Direct Taxation

Tho people of the United States would ïheerfully meet thes expenses. by a direct lax: but ncver will they BUpport our military narine and other preparations ar.d expenses for war by sucli a tox. The very terma of euch i tax-bill would render ite imposition impossible. Let U8 make out one against a hnrd laboring wood eawer, as the Government would be compelled to do, and sec how it would read! Washington March Sd, 1837. Mr. Oni Bentback, - Sir: Your nationol taxesfur Lhe year 183G, for yoursolf, yonr wifo nnd five children, nre, for the civil expenses of Governinnt, at 34 cent cnch, $2,37 For the Military and Naval Establislimenl fcc, fr the same year, at $1,51 cents each, 810,78 $13,15 And our poor ncighbor Bcnlback would have been compelled to foot his bilí, liad the tax been laid on persons eqnally and exclusively. For the expenditures of the Government d uring that year were $31,793,587 - $5,í4253, for civil purposes, and #25,269,344 forthe Military and JYavnl depa rímenla ! - and the population could not have execeded sixtecn miliions. Now, then, when the taxGjathererscntcrcd that poor man's cabin, and demondcd the avails of two day s labor for the civil expenses of government, and then the labor of ten days more for the military and naval establishment s , would not lliat bowbacked, 11-clad father, as he stood eurrounded by his shoelcss children with the demanded earning9 of his toil trcmbling in his hnnd - woul.l he not ask, "What ie the use of the Navy!" before ho dropped into the leechy maw of the 6tatc the twentielh part of his annual 6ubstonco? And would not that question betchoed, from one part of the Union 10 the other, by the million of delving Bentbacks wlio are laboring in the ditch and on the mountain, and by sunlight and starlighl and lamplight, dragging out long hours of toil for a pittance that hardly saves thern and theirs from pinching want? "What is the uae ofthe Navy and Arrnyf' would bc a queslion writtcn on cvery instrument of Inbor, and on bsnners raised high on the moaning brceze, by hands that do the drudgery of humanity, should the sum annually appropriatcd to Ihose departments be levicd on the people by a direct tax. No; palriotic as the poor have ever been, and ready as they ever ore, to sacrifico their all in defence of cheir country, tliere never will be a day in the future history of th8 republic, when if can raise ticeuty-six millions of dollars, by direct tox for