Налоговая реформа 1862 года в США и финансирование Гражданской войны

1862 United States tax reform law

The Revenue Act of 1862 (July 1, 1862, Ch. 119, ), was a bill the United States Congress passed to help fund the American Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln signed the act into law on July 1, 1862. The act established the office of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, a department in charge of the collection of taxes, and levied excise taxes on most items consumed and traded in the United States. The act also introduced the United States' first progressive tax with the intent of raising millions of dollars for the Union.

The American Civil War commenced in 1861 with the secession of many southern states (the group known as the Confederate States of America) from the United States (also known as the Union). In the early stages of the war, the Union believed that the conflict would be a relatively quick and easy victory. The federal government was in need of funding because of economic issues in the years leading up to the war, and as result, Congress' first attempt to fund the war came with the Act of July 17, 1861. It authorized the Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase to raise money by issuing $50,000,000 in Treasury Notes. Deteriorating economic conditions of the years before the war made the production of those notes cease, and they were officially declared unredeemable. As economic conditions worsened in the North, Chase needed to raise more revenue. He was initially opposed to the notion of internal taxes, and believed that the better way to raise revenue was through the selling of war bonds. That would have resulted in the exemption of many citizens due to lower average income. By 1862 the United States government realized that the war would not end quickly and the revenue from the income tax would be insufficient. As a result, the Revenue Act of 1862 was passed in July 1862 before any income tax was collected under the first system.

The first section of the act established "an office in the Treasury Department to be called the Office of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue." This commissioner, selected by the President of the United States, was in charge of preparing and distributing all the instructions, regulations, directions, forms, and licenses "pertaining to the assessment and collection of the duties, stamp duties, licenses, and taxes, which may be necessary to carry this act into effect." One particular new tax required that corporations, banks, trust companies, savings institutions, and insurance companies report their finances, including receipts and interest earned, so that these could be taxed as well. The majority of these taxes and tariffs were consumer oriented, and affected lower income Americans more severely than the higher income Americans. To reinforce the fairness of the system, Congress implemented a supplementary system of taxation via a new income tax. For U. S. residents whose annual incomes were less than $600, no tax was collected. For U. S. residents whose annual incomes were greater than $600 and less than $10,000, a percentage of 3% of total income was demanded in tax. For U. S. residents whose annual incomes were greater than $10,000, a percentage of 5% of total income was demanded in tax. The 5% tax rate also applied to the entire U. S. source income over $600 of U. S. citizens who resided abroad, regardless of their income, unless they worked for the United States government. The act also stated that to assure timely collection, income tax be "withheld at the source."

In the long term, the Revenue Act of 1862 was only partially successful. The Office of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue became the IRS, which is still a functional department of the Treasury. The excise taxes remained in force, though the majority of the revenue was eventually generated through the taxes on liquor and tobacco. The progressive nature of the income tax remains, but the rates established in 1862 did not produce enough revenue to support war expenditures and were increased with the Revenue Act of 1864.