PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION. 767 



the Government in proportion to his ability. For if, as almost all 

 authorities are now agreed, taxes are the compensation which 

 persons or property pay to the state for protection, then it of ne- 

 cessity follows that where there is no protection, ability is no 

 just guide for assessment. " Where there is no protection," said 

 Judge Story (in the case of United States vs. Rice, 4 Wheaton, 

 276), " there can be no claim to allegiance or obedience." And that 

 Adam Smith did not intend to have his first proposition fully 

 accepted would seem evident from the circumstance that he added 

 to it, and qualified it with these other words, " that is, in propor- 

 tion to the revenue which they [the citizens] respectively enjoy 

 under the protection of the state." Montesquieu, who wrote at 

 an earlier date, also enunciated even more clearly this common- 

 sense and equitable principle, when he said (see Spirit of the 

 Laws), that " the public revenues ought not to he measured by the 

 people's abilities to give, but by luhat they ought to give." " And 

 what they ought to give," as has been remarked by another 

 writer, " can, of course, be only measured by the benefit they are 

 to derive." 



Discriminating Taxation. The proposition that "the sub- 

 jects of every state ought to contribute to the support of the 

 Government in proportion to their respective abilities " embodies 

 also, and inferentially favors the policy of discriminating taxa- 

 tion, and finds popular expression and justification in the asser- 

 tion that the rich man needs more protection from the state than 

 the poor man, has more interests to be guarded, and it is there- 

 fore right that he should pay more in proportion to his fortune. 

 " It is just," says Sismondi, the Italian economist, " that all should 

 support the Government in return for the protection it gives to 

 their persons and properties, in proportion to the advantages 

 society guarantees to them, and the expenses which it incurs on 

 their account." But the question is pertinent, to whom or to 

 what class of its members does society afford the most protection 

 or render the most service ? Is there any standard by which 

 such proportionality can be even approximately determined ? 

 To these questions Mr. John Stuart Mill has made the following 

 answer : 



" It can not be admitted," he says, " that to be protected in the 

 ownership of ten times as much property is to be .ten times as 

 much protected. Whether the labor and expense of the protec- 

 tion, or the feelings of the protected person, or any other definite 

 thing be made the standard, there is no such proportion as the 

 one supposed, nor any other definable proportion. If we wanted to 

 estimate the degrees of benefit which different persons derive 

 from the protection of Government, we should have to consider 

 who would suffer most if that protection were withdrawn; to 



