Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 5.djvu/360

344 344 HAR VARD LA W RE VIE W. is political. To impeach the constitutionality of a revenue statute which must make some incidental private benefits, on the ground that Congress has at the same time tried to do something else which is beyond its power, would be a hopeless task. But a bounty is perhaps a different matter. Here money is raised and directly given away to encourage private individuals to continue or increase their otherwise unprofitable business "until such time as the business might be self sustaining." Apparently, therefore, the question in the matter of bounties is not concluded by any previous acquiescence in " protective " taxes, even consid. ering the latter as a colorable abuse of an unquestioned power. This is, moreover, the first case in which the constitutionality of a congressional bounty, whether direct, as here, or indirectly by " protection," has been before the court for decision. Until the opportunity for raising the question is presented, until " an individual is brought into the point of collision, and the clouds surcharged with the great forces of the public welfare burst over his head," x there is no presumption of legality from delay. 2 There seems, therefore, slight reason to doubt that the im- porters are in season to be heard carefully by the court in the consideration of this question. 3 It is a question which, as we have said, merits and will receive an attention commensurate to its far-reaching consequences. If the line is not drawn at this point, it is difficult to say where it can logically be drawn. Vast inter- ests of all kinds are involved in limitations of taxation ; for, as was grimly said by the leading American jurist, 4 " The power to tax involves the power to destroy." Charles F. Chamberlayne. Boston, Jan. 23, 1892. 1 Hon. W. M. Evarts, Defence of President Johnson, 2 Impeach., p. 269. 2 Gross v. Rice, 71 Me. 241. •Cooley, Taxation, 46, 55, 104; Marbury & Madison, I Cranch, 177; Sedgwick, Stat. Law, 414; Hurtado v. California, 110 U. S. 516, 536.
 * Marshall, C. J., in McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 341.