SING SING 



5392 



SIOUX 



their system of taxation. Canadian cities have 

 a larger degree of home rule than most cities 

 in the United States, but even in the latter 

 country the single tax has been adopted, nota- 

 bly by Pueblo, Colo., Houston, Tex., and Pitts- 

 burgh and Scranton, Pa. Pueblo in 1913 voted 

 to exempt practically all property except land 

 values from taxation ; in the first year fifty per 

 cent of the assessed value of improvements was 

 stricken from the tax list, and in the second 

 year, ninety-nine per cent. In Pittsburgh and 

 Scranton, twelve years, from 1913 to 1925, were 

 allowed to reduce the assessment on improve- 

 ments by fifty per cent. 



National Single Tax. Schemes for a national 

 single tax include such a violent readjustment 

 of existing conditions that even its most ear- 

 nest advocates do not indulge hope. Under 

 such a system there would be no tariffs, no in- 

 come taxes, no taxes of any kind except on 

 land. As a preliminary to national single tax 

 there must be universal free trade. The single- 

 taxers believe that universal free trade, like 

 the single tax itself, can be brought about only 

 by incredibly slow movement. Once inaugu- 

 rated, however, world-wide free trade and sin- 

 gle tax, it is claimed, would increase interna- 

 tional trade to such proportions that the na- 

 tions of the world would be bound together 

 into an inseparable brotherhood. The ultimate 

 result of the single tax would be the abolition 

 of war, for mere self-interest would require 

 peace. The most ardent advocates of the sin- 

 gle tax believe that it would create a new and 

 higher patriotism in the world. G.B.D. 



Consult George's Progress and Poverty; Mat- 

 thews' Taxation and the Distribution of Wealth. 



Related Subjects. The reader is referred to 

 the following articles in these volumes : 

 Economics Rent 



George, Henry Tax 



SING SING, one of the largest state prisons 

 in the United States, situated outside the vil- 

 lage of Ossining, N. Y., about thirty miles north 

 of New York City. It was erected by convicts, 

 the first draft of whom, men from Auburn state 

 prison, began work on the men's building in 

 May, 1825. A building for women was erected 

 in 1835. The buildings of the prison are anti- 

 quated and unsatisfactory, judged by prison 

 methods of the present day, and are not well 

 adapted to the introduction of prison reform. 

 At the same time, under the administration of 

 Thomas Matt Osborne, who was warden from 

 1914 to 1916, several reforms were inaugurated, 

 and the moral and physical conditions of the 



prisoners were considerably improved. As a re- 

 sult of Osborne's agitation the New York state 

 legislature passed a bill authorizing the erec- 

 tion of a new and adequate prison to take the 

 place of the old one. See OSSINING. 



SINN FEIN, sin jayn, an Irish society de- 

 voted to the single purpose of establishing an 

 "Irish Ireland." It opposes control of the island 

 by Great Britain, and is working for Irish inde- 

 pendence. The society took a leading part in 

 the short and unsuccessful revolution which 

 attempted to found an Irish republic in April, 

 1916. The words Sinn and Fein are from the 

 Gaelic language, the ancient tongue of Ireland, 

 and mean Ourselves Alone. They were first 

 made the name of the newspaper previously 

 called the United Irishman, and then became 

 the title of the organization which grew up 

 among the readers of the paper Irish poets 

 and philosophers who dreamed of a native land 

 as distinctly an individual nation as England 

 itself. The Sinn Fein continued to exist after 

 the suppression of the revolt, the history of 

 which is given in the article IRELAND, and a 

 member of the organization, though he was in 

 prison, was elected to Parliament in 1917. 



SIOUAN, sop 'an, INDIANS, next to the Al- 

 gonquian group, the largest linguistic family 

 of North American Indians north of Mexico. 

 The largest tribal group of Siouan Indians is 

 the Sioux, or Dakotas. The principal body 

 formerly ranged along the west bank of the 

 Mississippi, northward from the Arkansas, 

 and nearly to the Rocky Mountains. They 

 also ranged northward for some distance into 

 Canada in the direction of Lake Winnipeg. 

 The eastern tribes lived in wigwams of bark 

 and mat, but the bands on the plains lived in 

 teepees made of earth and skins. The princi- 

 pal tribes of the Siouan family are the Omaha, 

 Sioux, Winnebago, Assiniboin, Osage, Ponca and 

 Quapaw, but there are numerous others. The 

 Sioux, or Dakotas, were the most hostile to the 

 white settlers of any of the Siouan groups. The 

 entire group now numbers about 40,000. 



Related Subjects. For a description of vari- 

 ous Siouan tribes see the following articles in 

 these volumes : 



Assiniboin Quapaw 



Osage Sioux 



Ponca Winnebago 



SIOUX, soo, or DAKO'TA, a large and pow- 

 erful tribe of North American Indians of Siouan 

 stock, who formerly occupied the region ex- 

 tending from the Arkansas River in the south 

 to the western tributary of Lake Winnipeg in 



