lands, houses, and negro slaves.
Another was to require each state to raise by special tax a sum sufficient to pay its yearly share of the current expenses of Congress.
As it was expected that the revenue yielded would not be sufficient to meet the expenses of government, one section of the law provided for a tax of two per cent on all incomes above $4000.
The next letter, my lord, is from a clerk in the Tax Office, Somerset House.
If so, I am sure I am very thankful, for it's a great tax on a poor lone body like me to have such a undertaking to attend to.
Each of you saves twenty sous tax by suppression of the Civil List.
At the same time let a tax of ten, fifteen, or twenty per cent be levied on all property.
Each who takes the oath may exempt his property by holding himself ready to do what service he can for the cause; they who refuse the oath will be paying a tax on their insurance with the enemy.
His main reason for challenging the historian is an allegation that the Revolution originated in the question "whether the mother country had, or had not, a right to lay, directly or indirectly, a slight tax upon the colonies.
