“The other class of new occupants that came in, were poor squatters. These brought little or no capital, and no enterprise or ambition beyond enough to supply the essentials of existence. A family of this kind would alight on an unoccupied spot, construct a cabin or a dug-out, cultivate four or five acres of grain and potatoes, and eke out the rest of a living with a few cows and pigs. Little or no tax could be collected from them, and of course little or no public improvements, such as schools, bridges, roads etc., were accomplished where they squatted in any considerable force. In short, it gradually came about that the inhabitants of the rural districts did but little more than sustain themselves. And the state ceased almost entirely to be an exporter of agricultural products. The cities however suffered nothing on this account. They got their supplies largely from the neighboring states, and they became large producers and exporters of manufactured articles, competing in that respect with some of the famous manufacturing towns of Europe; and they became enormously wealthy.
“The question of taxation was however always a difficult one. The lands near the centers of the towns of course were the most valuable. But lands were never sold—only the buildings—and any given lot came to be valued by the kind of building and the amount of business on it. So assessments finally had to be fixed by an arbitrary rule—the rates decreasing at a fixed ratio according to distance from the center of greatest business activity. The rule had a tendency to verify itself by compelling the most valuable business to be done in the places subject to the highest rates, since the less valuable could not afford it. By this rule the rates in the suburbs were low, and since the buildings paid no tax, it often happened that a millionaire living in a $100,000 house paid little, if any more than a laborer living in a $300 shanty. But in the course of time it came to pass that notwithstanding the general prosperity, there were many who were wretchedly poor, made so by bad management, extravagance, indolence, ill health, dissipated habits, disappointment and ill luck. These became squatters in the vacant lands around the outskirts of the cities. They paid no rent and no taxes. It was found that it was useless to evict them as nobody could be found with money who could gain anything by paying their taxes, as long as there was plenty of unoccupied land. There also came to be a positive sentiment against eviction of the poor and so this non tax-paying class constantly increased and finally included many who were able to pay, but who shirked out, satisfying their consciences by the plea that the government had no right to discriminate, and exempt some and not others. These ideas expanded and finally crystallized into a political creed to the effect that a poor man ought not to be taxed for a spot on which to exist and bring up his family. Thus it came about that neither the very poor; nor the very rich whose property was chiefly in fine buildings, stocks, bonds and other personal effects, paid any considerable amount of the taxes.