Dimensions of Law in the Service of Order Origins of the Federal Income Tax, 1861-1913

by Stanley, Robert

• ISBN13: 9780195058482
• ISBN10: 0195058488
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1993-07-08
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

A sophisticated and accessible application of the newest theoretical work in public-policy history and legal studies, this book is a detailed account of how a permanent income tax was enacted into law in the United States. The tax originated as an apology for the aggressive manipulation of other forms of taxation, especially the tariff, during the Civil War. Levied with very low rates on a small proportion of the population and raising little revenue, the early tax was designed to preserve imbalances in the structure of wealth and opportunity, rather than to ameliorate or abolish them, by strengthening the status quo against fundamental attacks by the political left and right. This book shows that the early course of income taxation was more clearly the product of centrist ideological agreement, despite occasional divergences, than of "conservative-liberal" allocative conflict.

Author Biography

Robert Stanley is now Associate Professor of Political Science at California State University, Chico.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. v
Acknowledgments	p. xi
Introduction Dimensions of Law in the Service of Order	p. 3
Forestalling the Popular Clamor"""": Centrism, Class Tension, and the First Federal Income Tax Laws, 1861-1872""""	p. 15
The Income Tax, Incorporated, 1873-1881	p. 59
A Measure to Kill Anarchy and Keep Down Socialists"""": The Income Tax and the Meaning of Reform, 1881-1894""""	p. 100
The Court Confronts the Problem of Practice"""": The Pollock Compromise and the Dynamics of Reaction, 1894-1900""""	p. 136
The Restoration, 1895-1913	p. 176
Conclusion the Roads Not Taken: Law, the Centrist State, and the Problem of Reform	p. 230
Data and Inferences on the Incidence of Income Taxation, 1861-1872	p. 263
Source Materials for Table 3-7	p. 265
Notes	p. 267
Index	p. 323
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