In an earlier post on the Volokh Conspiracy, I described Professors Akhil Reed Amar's and Vikram David Amar's disagreement with an amicus brief that former Attorney General Edwin Meese III, Professor Gary Lawson, and I filed in Moore v. United States. An issue in that case is whether a wealth tax is a "direct tax", which has to be apportioned among the states according to their respective populations. The Amar brothers claim that the only things that are direct taxes are capitation (head) taxes and land taxes. They say falsely that on their side they have George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, the three Supreme Court justices who wrote opinions in the 1796 case, Hylton v. United States, 3 U.S. 171, Abraham Lincoln, and Chief Justice John Roberts. I completely and totally disagree.
First, all that George Washington did or said that is relevant to this case is that he asked Alexander Hamilton to defend in the Supreme Court a federal tax statute that said it imposed a duty, which is an indirect tax, on the use of carriages, which in the 1790's were luxury goods subject to duties in England and Massachusetts. Washington expressed no opinion whatsoever on the line between direct and indirect taxes.
Second, Alexander Hamilton himself said in his brief for the United States in Hylton v. United States, 3 U.S. (3 Dall.) 171 (1796) that:
