Mr. George calls upon the State to take over to itself, and to its own
uses, the whole annual rental value of the bare land of a country, the
land, that is, irrespectively of improvements put upon it by man, he
proposes not "a single tax upon land" at all, but an actual confiscation
of the rental of the land--which for practical purposes is the land--to
the uses of the State, without a levy, and without compensation to "the
miscalled owners."

When a tax is levied, the need by the State levying it of a certain sum
of money must first be ascertained by competent authority, legislative
or executive, as the case may be, and the law-making power must then,
according to a prescribed form, enact that to raise such a sum a certain
tax shall be levied on designated property or occupations. If the
exigencies of the State are held to require it, a tax may be levied upon
property of more than its value, as in the case, for example, of the
customs duty which was imposed in one of our "tariff revisions" upon
plate glass imported into the United States by way of "protecting" a
single plate-glass factory then existing in the United States. This was
an abominable abuse of a constitutional power, but it was not
"confiscation." What Henry George proposes is confiscation, as Dr.
M'Glynn plainly sees and courageously says. What he proposes is that
the State shall compel the annual rental value of all land to be paid
into the public treasury, without regard to the question whether the
State does or does not need such a sum of money. That is confiscation
pure and simple, the State, in the assumed interest of the State,
proceeding against the private owners of land, or the "miscalled
owners," to use Dr. M'Glynn's significant phrase, precisely as under the
feudal system the State proceeded against the private property of rebels
and traitors. No good reason can be shown why the process should not be
applied to personalty and to debts as well as to land.