Other Sources of Federal Revenue.—Besides the receipts obtained from tariff duties and internal revenue taxes, there are a number of other sources of revenue such as those from the sale of public land, the tax on national banks, fines and penalties for violations of the laws of the United States, profits on coinage, naturalization, immigration, patent office and other fees, etc.
Income Taxes.—In very recent years (since 1918), the income tax, in its various forms, has become the greatest of all the sources of revenue for the federal government.
It was in 1862 that Congress levied for the first time a tax on incomes, the rate varying from five to ten per cent according to the amount of the income, all incomes below $600 being exempt from the tax. In 1872, the law was repealed; but a demand for reviving this method of taxation gradually increased, and it came to be a standing part of the national platform of the Democratic party. Accordingly when the Democrats got control of Congress in 1894, they enacted a law providing that all incomes in excess of $4,000 a year should be taxed at the rate of two per cent on the amount in excess of that figure. Shortly after the law went into effect, however, the Supreme Court, overruling its former decisions, decided, by a vote of five to four, that the law was unconstitutional, mainly on the ground that a tax on income from property was a direct tax in the sense of the Constitution, and not having been apportioned among the states according to their population was null and void. Sentiment in favor of such a tax, however, steadily grew, and in 1913 the constitutional impediment was removed by the sixteenth amendment.
Later in the year Congress levied an income tax, in connection with an act to reduce tariff duties. The income tax is one per cent on each individual's annual net income in excess of $3000 (or $4000 for husband and wife living together), plus an additional tax of one per cent on net income over $20,000 and not exceeding $50,000, two per cent on net income over $50,000 and not exceeding $75,000, and so on up to six per cent on net income over $500,000.
The Corporation Tax.—Congress in 1909 passed a law imposing a tax on corporations, joint-stock companies, and associations, to the extent of one per cent on the net income of each in excess of $5,000 a year. In the year 1912 the tax yielded $28,583,259. The next year the exemption of $5,000 was removed, thus making the entire net income of corporations liable to the tax.
Inheritance Taxes.—During the Civil War and the war with Spain, Congress levied a tax on inheritances, and the permanent adoption of this form of taxation was strongly recommended by President Roosevelt in his annual messages, but owing largely to the fact that many of the states have passed laws of this kind, the idea has never commended itself to Congress.
Customhouse, New York
In the Mint at Philadelphia