America’s First Tariffs
Then Came Direct Taxes and a Rebellion
Waging war in the 18th century was an expensive proposition. The American colonies learned this when they were fighting for their independence from Britain. The colonies incurred significant debt during the American Revolution. After the war, the Continental Congress passed the Land Ordinance of 1785, which allowed the new government to sell land in the Western Territory (later known as the Northwest Territory) to settlers and speculators as a mechanism to raise money.
A few years later, the US Congress passed, and America’s first President George Washington signed into law, the Tariff Act of 1789. This July 1789 law was the first major piece of legislation enacted by the new government. The intent was to generate additional revenues to pay off war debts and to protect domestic manufacturers by levying a high tariff on imported products, especially those arriving on non-US flagged ships.
The tariffs on imports and excise taxes levied on valuable commodities such as alcohol, tobacco, and refined sugar were the sole sources of revenue for the United States.
John Adams succeeded Washington as president in 1797. Despite having been the colonies’ main ally during the battle for independence, ties between the United States and France had become strained because relations between America and Britain had thawed. The US had ratified the John Jay Treaty with Britain, resolving several post-revolution disputes between the new nation and its former enemy. The French government found the improving ties between the US and Britain threatening. France retaliated by attacking American merchant ships.
Anticipating a war with France convinced federal lawmakers they needed to raise money in order to rebuild the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps. They estimated about $2 million was needed. Federal revenue from tariffs was not enough. This led lawmakers to levy the first-ever direct tax on US property in July 1798.
Taxes had been very unpopular with the colonies several years earlier. “No taxation without representation” was a familiar rallying cry for those colonists who sought independence from the British crown. The new government’s decision to impose its own tax on the people was not warmly welcomed in many quarters. This direct tax was imposed on land, dwellings, and slaves.
Each state was assigned an amount it was responsible to raise. The state of Pennsylvania’s share of the $2 million was more than $237,000. The other fifteen states had to raise the balance of about $1,750,000. There were very few slaves in Pennsylvania that could be taxed, so the bulk of the tax would be levied primarily on dwellings and land. Tax assessors would take measurements of each dwelling and count the number of windows in order to assess taxes for each home.
The predominately German-descent farmers in southeastern Pennsylvania were not enthusiastic about paying the tax. In addition, they were suspicious of the tax assessors who were gathering information on private homes.
John Fries was a popular local auctioneer who was known to many of the farmers in the region. In February 1799, he took it upon himself to organize a resistance to the tax by holding a series of meetings to strategize on a response. In March, Fries assembled a group of several hundred men who chased tax assessors from the area. The group then freed a handful of tax resisters from the Bethlehem, Pennsylvania jail.
Fries and his followers were labeled as being guilty of sedition and treason. The Pennsylvania militia was called upon to put down the resisters. The militia never found the band of rebels because they had dispersed, but it did apprehend Fries and two other leaders. All three were charged with treason, tried, and convicted. They were sentenced to death.
Learning of the sentence, President John Adams elected to show compassion toward Fries and the other two. In April 1800, Adams pardoned all three. He followed up their pardons on May 21, 1800, with a “full, free and absolute pardon” to the rest of the tax resisters.
Adams’s pardon was opposed by most of his cabinet and is deemed to have contributed to his reelection defeat by Thomas Jefferson in late 1800.
Mark Hyman is a 35-year military veteran and an Emmy award-winning investigative journalist. Follow him on Twitter, Gettr, Parler, and Mastodon.world at @markhyman, and on Truth Social at @markhyman81.
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