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The Case Plainly 
 Stated 
 
 By H: F. RING 
 
 JOSEPH PELS FUND EDITION 
 
lXj- ^' 
 
 . 1329 
 
.\i^5^\^ 
 
 PRE"FATORY NOTE 
 
 This address originally was delivered to the United Labor Organiza- 
 tion of Houston, Texas, in 1887. It appeared in full the next morning 
 in the Houston Daily Post, and afterwards in The Standard, published 
 at that time in New York by Henry George. Mr. George then issued 
 it in tract form, giving it the name of "The Case Plainly Stated." 
 Many editions of it have since been published from time to time in this 
 country and in Europe and Australia, and it is generally regarded as 
 one of the clearest brief statements extant of the philosophy of land 
 value taxation as taught by Henry George in his famous "Progress 
 and Poverty," 
 
 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 By H. F. RING. 
 
 MR. CHAIRMAN :— The land question is simply a 
 question as to how the use of the bounties of 
 nature shall be best regulated and controlled. By 
 bounties of nature I mean the coal beds, the mineral 
 deposits, the land — all those natural elements which were 
 not created by human industry, but which Nature has 
 freely and abundantly provided for the use and enjoy- 
 ment of all the children of men ; and I propose to show 
 how the right of capital and. labor to use these natural 
 elements should be regulated by the government*, so as 
 most to conduce to the happiness and well-being of 
 mankind. 
 
 I am a Single Taxer, and a discussion of the land 
 question by me can be nothing more than a mere attempt 
 to expound the teachings of that great master of the 
 subject, Henry George. 
 
 George, at the outset, calls attention to the marvelous 
 improvements in the arts and sciences, the discoveries, 
 
 * The word "government" as used in this presentation of the Single Tax 
 refers to the tax levying power as vested, not alone in the federal, But also 
 and even primarily in the state, county, and municipal governments. 
 
 It is probable that a complete application of the Single Tax will be reached 
 through its gradual adoption at first in cities, counties and states, before it is 
 substituted for tariff and internal revenue taxation. 
 
 1 
 
2 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 inventions, and labor-saving machines which, within the 
 past 100 years, have so immensely increased the pro- 
 ductive powers of the human race. Is it not a moderate 
 estimate to assume that on an average the labor of one 
 man today, with all these labor-saving inventions, will 
 produce as much of the comforts and luxuries of life 
 as the labors of four men would a hundred years ago? 
 And does it not follow that the average workman of today 
 creates, by each day's labor, four times as much wealth as 
 the average workman did a hundred years ago ? George 
 teaches that if the workman of today, on an average, cre- 
 ates four times as much wealth as the workman of a 
 hundred years ago, then the services of this workman of 
 today are four times as valuable to society; then why 
 should not his wages of right be four times as great ? 
 Why should he not be four times as independent? Why 
 should it not be four times as easy for him to make a 
 living and support his family in comfort and decency? 
 
 Will any one presume to assert that this is in fact the 
 case? On the contrary, is it not just about as hard for 
 the poor man to make a living today as it ever was ? 
 Does he not dread the loss of a position today just as » 
 much as he ever did? George asserts that labor-saving 
 machinery really ought to lessen the burdens of labor, 
 to make it easier for the laborer to live, and in fact, to 
 lighten his toil. But alas, from some apparently mys- 
 terious cause, — a cause which many comfortably well-to- 
 do people insist is one of the unfathomable mysteries of 
 Divine Providence, — what George claims should rightly 
 result from inventions does not result from them. And 
 still we are all the time making new discoveries, and 
 year by year increasing, by means of new inventions, 
 the productive powers of working men; yet, with the 
 increase of population, the lot of those who produce all 
 this wealth seems to be becoming more precarious, less 
 independent and more and more wretched. 
 
 Who denies that under the present social system, 
 wages tend to fall irresistibly to the point at which the 
 wage-workers can barely subsist ? This is called the 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 3 
 
 iron law of wages, and all the strikes conceivable can 
 only temporarily, and but fitfully, arrest this steady ten- 
 dency. For so long as unemployed men compete for em- 
 ployment against the employed, wages cannot permanent- 
 ly advance. The worker may create quadruple the 
 wealth, but he is not permitted to retain any more of it 
 as his share. 
 
 WHO GETS THE WEALTH? 
 
 Now, where does this wealth go — this wealth which 
 we now produce so much more easily and in such vastly 
 greater quantities than ever before ? What becomes of it ? 
 Who gets it? Why is it that in this age of wealth-pro- 
 ducing and labor-saving machinery, poverty as abject and 
 hideous as ever before seen in the history of the world 
 abounds and increases in our midst? What is the cause 
 of the so-called iron law of wages? Henry George has 
 discovered it. He has pointed it out, and he has shown 
 us the remedy. He has demonstrated beyond a doubt or 
 question that it does not result as a fatal necessity from 
 the nature of things, but that it is a result of violation of 
 natural law, of a refusal on the part of society to recog- 
 nize the inalienable right of every citizen of access to the 
 bounties of nature within the territory of his country on 
 equal terms with every other citizen of that country. 
 
 Let me now give you a short lesson in the elements of 
 this new political economy. 
 
 Three factors enter into the creation of every con- 
 ceivable kind of wealth. By wealth we mean any ma- 
 terial thing produced by human industry which gratifies 
 human desires. These factors are land, labor and capi- 
 tal. Wealth in a civilized community is produced only by 
 means of a union or partnership between land, labor and 
 capital. Labor does the work, capital loans the tools, 
 and land furnishes the natural elements on which, and 
 out of which all material things resulting from human 
 industry are created. In speaking of land in the new 
 political economy we never include improvements or 
 
4 The Case Plainly Stated, 
 
 anything which is the result of human toil. We simply- 
 mean the opportunities which land and the elements 
 within it afford for the employment of capital and labor 
 — we mean the raw elements as they lie on or in the 
 bosom of the eartli, untouched by the hand of man. 
 
 Now, as before remarked, the product of land, labor 
 and capital is wealth, and after it is produced, it is di- 
 vided among these factors entering into its composition. 
 A certain portion of it, called rent, goes to land, either 
 directly in the form of rent or in the form of interest 
 on the selling price of the land or of the coal bed, or 
 whatever it is ; another portion of it, called profit or in- 
 terest, goes to capital for the use of tools which capital 
 has furnished, and the balance left, after land has been 
 paid rent and capital has been paid interest or profits, 
 goes to labor as wages for the work which labor has 
 done, including the labor of superintendence. 
 
 MEANING OF RENT. 
 
 Now what does rent signify as used here? Rent is 
 the price paid for the privilege of access to the raw ma- 
 terial — for the mere privilege of getting hold of something 
 not created by man, on which and out of which labor and 
 capital can produce wealth. This rent may be paid peri- 
 odically, or may be paid in a lump in the form of pur- 
 chase money. In either case the result will be the same. 
 Is it not clear that in the division of wealth after it has 
 been produced by this partnership between land, labor 
 and capital, the more land gets for rent the less there 
 will be left for capital and labor ? Is it not quite as plain 
 as A B C that the more it costs capital and labor to get 
 hold of these natural elements, the coal beds, the mines, 
 the water fronts, the land — the gifts of nature which a 
 kind providence has provided for the equal use and en- 
 joyment of all — the less there will be for labor and capi- 
 tal to divide between them? 
 
 In the new political economy we must never confuse 
 land v/ith capital. One is never the synonym of the 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 5 
 
 other. Land, as before stated, is simply the natural oppor- 
 tunity, exclusive of improvements or anything done to 
 it by man. Capital is something that has been made by 
 man, like a machine for instance, which is useful in the 
 production of wealth. It is wealth used to produce more 
 wealth. 
 
 LABOR AND CAPITAL PARTNERS. 
 
 But someone asks : Suppose the capitalist who is 
 using the coal bed or using this natural opportunity, 
 whatever it may be, is also owner of it. Where then does 
 your partnership between land, labor and capital come 
 in? We answer just the same as before. A sum equal 
 to the interest on the market value of the coal bed (in- 
 dependent of the machinery, excavation work, etc.) is in 
 such cases a factor of rent. The owner, in addition to 
 profit or interest on his capital, as before defined, must 
 also take from the wealth produced a sum equal, approx- 
 imately, to interest on the market value of the coal land, 
 otherwise he would sell out and quit. It is evident that 
 the more money the owner is obliged to invest in pur- 
 chasing the coal bed, for instance, the greater must be 
 the sum which he takes out of the wealth produced to 
 cover interest on that investment, and hence such interest 
 money is simply rent paid for the use of a natural ele- 
 ment, for the privilege of access to one of the bounties 
 of nature. Therefore, is it not equally plain in this case 
 that the more paid for this privilege of use, the less will 
 remain out of which labor can get wages? 
 
 A few years ago we read in the newspapers of a 
 great boom in the vicinity of Birmingham, Alabama. 
 We were exultingly told that the lands containing coal 
 beds and mineral deposits in northern Alabama had gone 
 up in value from $75,000 to $50,000,000 in the space of 
 six years. What does this signify? It means that when 
 capital and labor shall attempt to utilize these coal beds 
 and mineral deposits, when capital and labor shall unite 
 together, the one to furnish the tools, the other the labor, 
 
6 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 with which to produce wealth out of this raw material, 
 then will a set of landlords step forward and block the 
 enterprise with a demand for $50,000,000 for the mere 
 right of access to these free gifts of nature, or in lieu 
 of it the payment of $3,000,000 a year as tribute money, 
 that being the interest of $50,000,000 at six per cent. 
 
 There lie the coal beds and mineral deposits un- 
 touched by man, fresh from the hands of the Creator, in- 
 tended by Him, if He is the just, benevolent Being whom 
 we have been taught to worship, for the equal use and en- 
 joyment of all His children, and yet our laws say that 
 capital and labor must pay a few forestallers $3,000,000 
 a year for the privilege of applying the hand of industry 
 to these elements. 
 
 And after this blackmail has been paid, how much 
 will there be left for the wages of labor? The answer 
 is, just as little as labor can ordinarily subsist upon. 
 Why? Because this monopolization of the gifts of nature 
 going on, not only in northern Alabama, but everywhere 
 else, enables capital to drive a hard bargain with labor. 
 For this reason, and this alone, they can't deal with each 
 other on equal vantage grounds. Suppose labor objects 
 and says to capital : *T'll not accept the pittance you 
 offer." Capital replies : "All right, go elsewhere." And 
 so labor starts out to get work for himself, and what does 
 he find? Here he is, living in a country capable of rais- 
 ing food for ten times its present population, and he finds 
 four-fifths of the land untilled or but partially culti- 
 vated. He finds four-fifths of the coal beds and mineral 
 deposits unused. He finds vacant land and unused lots 
 on every side. He goes to New York City even and he 
 finds there within its corporate limits almost one-third 
 the area of that city vacant, unoccupied, and unused, al- 
 though there are miles and miles of tenement houses, in 
 which men and women and innocent children are packed 
 and crowded like maggots, as though there wasn't ample 
 room in the city for the comfortable housing of every 
 human being in it. He finds unused natural elements 
 all around him wherever he goes, sufficient to give em- 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 7 
 
 ployment and support in abundance to tens of millions 
 of happy families. 
 
 But now suppose labor attempts to make use of any 
 of these unused natural opportunities ? Suppose he con- 
 cludes to go to work for himself upon a piece of vacant 
 land in the suburbs of a city, for instance, where labor 
 could be applied to the greatest advantage. What hap- 
 pens? An individual comes along and waves a title 
 deed, and orders him ofif the premises. He finds that all 
 these unused natural opportunities are owned by indi- 
 viduals and claimed as private property. He finds him- 
 self frustrated at every point. He finds that he can't 
 go to work anywhere without paying blackmail to the 
 owner of some natural element for the mere privilege 
 of working and so he strikes back to northern Alabama 
 and takes off his hat to Capital and bows very low and 
 says : 'Tlease, sir, give me a bare living and I will be 
 your slave." 
 
 And that is about all that he does get, and that is all 
 he ever will get under the present system of land owner- 
 ship, though you may strike and boycott and potter about 
 graduated land taxes, graduated income taxes, and grad- 
 uated nonsense until doomsday. 
 
 THE GREAT PARASITE. 
 
 With advancing population the greater becomes the 
 demand for natural opportunities and the higher the 
 prices which can be extorted for the privilege of using 
 them. As population increases, the town lots, the coal 
 beds, the mineral deposits, the water fronts, the land, 
 go up in value, and so goes up also the amount of trib- 
 ute money which labor must pay for access to them, for 
 the privilege of employment. The more of the products 
 of industry which go for the payment of this constantly 
 increasing tribute, the less and less will grow the share 
 allowed the laborer and the more dependent and the 
 more wretched will his lot become. 
 
8 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 Here in Houston today, suppose Enterprise has $50,- 
 000 to invest in the paper mill business, a sum barely suf- 
 ficient to put up the building, buy the machinery and 
 carry stock. He finds a beautiful site for his mill on the 
 banks of the bayou. It is a vacant lot. The hand of 
 man has never been applied to it, and it stands there now 
 just as it stood when the Indian roamed over the site of 
 this city. The owner of that block, however, thinks he 
 can make Enterprise pay him $20,000 for the privilege 
 of giving employment to labor on this natural oppor- 
 tunity — this piece of ground. That is the price, and if 
 he can't get it today he will goX it when the city grows 
 a little larger. But Enterprise says to him: *T have 
 only $50,000 capital, all of which I shall need in my 
 business." The land owner answers it is not his lookout, 
 and so Enterprise turns away checkened and baffled, and 
 the mill is not built. 
 
 CAUSE OF DULL TIMES. 
 
 And so it is everywhere. Wherever we find a portion 
 of the vacant surface of the earth which could be utilized 
 by capital and labor, and which affords an opportunity 
 for human toil and enterprise, there we find a human 
 vampire with a paper title in his hand warning off labor ; 
 and that vampire must always be placated by the pay- 
 ment of blackmail before the wheels of industry can be- 
 gin to turn. 
 
 Need we wonder that these wheels turn slowly, and 
 that they are always getting out of gear ; that we are al- 
 ways talking about dull times; that men are always out 
 of employment and always hunting for work, regarding 
 it as a favor even to be allowed to work; that we are 
 all the time growing too much cotton, when millions of 
 human beings have only one shirt to their names; that 
 we are producing too much food, when half the popula- 
 lation of the world is insufficiently fed; that carpenters 
 are out of work, when half the people are not comfort- 
 ably housed; shoemakers wanting work and millions 
 
The Case Plainly Stated, 9 
 
 needing shoes? How could it be otherwise, when labor 
 is compelled to beg for work in the midst of limitless 
 unused opportunities for work, on which opportunities, 
 however, sit these human vampires, these dogs in the 
 manger, waving labor back with their paper title deeds? 
 
 AN ILLUSTRATION. 
 
 Now let us go back for a moment to that partnership 
 between land, labor and capital. For illustration, sup- 
 pose the wealth produced by the partnership to be created 
 by the application of capital and labor to those coal beds 
 and mineral deposits in northern Alabama, valued, as we 
 have seen, at $50,000,000. In the division of wealth 
 produced we have shown how, say six per cent of this 
 $50,000,000, or $3,000,000, must go to land as rent. Or, 
 in other words, $3,000,000 a year must be paid to land 
 owners directly as rent or interest on purchase money 
 for the bare privilege of utilizing these gifts of nature. 
 Now, in the division of wealth produced, why is labor 
 entitled to any portion of it? Clearly because labor's 
 industry has contributed to its creation. Why is capital 
 entitled to any part of it? Because capital has furnished 
 labor with tools with which to develop the mineral de- 
 posits. The capitalist who owns the tools can trace his 
 title back to the creator of them, to some individual or 
 set of individuals whose industry produced them and 
 from whom he purchased or inherited them. The title, 
 then, of both labor and capital to a portion of the wealth 
 produced from these mineral deposits originates in hu- 
 man industry, and it is a sacred title. Now then, why 
 should the land owner get any portion of this wealth, 
 to produce which capital has supplied the tools and labor 
 has done the work ? This owner claims the right of mak- 
 ing capital and labor pay him interest on $50,000,000, or 
 $3,000,000 a year, for the mere privilege of access to this 
 raw coal and raw ore. Ought we not to scrutinize most 
 carefully his right to extort this immense tribute? And 
 if he can show no natural and moral right to claim it, 
 
lo The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 does not society countenance the robbery of labor in per- 
 mitting him to do so ? Where does his title originate ? 
 
 We find that six or seven years ago he paid someone 
 who claimed to own the land in which these mineral de- 
 posits are found $750,000 for the raw natural element for 
 which he now demands $50,000,000. Was this additional 
 value of $49,250,000 in six years produced by his in- 
 dustry? Was it produced by the industry of any previ- 
 ous owner of these natural elements? Did it cost $49,- 
 250,000 to discover these mineral deposits? We trace 
 back his title a little further, and we find that perhaps a 
 hundred years ago it originated in a grant to John Jones 
 from the government — that is to say, the people who in- 
 habited this country a hundred years ago and who con- 
 stituted the government said : "We will divide the land 
 and we will give John Jones this particular tract for his 
 private property." 
 
 But did these people create that land and the coal 
 and iron in it ? Can it be shown that they had any better 
 right to it from the Almighty Creator than the people 
 of this generation have? Was the earth intended by 
 the Heavenly Father for one generation to dispose of 
 forever, or as an abiding place for all generations ? Was 
 Thomas Jefferson right or wrong when he wrote : "The 
 earth belongs in usufruct to the living; the dead have no 
 right or power over it?" By what authority could the 
 people living here a hundred years ago, long since dead 
 and gone, confer upon John Jones, also dead and gone, 
 a right which would enable John Smith today, by trac- 
 ing a paper chain of titles from him, to extort from 
 capital and labor a tribute of $3,000,000 a year for the 
 bare privilege of getting to tliat coal and iron and making 
 it useful to mankind? 
 
 Who dares to blaspheme the name of the Almighty 
 Ruler of the universe by saying that the coal and iron 
 were not intended by Him for the equal use and the en- 
 joyment of all His children — the humblest babe born 
 today in a garret equally with a child of the proudest 
 duke who ever lived? 
 
The Case Plainly Stated, ii 
 
 MAN IS A LAND ANIMAL. 
 
 Is not man a land animal? Can he live without land? 
 Can he any more rightfully be deprived of access to land 
 than he can rightfully be deprived of life itself? Can 
 he any more rightfully be compelled to yield up to a fore- 
 staller, a mere owner of land, a portion of the fruit of 
 his industry for the privilege of getting hold of the raw 
 material elements than he can rightfully be compelled 
 as a slave to yield up to a master a portion of the fruits 
 of his industry? To compel him to do so is as much a 
 robbery of labor in one case as in the other. Why then 
 is not the humblest babe that God sends into this world 
 naturally and by inalienable right entitled to access to 
 land on equal terms with all his fellow human beings ? 
 
 ORIGIN OF PROPERTY RIGHT. 
 
 Mind, when we say access to land we do not include 
 access to improvements on land, or access to anything 
 produced by human industry, a title to which can be 
 shown originating in human toil ; we simply mean access 
 upon equal terms to the free bounties of nature as they 
 lie upon the kind bosom of mother earth, untouched and 
 undisturbed by the hand of man. What I produce by 
 my industry is mine. What I obtain by exchanging the 
 products of my industry for the products of another's 
 industry is mine. What my father or my grandfather 
 produced by his industry was his, and if he has given it 
 to me it is mine. 
 
 In all these cases human industry is the origin of 
 property right, and property rights originating in human 
 industry must be held sacred, else there would be no in- 
 centive to human effort. Do not the values produced by 
 the individual belong to the individual producing them? 
 Do not the values produced by the community belong to 
 the community producing them? Is there anything 
 wrong, immoral or communistic in this ideal ? And yet 
 this is the sum and substance of the Henry George phi- 
 losophy. 
 
12 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 Take the case of the vacant block on the bank of the 
 bayou which Enterprise wanted for a paper mill and 
 could not get. Fifty years ago it was worthless. Now 
 labor must pay a tribute of over $20,000 to the so-called 
 owner for the privilege of using it. Whose industry has 
 put $20,000 of value on that piece of vacant ground? 
 Not the industry of the present owner, nor the industry 
 of any former owner, because no man has ever done a 
 stroke of work upon it. That value of $20,000 has been 
 placed upon the land by the common energy and enter- 
 prise of the entire community. Since the community has 
 produced that land value why does it not belong to the 
 community? Why has not the community the same 
 rights to the value it creates as the individual has to 
 the values which he individually creates ? 
 
 THE REMEDY. 
 
 How shall this derangement of the wheels of industry, 
 this blackmail upon enterprise, this robbery of labor, this 
 eager and fatal competition among laborers for employ- 
 ment, this slavish fear of the loss of a situation in the 
 midst of abundant unused opportunities for employment 
 — how shall this curse which our present land system has 
 fastened upon the productive industry of the country, be 
 removed? Simply by doing justice; by being honest; by 
 recognizing in our laws one of the inalienable rights of 
 man; by recognizing in every human being, in every 
 generation, the present as well as the past, an inalienable 
 right of access to the bounties of nature on equal terms 
 with every other human being. 
 
 How shall this right of access on equal terms be se- 
 cured? Simply by making every individual who claims 
 a right to the exclusive possession of a tract of land pay 
 in the form of a tax approximately what the use of that 
 tract of land is worth, exclusive of all improvements 
 on it or anything done to it by the hand of man, and 
 by abolishing every other form of taxation. Take the 
 rent of land for public use instead of taxes. 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 13 
 
 WILL SIMPLIFY GOVERNMENT. 
 
 Some one asks : "Will not this proposed change 
 vastly increase the functions of government and im- 
 mensely add to the number of government employees?" 
 I reply no. On the contrary, at least two-thirds of the 
 present army of revenue collectors and tax gatherers 
 will be dispensed with, and the remaining one-third will 
 collect this single tax on land values at one-third the ex- 
 pense now incurred in the collection of national, state, 
 county, and municipal taxes. 
 
 Another inquirer asks : "Will not the new system 
 offer abundant opportunities for corruption and partiality 
 in fixing the amount of this tax annually to be paid for 
 the exclusive use of a piece of land? And how do you 
 propose the amount of the tax shall be determined?" 
 It will be determined by the same law of demand and 
 supply which now determines the amount of tax under 
 the present system. The single tax will be fixed by the 
 same machinery of an assessor and a board of equaliza- 
 tion which fixes it now. For instance, under this system 
 a piece of property on Main street rents for $5,000 a 
 year. Interest at the prevailing rate on the building alone, 
 added to the annual cost of insurance, repairs and care- 
 taking, and a sum sufficient to provide a sinking fund for 
 renewals amounted to, say $3,000 a year. The land- 
 lord is then collecting the difference between $3,000 and 
 $5,000, or $3,000 for the use of this naked earth. 
 That is to say, he is collecting $2,000 a year for the use 
 of something never created by man, to which all are by 
 natural right equally entitled, and which owes its rental 
 value of $2,000 a year exclusively to the common enter- 
 prise and energy of the entire community. 
 
 This is the sum which, under Henry George's system, 
 would be turned over to the government in the form of a 
 tax for the common benefit of the community who col- 
 lectively have made the use of this land worth $2,000 
 a year. 
 
14 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 Here an interested friend anxiously inquires: "But 
 'if the landlord has to pay this tax of $2,000 a year for the 
 use of the land, will he not take it out of the tenant by 
 raising his rent to $7,000?" No, for the landlord's 
 charges now all he can compel the tenant to pay. Sup- 
 pose he tries to. Suppose he says to his tenant: "You 
 must now pay me $7,000 a year." What happens ? Just 
 what happens every day now. If the tenant can do no 
 better he pays the increase. But now, mark you, when 
 the landlord goes to pay his tax what happens then ? Why 
 the board of equalization says to him, you have received 
 $7,000 a year rent for the use of improvements worth 
 only $3,000 a year. You are therefore collecting $4,000 a 
 year instead of $2,000 for the use of the naked lot, and 
 you will therefore pay the city or state $4,000 a year for 
 the privilege of the exclusive use of the ground instead 
 of $2,000 a year as heretofore. Now what has the land- 
 lord made by jumping up the rent? Nothing. What 
 would be made by thus jumping up the rents under the 
 present system? Everything. Under which system 
 would landlords be more apt to force up rents ? 
 
 DETERMINING THE TAX. 
 
 Another way by which the board of equalization 
 under the George system would determine the amount of 
 tax to be paid for the privilege of the exclusive posses- 
 sion of a tract of land, and which would also compel 
 landlords to collect from their tenants and turn over 
 to the government in the form of a tax the full 
 value of the use of the land, would be from observation 
 of the prices which real estate brought in the market. 
 But note, at this point some smart fellow jumps up — and 
 he is likely enough to be a newspaper editor — and vehe- 
 mently protests, saying: "Why, sir, the taxation of 
 ground values plan does not propose to allow any ex- 
 clusive ownership of land. It demands that the govern- 
 ment own it all and rent it out or divide it up into 60,- 
 000,000 or 70,000,000 Httle bits, or do something of that 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 15 
 
 kind with it, and here you are talking about lands being 
 bought and sold under the Henry George system. Why, 
 man alive, you don't know what that system is !" 
 
 Now, Mr. Editor, or Mr. Who-ever-you-are, let me 
 say to you that in your ignorance, or in your indifference 
 to the sufferings of your fellowmen, or in your desire 
 to pander to the greed of monopoly, or to the timidity 
 of capital, you may say what you please; you may mis- 
 represent as much as you please for the purpose of 
 bringing odium and contempt upon the cause; you may 
 call it what you please — state ownership, state landlord- 
 ism, ownership in common, communism, nihilism, anarch- 
 ism or anything else; but the fact, nevertheless, remains 
 that, under the just and righteous land system which 
 we are trying to explain, the land will continue to be 
 bought and sold under the same form of paper deeds, 
 precisely as it is bought and sold today. It will con- 
 tinue in precisely the same way to pass to devisees by will 
 and to heirs by law of descent and distribution. The 
 right of control, of exclusive possession and dominion 
 over a piece of land and of the free and exclusive en- 
 joyment of all improvements on it, w411 in no way be 
 abridged or disturbed. When you buy a lot on Main 
 street today worth $10,000 with a building on it worth 
 $10,000 more, your deed recites a consideration of 
 $20,000. Now when you buy this same property under 
 the George system, the only difference in the whole 
 transaction will be that your deed for it — assuming that 
 the price accords with the market value prevailing at the 
 time of your purchase — will recite a consideration of 
 only $10,000, and $10,000 is all that you will then pay for 
 the property. You will pay nothing for the land. After 
 you have bought the property you will pay yearly in 
 the form of a tax to the government, approximately the 
 full market value of the (yearly) use of it — which will 
 amount to the annual rental value of the land, and as the 
 man from whom you purchased had to pay the govern- 
 ment the same annual rental value, you will consequently 
 
1 6 The Case Plainly Stated, 
 
 pay nothing, or approximately nothing''', to him for the 
 land itself when you purchase the property. You thus 
 save an investment of $10,000 in dirt; instead of such in- 
 vestment you will pay for the common benefit of the 
 community, including yourself, what the privilege of the 
 exclusive use of that spot of earth is worth — nothing 
 more, nothing less — and that is simply what you ought 
 to pay. The $10,000, which, under the present system, 
 you are compelled to bury in a bit of earth, you will 
 have left you with which to increase your business ; and 
 if you do increase your business with it, and add another 
 story to your building, no tax gatherer will come around 
 and impose an additional fine upon you for doing some- 
 tliing with your money which gives employment to labor. 
 
 NO PROPERTY IN LAND. 
 
 Thus, under the single tax system^ land would be sold 
 and would change hands as it does now, but it would 
 only bring in the market approximately the value of the 
 improvements on it. If land in any locality should get 
 to selling for considerably more than the value of the 
 improvements on it, this would be a certain indication 
 that the parties using the natural elements in that neigh- 
 borhood were not paying for the benefit of all the people 
 what the use of the same was worth, and so a board of 
 equalization would put the tax up. As population in- 
 creases the value of the use of land increases, and with 
 it, under the George system, the revenue from this tax 
 on land values will increase, and thus the entire people 
 who collectively produce this increasing value will get 
 the benefit of the values collectively produced by them. 
 As it is now, the increase in the value of land, which 
 amounts to several billions annually in the United States, 
 four-fifths of which is increase in the value of city and 
 
 * There will, no doubt, be instances where the desire of an individual to 
 get and retain possession of a certain piece of property, will cause him to 
 offer a bonus over and above the market value of the improvements. 
 
The Case Plainly Stated, 17 
 
 town lots and mineral deposits, goes to a comparatively 
 small number of individuals who do no more to produce 
 these values than any other members of the community. 
 
 TAXATION ABOLISHED. 
 
 Another doubter puts this objection: Under the 
 George system you would make the owner of a lot on 
 Main street, with an improvement on it worth $10,000, 
 pay as much tax as the owner of a similar lot adjoining, 
 having a building on it worth $50,000. What justice is 
 there in that? 
 
 Let us see. Take away the improvements and these 
 two lots are of the same value — that is to say, the value 
 of the use of both lots for ordinary business purposes is 
 the same. Suppose it is $300 a year. Now, the man with 
 the $50,000 improvement collects from his tenant ten per 
 cent on his $50,000, or $5,000. He also collects $300, 
 the value of the use of the lot, making in all $5,300. The 
 man with the $10,000 improvement also collects ten per 
 cent upon the valuation of his improvement from his 
 tenant, of $1,000. He, too, collects $300 in addition 
 for the use of the lot, making in all $1,300. Now after 
 both have paid the government $300 apiece for the privi- 
 lege of the exclusive use of these lots, each will have 
 left ten per cent upon the capital invested, and why 
 should one be entitled to any greater per cent upon the 
 capital invested than the other? 
 
 The fact is, that under this system there will be no 
 such thing as taxes. Taxation, as we now understand it, 
 will be abolished. The revenue derived by the govern- 
 ment from requiring all who use a natural opportunity 
 to pay into the common treasury what the use of that op- 
 portunity is worth, if it is worth anything at all, will be 
 more than sufficient to enable the government to dispense 
 with every species of taxation. As it is now, when you 
 pay your taxes, you are simply robbed of a portion of the 
 fruits of your industry, for which you do not get, di- 
 rectly, any equivalent. Under the proposed system, 
 
1 8 The Case Plainly Stated, 
 
 when you pay your single tax on land values you will 
 get directly a full equivalent for every dollar paid. You 
 will get the privilege of the exclusive use of a tract of 
 land for what that privilege is worth, 
 
 ACCESS TO UNUSED LAND. 
 
 If this system were adopted what would become of 
 the vacant lots and lands, the unused coal beds and 
 mineral deposits, the unoccupied water fronts and water 
 privileges over which human vampires now stand guard, 
 retarding enterprise and driving off labor? They would 
 become absolutely free. No one could afford to hold 
 them and pay taxes on them. The vampires would turn 
 them loose. Land speculators and land sharks, instead 
 of trying to grow rich by forestalling labor and capital 
 and thus preying like devouring beasts on their fellow- 
 men, would turn their talents to better account. Wher- 
 ever labor could find an unused lot or coal bed or mineral 
 deposit or unused tract of land, there labor could go to 
 work and employ itself without being required to invest 
 a dollar in the purchase of a right of access to the na- 
 tural element, without being compelled to first make terms 
 with a dog in the manger claiming it as private property 
 and holding it for speculative purposes. 
 
 If that vacant natural opportunity were situated near 
 a center of population, or were of a character to bestow 
 peculiar money-making advantages upon the persons 
 using it, this advantage would create a demand for it, 
 and this demand would regulate in the manner already 
 pointed out the amount which labor and capital would 
 pay for the ttse of it, in the form of a tax for the con- 
 mon benefit of all. If that vacant opportunity, for in- 
 instance, were a tract of land four or five miles from 
 this city, it would have few advantages to make the 
 use of it at present peculiarly valuable. Why ? Because 
 there is so much vacant land of the same character near 
 it, the use of which is equally valuable, that no one 
 would give a bonus, as it were, for the use of that par- 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 19 
 
 ticular tract. Labor would, therefore, at first get the use 
 of that land for nothing. It would have no taxable 
 value at all until all the other vacant land similarly situ- 
 ated was put into use. Under this most just and equit- 
 able system the taxable values of land would be confined 
 almost exclusively to the cities and towns and the coal 
 and mineral deposits. Where people congregate, there 
 land has value. In New York City alone, capital and 
 labor today pay to a few thousand land owners, in ground 
 rent alone, exclusive of rent paid on improvements, for 
 the bare privilege of living and doing business, tribute 
 money amounting to hundreds of millions annually, a 
 sum almost equal to the expense of carrying on the 
 government of the United States. It is in these great 
 centers of trade and commerce that land has its greatest 
 value; it is here that land values are mostly found and 
 from these centers nine-tenths of the revenue of the gov- 
 ernment from this tax on land values would be derived. 
 
 FARMERS WOULD BE BENEFITED. 
 
 If the George plan were suddenly put in force today, 
 not only would all farmers be relieved from direct and 
 indirect taxation, not only would farmers participate in 
 common with all others in the universal and uninter- 
 rupted prosperity which would result from removing the 
 obstructions which needlessly hamper and clog enter- 
 prise, but probably three-fourths of the working farmers 
 in this country would pay no land tax at all. Why? Be- 
 cause with so much vacant or but partially cultivated 
 land as there is here today three-fourths of the farmers 
 would have no taxable value at all ; and all who are 
 counting on the farmers of America being so foolish as 
 not to see how they will be as much benefited by a just 
 and righteous land system as any other class will cer- 
 tainly be disappointed. 
 
20 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 EFFECT ON FARMS. 
 
 "Yes," says our farmer friend, "but you propose to 
 confiscate the farmer's land." Let's see about that. You 
 are a farmer owning say a hundred-acre farm, situated 
 Hke a majority of farms, in a neighborhood where for 
 every acre of land in cultivation there are two or more 
 acres unimproved or but partially improved. Your farm 
 is worth under the present system, say $2,000. A hun- 
 dred acres of this unimproved land adjoining it of the 
 same quality is held by some speculator at $500. Your 
 tax on your hundred-acre farm is $10 a year, the specula- 
 tor's tax on the hundred acres of land adjoining of equal 
 value, exclusive of improvements, is $2.50 a year — one- 
 fourth as much as yours. You give employment to la- 
 bor on your land, and thereby add to the prosperity of 
 the community. The speculator excludes labor from 
 employment on his land, and thereby retards the pros- 
 perity of the community. Why should you be taxed any 
 more for using your hundred-acre tract, and giving em- 
 ployment to labor on it, than the speculator is taxed for 
 holding in idleness a tract of equal value and preventing 
 labor from using it ? Why should not the speculator pay 
 at least as much tax for the privilege of excluding labor 
 from his tract as you have to pay for the privilege of 
 employing labor on yours? Have you hurt anyone by 
 turning up the wild sod and building fences and houses 
 and putting $1,500 worth of improvements on your land? 
 If not, why should you be fined for it by having your 
 taxes increased? 
 
 Where our plan is adopted you will have no taxes 
 at all to pay until this vacant land around your farm is 
 put into use. Until then no land value could attach to 
 your farm, and the tax which, with increasing population, 
 you would ultimately be required to pay, would seldom 
 equal and rarely, if ever, exceed that which farmers now 
 pay on the improvement valuation. Assuming that you 
 spend say $600 a year on your family, then under the 
 present system your taxes, direct and indirect, and the toll 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 21 
 
 which the merchants take for collectmg indirect taxes, 
 amount to at least $100 a year. You may not know it, 
 because an indirect tax always fools a fellow paying it. 
 You will be relieved from all these taxes, but best of all, 
 men who are now idle and who can't buy what you raise 
 will all be at work, and not only that, but their wages 
 will be high enough to pay good prices for what you raise. 
 It is true that under the new system you could only 
 sell your place for $1,500. Still, with this same $1,500 
 you could buy just as good a place from some one else. 
 The purchasing power of your farm, when it comes to 
 buying another farm, would not have been reduced. Do 
 not your interests as producer or a laborer vastly exceed 
 your interests as a land owner? 
 
 LANDLORDISM AND GOVERNMENT 
 
 Now, coming back to the elements of the new political 
 economy, some one says : "What difference does it make 
 to the workmen whether labor and capital pay this 
 ground rent to the individual or to the government, since, 
 according to your theory, it must be paid all the same?" 
 In the first place, if it is paid to the individual none of 
 it ever comes back to labor and capital unless value re- 
 ceived is paid for it; so far as labor and capital are 
 concerned, it might about as well be cast into the sea. 
 But when it is paid to the government in the form of a 
 tax on land values it does come back to labor and capital 
 again in the form of relief from every species of taxa- 
 tion, direct and indirect. 
 
 Again, the amount that Enterprise would pay the 
 government for the privilege of access to the natural ele- 
 ments would be less under the single tax than is now 
 paid individuals for this privilege. Under the land value 
 tax the prices could not be advanced by monopolization 
 of these elements, as is being done now. 
 
 But best of all, and by far the most glorious result 
 that will flow from the establishment of a just and 
 righteous land system, is that it will enable tlie wealth 
 
22 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 creator to stand erect, presenting to capital an unterri- 
 iied front. 
 
 Return for a moment to the coal beds of northern 
 Alabama and imagine the Henry George system adopted. 
 Labor now again objects to the terms offered by capital, 
 and again capital tells him to go. And again labor goes 
 forth hunting for work. But how different he finds the 
 aspect of things. He finds the same unused natural ele- 
 ments, the same unused coal beds and mineral deposits, 
 the vacant lots and lands, but he no longer finds a fellow- 
 man sitting upon every vacant opportunity for work and 
 waving him off. They have vanished. They have gone 
 to work themselves. He finds every unused opportunity 
 for labor, wherever it may be, absolutely free. Not a 
 dollar of capital need be invested in buying a natural 
 opportunity, in paying for the privilege of work. When 
 labor went forth hunting work before, he not only had 
 lo ask capital to pay for the tools, but also to pay, usu- 
 ally a greater sum, to some forestaller, in addition, as 
 blackmail, for the privilege of access to a natural ele- 
 ment. 
 
 This will all be changed. It won't take near as much 
 capital to start enterprises as it did, or in other words, 
 to give employment to labor. In fact, labor could then 
 take even an axe and hoe and find plenty of vacant op- 
 portunities on which he could make a living without 
 having to bury himself in a wilderness to do it. All this 
 makes him feel independent and enables him to bargain 
 with capital for employment on equal vantage grounds. 
 
 MONOPOLY IS PROFITABLE. 
 
 Some time since a large manufacturing firm in Mas- 
 sachusetts adopted the eight-hour system. After trying 
 it a year they gave it up and went back to the ten-hour 
 system. The general manager said they could only make 
 five per cent profit on their investments by requiring 
 only eight hours' work, and that unless they could make 
 a bigger percentage than that, they would not be bothered 
 
The Case Plainly Stated. 23 
 
 with the management of the business — they would put 
 their money into town and city lots, because that species 
 of property would certainly enhance in value as much as 
 five per cent annually, and that, too, without any trouble 
 to the owner, and so it is everywhere. Now, is it not 
 absurd to expect to reduce the rate of profits with which 
 capital will be content below this steady per cent of in- 
 crease in the value of town and city lots, by any com- 
 bination of labor, or by any legislation which falls short 
 of restoring these land values to the people v/ho col- 
 lectively create them? 
 
 Suppose you have $10,000 today. The best and 
 safest thing you can do with it is to invest it in town lots 
 in or near some growing town. Ten years from today, 
 unless the George theory becomes generally understood, 
 the lots will be worth $20,000 and you will have drawn 
 to yourself $10,000 worth of wealth for which you have 
 given no equivalent. You will simply have robbed the 
 labor of the country of $10,000. But now suppose 
 ground values to be appropriated to the public use 
 by taxation. What are you to do with your $10,000? 
 You would not buy vacant lots now ; there is no specula- 
 tion in them. The tax which you would have to pay for 
 the privilege of excluding capital and labor from the 
 opportunities for employment which vacant lots afford, 
 would be too heavy for you. In fact, you couldn't even 
 loan on land alone, because land alone will have no sell- 
 ing value in the market. The result is, that unless you 
 let your money lie idle and so lose interest on it, you will 
 be compelled to invest it so as to give employment to 
 labor. You must put it into buildings, into machinery, 
 into manufactory stock, into farm implements, into some 
 channel where it will be active and where it will afford 
 employment to labor. 
 
 Not only must you do this with your capital, but 
 every other capitalist must do the same with his capital. 
 Capitalist thus must bid against capitalist, since capital 
 can only increase by calling labor to its aid and giving 
 it employment. 
 
24 The Case Plainly Stated. 
 
 Under the present system the rich can grow richer 
 without calling in the aid of labor, without giving employ- 
 ment to labor. They do so by buying space and monop- 
 olizing land. 
 
 Under the present system, as wealth accumulates, the 
 wealthy seek to invest in land, to get control of natural 
 elements, and get into a position from which to black- 
 mail labor, thus becoming an obstacle in the way of the 
 production of more wealth. 
 
 Under the better system, however, wealth could not 
 thus be made to set up an obstacle to the creation of more 
 wealth, or, in other words, to the employment of labor. 
 It can then only obtain a profit by investing in lines of 
 enterprise which give employment to labor. 
 
 Under which system will the demand for labor be 
 greater? Under which will earnings be higher? 
 
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