Legal history of income tax in the United States adopted an income tax modeled on the tax instituted in England. The British theory was that you tax the income from property, and not the property itself; thus, sales of property were not subject to taxation. In order to help pay for its war effort in the American Civil War, the United States government imposed its first personal income tax, on August 5, 1861, as part of the Revenue Act of 1861. Tax rates were 3% on income exceeding $600 and less than $10,000, and 5% on income exceeding $10,000. This tax was repealed and replaced by another income tax
The Cold War and the Income Tax it his business to study the state in theory and in practice. The person who is in the weakest position to attack the state is he who has largely ignored its potential for evil while strongly backing its expansion on humanitarian grounds and is only stirred to protest when he falls foul of it through his own negligence. That exactly describes Wilson's position. In his book he tried to evade his own inconsistencies by arguing that most of his income tax went on defence spending induced by Cold War paranoia. But then he had not paid his state income taxes