"Yes."
"What was your tax the past year?" Wolf asked.
The old man laughed bitterly. "Seventy-nine percent."
"Enough to live on?"
"Barely," said Carroll, leaning heavily on the scythe. "It means we must work many hours, sixteen or more a day, in order to survive."
"That is what we fight," said Wolf simply. "That, and the near slavery of many of the Colonies. Do you know what happens to the money you pay the Terran Federation in taxes?"
"No," admitted Carroll. "No one has dared ask."
Wolf laughed. "And yet they say the Federation is a republic? When the citizen does not dare ask what happens to the taxes that are ground out of him? I'll tell you, my friend Joseph. It is used for administration. Simply that. Administration of a space empire is an expensive project, and you must pay for it. It costs a great deal of money, our treasured Empire. And what does the administration consist of? Machinery to collect taxes. It is like a snake that feeds on its own tail, Joseph. Taxes are increased in order to have enough money to collect more taxes. It never ends."
"This is one thing," said Joseph. "The killing of people is another."
"How many do you know who have died in Debtor's camps, or died because they could not work hard enough? Joseph, this is no life for a man. The Colonies cannot develop under the Federation. They must be free to govern themselves. Otherwise, we have simply a great, cancerous tumor, spreading through the universe, calling itself the Terran Federation."