Tim Rutten: And the Rich Get Richer
[Tim Rutten is a columnist with the LA Times.]
...Abolishing the estate tax has been a goal of some conservative Republicans since the 1940s, so it's easy to forget that its modern champion was a president the GOP used to regard as among the greatest the party has produced — Theodore Roosevelt. Like many thoughtful Americans of his era, he believed the disproportionate accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few would make a mockery of our meritocracy and, ultimately, of our democracy. In 1910, he summed up those feelings. "We grudge no man a fortune in civil life if it is honorably obtained and well used," Roosevelt said. "It is not even enough that it should have been gained without doing damage to the community. We should permit it to be gained only so long as the gaining represents benefit to the community.... The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size, acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is possessed by men of relatively small means. Therefore, I believe in a graduated income tax on big fortunes, and … a graduated inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against evasion, and increasing rapidly in amount with the size of the estate."
In 1916, eight years after Roosevelt left office, Congress finally recognized the justice of his case and incorporated a levy on estates into the tax code.
In fact, American governments have taxed estates, at least on a temporary basis, since the founding. The first estate duty was imposed by the Federalists to finance the undeclared war with France; Abraham Lincoln imposed a temporary inheritance tax during the Civil War. It clearly is a pillar of any rationally progressive tax system, and it is no accident that it's under assault in what amounts to a new Gilded Age in which wealth is accumulating with ever-greater rapidity in a smaller and smaller number of hands. The hereditary advantage such unchecked concentration confers undermines our notions of equal opportunity and turns the American dream into little more than a genetic lottery....
Read entire article at LA Times
...Abolishing the estate tax has been a goal of some conservative Republicans since the 1940s, so it's easy to forget that its modern champion was a president the GOP used to regard as among the greatest the party has produced — Theodore Roosevelt. Like many thoughtful Americans of his era, he believed the disproportionate accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few would make a mockery of our meritocracy and, ultimately, of our democracy. In 1910, he summed up those feelings. "We grudge no man a fortune in civil life if it is honorably obtained and well used," Roosevelt said. "It is not even enough that it should have been gained without doing damage to the community. We should permit it to be gained only so long as the gaining represents benefit to the community.... The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the mere fact of its size, acquires qualities which differentiate it in kind as well as in degree from what is possessed by men of relatively small means. Therefore, I believe in a graduated income tax on big fortunes, and … a graduated inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against evasion, and increasing rapidly in amount with the size of the estate."
In 1916, eight years after Roosevelt left office, Congress finally recognized the justice of his case and incorporated a levy on estates into the tax code.
In fact, American governments have taxed estates, at least on a temporary basis, since the founding. The first estate duty was imposed by the Federalists to finance the undeclared war with France; Abraham Lincoln imposed a temporary inheritance tax during the Civil War. It clearly is a pillar of any rationally progressive tax system, and it is no accident that it's under assault in what amounts to a new Gilded Age in which wealth is accumulating with ever-greater rapidity in a smaller and smaller number of hands. The hereditary advantage such unchecked concentration confers undermines our notions of equal opportunity and turns the American dream into little more than a genetic lottery....