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GEORGE, HENRY (1839—1897)

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Originally appearing in Volume V11, Page 748 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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GEORGE, See also:HENRY (1839—1897) , See also:American author and See also:political economist, was See also:born in See also:Philadelphia, See also:Penn., on the 2nd of See also:September 1839. He settled in See also:California in 1858; removed to New See also:York, 188o; was first a printer, then an editor, but finally devoted all his See also:life to economic and social questions. In 1871 he published Our See also:Land Policy, which, as further See also:developed in 1879 under the See also:title of Progress and Poverty, speedily attracted the widest See also:attention both in See also:America and in See also:Europe. In 1886 he published See also:Protection or See also:Free See also:Trade. Henry George had no political ambition, but in 1886 he received an See also:independent nomination as See also:mayor of New York See also:City, and became so popular that it required a See also:coalition of the two strongest political parties to prevent his See also:election. He received 68,000 votes, against 90,000 for the coalition See also:candidate. His See also:death on the 29th of See also:October 1897 was followed by one of the greatest demonstrations of popular feeling and See also:general respect that ever attended the funeral of any strictly private See also:citizen in American See also:history. The fundamental See also:doctrine of Henry George, the equal right of all men to the use of the See also:earth, did not originate with him; but his clear statement of a method by which it could be enforced, without increasing See also:state machinery, and indeed with a See also:great simplification of See also:government, gave it a new See also:form. This method he named the Single Tax. His doctrine may be condensed as follows: The land of every See also:country belongs of right to all the See also:people of that country. This right cannot be alienated by one See also:generation, so as to affect the title of the next, any more than men can sell their yet unborn See also:children for slaves. Private ownership of land has no more See also:foundation in morality or See also:reason than private ownership of See also:air or sunlight.

But the private occupancy and use of land are right and indispensable. Any See also:

attempt to See also:divide land into equal shares is impossible and undesirable. Land should be, and practically is now, divided for private use in parcels among those who will pay the highest See also:price for the use of each See also:parcel. This price is now paid to some persons annually, and it is called See also:rent. By applying the rent of land, exclusive of all improvements, to the equal benefit of the whole community, See also:absolute See also:justice would be done to all. As rent is always more than sufficient to defray all necessary expenses of government, those expenses should be met by a tax upon rent alone, to be brought about by the See also:gradual abolition of all other taxes. Landlords should be See also:left in undisturbed See also:possession and nominal ownership of the land, with a sufficient margin over the tax to induce them to collect their rents and pay the tax. They would thus be transformed into See also:mere land agents. Obviously this would involve absolute free trade, since all taxes on imports, manufactures, successions, documents, See also:personal See also:property, buildings or improvements would disappear. Nothing made by See also:man would be taxed at all. The right of private property in all things made by man would thus be absolute, for the owner of such things could not be divested of his property, without full See also:compensation, even under the pretence of See also:taxation. The See also:idea of concentrating all taxes upon ground-rent has found followers in Great See also:Britain, See also:North America, See also:Australia and New See also:Zealand.

In See also:

practical politics this doctrine is confined to the " Single Tax, Limited," which proposes to defray only the needful public expenses from ground-rent, leaving the surplus, whatever it may be, in the undisturbed possession of land-owners. The See also:principal books by Henry George are: Progress and Poverty (1879), The Irish Land Question (1881), Social Problems (1884), Protection or Free Trade (1886), The See also:Condition of Labor (1891), A Perplexed Philosopher (1892), Political See also:Economy (1898). His son, Henry George (b. 1862), has written a Life (1900). For the Single Tax theory see Shearman's Natural Taxation (1899). (T. G.

End of Article: GEORGE, HENRY (1839—1897)

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