The Income Tax: Root of all Evil

von Mises Institute ^ | 1954 | Frank Chodorov

[Taxman]

The Income Tax: Root of all Evil by Frank Chodorov

Foreword

THIS WAS, to be sure, "the home of the free and the land of the brave." Americans were free simply because the government was too weak to intervene in the private affairs of the people it did not have the money to do so and they were brave because a free people is always venturesome. The obligation of freedom is a willingness to stand on your own feet.

The early American wanted it that way. He was wary of government, especially one that was out of his reach. He had just rid himself of far away and self sufficient political establishment and he was not going to tolerate anything like it in his newly founded country. He recognized the need of some sort of government, to keep order, to protect him in the exercise of his rights, and to look after his interests in foreign lands. But, he wanted it understood that the powers of that government would be clearly defined and be limited; it could not go beyond specified limits. It was in recognition of this fear of centralized power that the Founding Fathers put into the Constitution it never would have been ratified without them very specific restraints on the federal government.

In other matters, the early American was willing to put his faith in home government, in a government of neighbors, in a government that one could keep one’s eyes on and, if necessary, lay one’s hands on. . . .

The Constitution, then, kept the federal government off balance and weak. And a weak government is the corollary of a strong people.

The Sixteenth Amendment changed all that. . . .

J. Bracken Lee,

Governor of Utah

[SeeSharp]

All it takes is a crisis. That's how we got the income tax to begin with. It was just supposed to replace the import tariff, and it was only two percent, and it only affected the super wealthy. But then two years later we jumped into WWI (which Wilson had planned to do all along) and the top marginal tax rate went to seventy percent, and almost everyone had to start paying.