recognition and practice of which, by any government is something inconsistent with, and antagonistic to, the maintenance of a free people.
It is not generally known, furthermore, that Alexander Hamilton, as a member of the conventions which framed the Constitution of the United States and the first Constitution of New York, gave all his influence in favor of the restriction of all internal or local taxation to visible, tangible objects, and to the assessment of these specifically, and by some uniform and simple rule. The language used by him in one of his papers (The Constitutionalist) on this subject is as follows: "The genius of liberty reprobates everything arbitrary or discretionary in taxation. It exacts that every man, by a definite and general rule, should know what proportion of his property the State demands. Whatever liberty we may boast in theory, it can not exist in fact while (arbitrary) assessments continue."
Again, had nothing come down to us in English history from the time of Edward III, other than one of the assessment rolls of that period (when there was little or no property capable of taxation but what was visible and tangible), the evidence would be complete that the mass of the English people were but little better than slaves; for the mere inspection of such rolls shows that their preparation involved such an inquisitorial scrutiny into domestic life, such a seeing, handling, enumeration, and minute valuation of everything in the household, from the utensils of the kitchen to the furniture of the bedchamber, as to make personal freedom, or a sense of self-respect, on the part of the taxpayer who submitted to such a scrutiny, almost an impossibility.[1]
And in this connection it is instructive to again refer to the famous insurrection of English yeomen and peasants under "Wat" the Tyler, in the reign of Richard II, the successor of Edward III, which originated directly in the attempt of a tax-gatherer or assessor to ascertain, by brutal personal examination, whether a daughter of "Wat's" had attained the age of puberty, and in consequence had so become liable to enrollment for capitation assessment.
But to whatever extent simplicity in the elements of property simplified the original methods and ideas in respect to local taxation, the problem involved rapidly changed, and became more and more intricate as increasing population, and increasing commerce, and in-
- ↑ A copy of an assessment roll of the time of Edward III (1329–’67) given by Lingard, in his History of England, contains a list of articles, down to a towel and a bench; and the historian notes that in the returns are carefully mentioned the very rooms in which the articles were found, and that there were no exemptions except one suit of clothes for each person, which were supposed to be included in the tax levied on the poll or person.
