State Property Tax Revolt Shakes Foundations of Government
Vermont’s revolt got the attention of the New Hampshire Supreme Court yesterday. The story by John DiStaso (“ABC Goes to Court”) is in The Union Leader today.
Not could, Mr. McLaughlin… guaranteed. There are several regiments of perfectly normal, but now radicalized, Vermonters who would march over and give the Granite State a hand in conducting an effective middle class revolt. They’re writing a new handbook of how to do it. There are plenty of Maine veterans of the tax fight from 20 years ago, when Maine dumped the state property tax, who would come-a-runnin’ when the call goes out to help New Hampshire should the legislature ever make the mistake of imposing a state property tax there.
For states where the real local control of town meetings is unknown, perhaps a state property tax can be stitched to stay, but not in Northern New England. As a Union Leader editorial (“Tax revolt!”) pointed out yesterday 6/5/98), the spirit of “Live Free or Die” is alive in Vermont. Thomas Jefferson noted the power of the self-governing towns of New England when stirred by an embargo in a letter to Joseph Cabell in 1816: “I felt the foundations of the government shaken under my feet by the New England townships.” And it’s shaking again, because a state property tax destroys every good thing these states ever stood for and their citizens ever hope to hold on to.
It destroys freedom.
If that won’t cause the foundations to shake, what will?