: Benjamin Franklin
Q. What is your name and place of abode?
A. Franklin, of Philadelphia.
QO. Do the Americans pay any considerable taxes
among themselves?
A. Certainly, many and very heavy taxes.
Q. What are the present taxes in Pennsylvania,
laid by the laws of the colony?
A. There are taxes on all estates, real and personal;
 a poll tax; a tax on all offices, professions,
trades, and businesses, according to their profits; an
excise on all wine, rum, and other spirits; and a duty
of ten pounds per head on all negroes imported, with
some other duties.
Q. For what purposes are those taxes laid?
A. For the support of the civil and military establishments
 of the country, and to discharge the heavy
debt contracted in the last war.
Q. How long are those taxes to continue?
A. Those for discharging the debt are to continue
till 1772, and longer, if the debt should not be then
all discharged. The others must always continue.
Q. Was it not expected that the debt would have
been sooner discharged?
A. It was, when the peace was made with France
and Spain. But a fresh war breaking out with the
Indians, a fresh load of debt was incurred; and the
taxes, of course, continued longer by a new law.
Q. Are not all the people very able to pay those
taxes?
A. No. The frontier counties, all along the continent,
 having been frequently ravaged by the enemy
and greatly impoverished, are able to pay very little

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