Civil War Taxes

During the Civil War, both the North and South were challenged by fiscal and monetary needs, but physical differences such as gold reserves, industrialization and the blockade largely predicted the war’s outcome from the onset.
To raise revenue for the war effort, every possible person, business, activity and property was assessed, but projections and collections were seldom up to expectations, and waste, fraud and ineffectiveness in the administration of the tax systems plagued both sides.
This economic history uses forensic examination of actual documents to discover the various taxes that developed from the Civil War, including the direct and poll taxes, which were dropped; the income tax, which stands today; and the war tax, which was effective for only a short time.

John Martin Davis, Jr., is a retired Dallas tax attorney and CPA who lives in Fort Davis, Texas. He was awarded an honorary doctorate in history by Sul Ross State University. An authority on Texas maps, he is a member of the Philosophical Society of Texas for the Collection and Diffusion of Knowledge.

John Martin Davis, Jr.
Format: softcover (8.5 x 11)
Pages: 173
Bibliographic Info: 124 photos, notes, bibliography, index
Copyright Date: 2019
pISBN: 978-1-4766-7794-1
eISBN: 978-1-4766-3671-9
Imprint: McFarland

Foreword by Mary Volcansek  1
Preface  3
I—Antebellum United States Taxes, 1789–1860  7
II—United States Taxes, 1861  12
III—Confederate States Taxes, 1861  16
IV—United States Taxes, 1862  20
V—Confederate States Taxes, 1862  24
VI—United States Taxes, 1863  27
VII—Confederate States Taxes, 1863  33
VIII—United States Taxes, 1864  38
IX—Confederate States Taxes, 1864–1865  43
X—United States Taxes, 1865  50
XI—­Post-War United States Taxes, 1866–1900  59
Conclusion  67
Illustrations  69
Chapter Notes  155
Bibliography  159
Index  163

“Davis sheds light on one of the murkier corners of the Civil War, how it was financed, with a particular concentration on taxation…invaluable insights”—The NYMAS Review