APPLETONS' 



POPULAR SCIENCE 



MOI^THLY. 



JANTJAHY, 1897. 



PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION". 



By DAVID A. "VVELLS, LL.D., D.C.L., 



COERESPONDANT DE l'iNSTITOT DE FEAlfCE, ETC. 



V. LIMITATION AS RESPECTS INSTRUMENTALITIES BY WHICH 

 TAXATION IN A CIVILIZED STATE EFFECTS ITS PURPOSE. 



ATTENTION is next asked to the instrumentality by which 

 -^^ taxation subserves the necessities of the state and enables it 

 to effect the purposes for which it was instituted. The designa- 

 tion of this instrumentality is " revenue," as is indicated in the 

 phrase " tariff (or taxation) for revenue." But the term " rev- 

 enue " is abstract and most indefinite, and as popularly used con- 

 veys little meaning other than a receipt of something pi value. 

 In rude or incipient forms of government, where tribute or taxes 

 were payable in cattle, skins, cocoanuts, salt, grain, and the like, 

 the term might be fairly interpreted as an income of property in 

 general. But in a highly civilized state such a meaning is inad- 

 missible. The government of such a state obviously could not 

 defray its varied expenses by payments with various articles of 

 property, even though their value may be unquestioned as, for 

 example, its executive with fish, fresh or salt ; its legislators with 

 distilled or fermented liquors ; its judges with boots and shoes ; 

 its soldiers and sailors with cotton or corn ; and its clerks with 

 agricultural implements even though the producers of all these 

 forms of wealth or property may be most willing to give them in 

 discharge of their tax obligations.* In such a state revenue has 



* In ancient times cattle were regarded among nations of a considerable degree of civ- 

 ilization as standards of value, and obligations to government in the nature of taxes were 

 payable therein. As recent, moreover, as 1758 taxes in Virginia and Maryland were pay- 

 VOL. L, 23 



