Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 50.djvu/761

Rh returned at 181,494,000 pounds, as compared with 83,346,000 manufactured for smoking.

From 1863 (when the tax was first imposed on this commodity) to 1869 the variations in the annual internal revenue receipts from tobacco (always in the way of increase) were very great and, as it were, spasmodic, and were due mainly to frequent changes in the rate of tax on the different forms of tobacco. During this same period occurred one of the most remarkable illustrations to be found in fiscal history of the influence of a tax reduction in increasing the consumption of a comparatively cheap commodity in general use. Thus, in 1866, with a uniform tax of ten dollars per thousand on cigars, only 347,443,894 were returned by manufacturers for taxation, while in 1869, under a uniform tax of five dollars per thousand, 991,335,934 were returned, or nearly three times the quantity.

From 1870 to 1882 the ratio of annual increase in the taxed product of domestic tobacco was greater on the average than the corresponding ratio of increase in the population of the country; and in the latter year the annual internal revenue collected from this source attained the large and unprecedented aggregate of $47,391,989.

In 1883 the rates of tax on all forms of domestic tobacco and the special taxes on dealers and manufacturers of the same were reduced fully fifty per cent. This reduction of tax caused an immediate reduction of revenue, comparing the receipts of 1883 with those of 1884, the first full year of reduced rates, to the extent of $21,329,589. In 1886 the tax on cigars was further reduced fifty per cent, and in 1890 the taxes on snuff, chewing and smoking tobacco, twenty-five per cent. At this latter date all special taxes relating to tobacco—i. e., licenses to manufacturers, dealers, etc.—were also entirely repealed. The annual reduction in revenue in consequence of these last abatements, comparing the receipts for 1890 with those for 1892, was near $3,000,000, notwithstanding an increase in population during the same period of 2,897,750. The internal revenue from tobacco for the fiscal year 1896 was $30,711,629, an increase of $1,006,721 over the receipts for 1895, and a decrease of $3,277,372 as compared with the receipts of 1890. Had the taxes on tobacco existing in 1882 been allowed to remain unchanged, the annual revenue from this source (the increase of population being taken into account) for the fiscal year 1897 would probably have approximated $70,000,000.

The United States internal revenue taxes on tobacco are smaller than those imposed by any other country that seeks to make this commodity a leading source of revenue. In the year 1895 they amounted to about forty cents per capita. The duties collected on imports of tobacco for 1895 were $14,916,000, and