A Word About Income Taxes

Since today is the day some of us Americans have to make our quarterly estimated income tax payments, I thought it appropriate to look briefly into the history of income taxation in this country. Did you realize the Constitution prohibited direct taxation on U.S. citizens? The government was allowed by the Supreme Court to impose an income tax during the Civil War, since other forms of federal revenue (tariffs and taxes on certain commodity sales) weren’t generating enough money to finance the war effort. The income tax was abandoned in the 1870s, then, after abortive efforts to institutionalize it in the 1890s, finally was authorized by constitutional amendment in 1913. Citizens that year were subject to a maximum income tax of 7 percent of their personal income.

Seven percent? Don’t we wish. . . ?