tered into the considerations which determined the
recommendations of the secretary. He proposed to rely upon the
tariff for a large share of the basis of credit, and, while adding
to its provisions, to impose a direct tax, and to levy duties upon
stills and distilled liquors, on ale and beer, on tobacco, spring-
carriages, bank-notes, silver ware, jewellery, and legacies.

Congress made haste to consider and substantially to carry out the
recommendations of Secretary Chase. The legislators were not
inclined to go farther than the head of the Treasury suggested.
No practical proposition was made for a broader scheme of taxation.
The tariff, as has been indicated, was enlarged. A bill was passed,
levying a direct tax of $20,000,000, to be apportioned among all
the States, of which the sum of $12,000,000 was apportioned among
the States which had not seceded from the Union. Instead of the
scheme of internal taxes which Mr. Chase had proposed, an income
tax was substituted, to be collected on the results of the year
ending April 1, 1862, and assessed at three per cent. on all incomes
in excess of $800; but before any collections were made under it,
the broader internal-revenue system went into effect. Direct taxes
had been tried in 1800 and again in 1814, but the receipts had
always been disappointing. The results under Secretary Chase's
proposition were altogether unsatisfactory; and on the 1st of July,
1862, an Act was passed limiting the tax to one levy previous to
April 1, 1865, when the law should have full force. The estimates
of collections were set at $12,000,000 annually, or very near that
sum. For four years, 1862-1865 inclusive, the receipts were only
$4,956,657: in 1867 they became $4,200,233, and then dribbled away.

THE NATIONAL LOAN ACT OF JULY, 1861.

Inadequate as is now seen to be the legislation of 1861 with
reference to actual revenue, the receipts fell far below the
calculations of experts. For the fiscal year 1862 the customs
amounted to only $49,056,397, and the direct tax to $1,795,331;
and the total receipts, excluding loans, were only $51,919,261
instead of $80,000,000, as expected under the estimates of the
Treasury. The plea may perhaps be pressed in defense of Congress,
that financial legislation, laggard as it was, ran before popular
readiness to raise money by taxes. There was a wide-spread opposition
among the strongest advocates of the wa