Income tax II in 1188 to raise money for the Third Crusade. The tithe demanded that each layperson in England and Wales be taxed one tenth of their personal income and moveable property. The inception date of the modern income tax is typically accepted as 1799, at the suggestion of Henry Beeke, the future Dean of Bristol. This income tax was introduced into Great Britain by Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger in his budget of December 1798, to pay for weapons and equipment for the French Revolutionary War. Pitt's new graduated (progressive) income tax began at a levy of 2 old
Legal history of income tax in the United States in the Revenue Act of 1862. After the war when the need for federal revenues decreased, Congress (in the Revenue Act of 1870) let the tax law expire in 1873. However, one of the challenges to the validity of this tax reached the United States Supreme Court in 1880. In "Springer v. United States", the taxpayer contended that the income tax on his professional earnings and interest income on bonds violated the "direct tax" requirement of the Constitution. The Supreme Court concluded that the tax of which Mr. Springer complained (i.e. a tax on professional earnings and on interest from