INCOME TAX WAR-PROFITS AND EXCESS-PROFITS TAXES INCLUDING STAMP TAXES CAPITAL STOCK TAX TAX ON EMPLOYMENT OF CHILD LABOR BY GEORGE E. HOLMES CHICAGO CALLAGHAN AND COMPANY PREFACE In the short time which has elapsed since the appearance of the first edition of this book a great development has taken place in our system of income taxation. The Revenue Act of 1918 is a remarkable improvement in form and in substance over the former law. But improvement is to be found not only in the statute. The Treasury Department has made vast strides in administrative progress. In the stress of collecting revenues at rates so high that they fairly threatened the solvency of many taxpayers, old departmental customs have been changed and old rules discarded. A new, more efficient, and withal a fairer, system of collecting revenue has been evolved. In a year of great deeds, the achievement of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue and his able assistants is worthy of unqualified admiration. The language of the regulations reflects the new order, in its expression of a firm but reasonable and thoughtful purpose to exact from each taxpayer what the law requires an expression which will no doubt have pronounced psychological effect on the great. body to which it is addressed. The tax burden of the present is tremendous, but taxpayers may rest assured that while it will be placed where the law indicates, it will be placed carefully, intelligently and with due consideration of the merits of each case. The author has been under no inconsiderable stress in the preparation of the present edition of this book, since less than a month has elapsed between the passage of the law and the day it must go to press to be of timely value; and less than three weeks have elapsed since the issuance of the new regulations and forms. Necessarily the book will have its shortcomings, but it is the belief of the author that all the rulings and regulations bearing upon the 1918 Revenue Law will be found therein, together with such rulings and regulations under former laws as are necessary to a proper understanding of the present law and those which immediately preceded it. Any criticism of the book or suggestions for its improvement will be gratefully received. The author's thanks are extended to the many friends who have given him helpful suggestions and criticism in preparing the work, and particularly to Mr. Randolph E. Paul, of the New York and the New Jersey Bar, and Mr. H. B. Spaulding, for their assistance in the preparation of the manuscript. The author's thanks are again extended to the Corporation Trust Company of New York for the use of those invaluable sources of information, its Income Tax Service and War Tax Service. These Services are so generally recognized as the standard reporters of the Treasury rulings that reference is freely made to them as sources of authority. They are cited "I. T. S." and "W. T. S." respectively in the footnotes. New York, March 15, 1919. GEORGE E. HOLMES. 1 |