STATE GRANGE OF ILLINOIS. 73 



but more easily Uuiu now. Mr. AVells, despairing of lionest assessing, rec- 

 ommends this as preferable to direct taxation of personal property, but after 

 an examination into the results of assessments in the census of 1870, I am 

 inclined to believe he overrates the dilflculty. There are great discrep- 

 ancies in the ratio of personal property to real estate, even in adjoininir 

 States, but I find upon the whole, that the States whose taxation Mr. Wells 

 appears to have specially studied, were exceptional and exaggerated cases. 

 The bidding for capital begun in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, by exemp- 

 tion of mortgages from taxation, etc., is one of the ugly features of the 

 case; and suggests the necessity of making our tax system in the different 

 States, to a certain extent, uniform by some agreed limitations in the way 

 of constitutional amendment. 



In connection with the consideration of taxes on gross receipts, it is 

 worth while to notice that our Illinois railroads, which were assessed 

 $75,000,000 in 1873, and have not paid the tax, amounting to about $1,200,- 

 000, would have paid about the same amount by a tax on their gross 

 earnings ($-13,000,000) of 3 per cent. In 1874, a like tax would have yielded 

 somewhat more. 



With these suggestions I leave the subject of direct taxation for State 

 purposes and pass to a consideration of the indirect taxation practiced by 

 our national government and the possibility of improving it. 



This, as I have said, is a fiscal chaos. It is avowedly founded as 

 regards the customs on what is called the principle of "incidental pro- 

 tection." As a matter of practice, as Mr. Wells shows in the Creed of 

 Free Trade, it makes the Michigan Central on one side of the Detroit 

 river lay down steel rails at $97 a ton, when the Canada Southern is 

 doing it on the other side for $70, and requires the New England people 

 to pay $1.25 per ton for the privilege of using Nova Scotia coal that lies 

 at their doors. As regards the Internal Revenue, the principle of taxing 

 "injurious consumption" is consistently adhered to in statute, whatever 

 we may say of the administration. 



Conceding the present impracticability of an abolition of the customs 

 or internal revenue duties at this time, we must criticise severely the influ- 

 ences which have been permitted to shape their details. Our national 

 legislature has been simply the arena where contending iron-masters, 

 woolen manufacturers and paper makers strove for special privilege?* 

 while little thought and less work has been given to serve the public. 

 The tax on spirits has been increased for the profit of speculators, and to 

 the detriment of the civil service. 



The future taxation of the United States will undoubtedly discard the 

 idea of " incidental protection," and ultimately do away with all duties 

 upon imports. But for the present we find nearly every one tending 

 towards the doctrine of a tariff for revenue only. A tariff of this kind 

 would mftke a heavy reduction on the present rate of taxation which, I 

 think, is nearly 40 per cent, on tiie average, and place it at not far from 

 25 per cent. The list of tax-paying articles for 1874 contains over 200 

 names of articles, more than 100 of which do not produce an average of 



