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| Thomas G.
Shearman, 1834-1900 |
Part I
THE AUTHORITIES
Chapter 8 |
Having occasion to scan the latest volumes on political economy, the
authorities of the colleges and universities of the United States and
Canada, in order to note how much economic importance is therein
attached to the taxation of land values, I found myself confronted by
more than one surprise.
(1) Almost the only name connected by these writers with the reform as
originator an interpreter and commentator is that of Henry George. But
even more numerous criticisms pertain, not to the principles of a
scientific taxation for which Henry George stood, but are centered upon
the gratuitous and fallacious charge that the burden of his message to
the world was confiscation of property and the overturn of civilization.
This way of handling the subject during the past 30 years has showed
little gain for either professors or for tax reform, and I have come to
realize that this poverty of method amounts to in educational
abnormality if not deformity.
(2) I was surprised to note that in all of these volumes no room was
found for the name and dictum of Mr. Thomas G. Shearman, a man who, in
addition to his general reputation as of authority on whatever subject
he touched, was a sounder, safer, and more thorough student at expositor
of the principles of taxation that any other person who has spoken from
the single tax standpoint. Yet no economist appears to have made so much
as a pretense of answering his argument. That his taxation work, which
was the particular pride of his life, should have been unchronicled in
the economic annals of his generation, seems almost incredible, and yet,
mirabile dictu, in the eleven of the volumes on political
economy that span the economic firmament, the name of Thomas G. Shearman
is not indexed, while four have half a dozen references or citations,
none of which deal with the principle of land values taxation. This
complete ignoring of a leading authority can be explained only upon a
theory that his plan of tax reform is thought to be of no consequence.
Under these circumstances I cannot forbear to make an earnest request
of the professors that they will reopen the case, "In re Natural
Taxation," according to Thomas G. Shearman, and allow it to be
reargued before a fresh bench and jury, thus giving them a fraction of
the 30 years' innings that have been accorded to Henry George.
To extol the excellences of Mr. Shearman by no means implies detraction
from the achievements of Mr. George. In a dozen volumes of reform
literature, resplendent with illustration, Mr. George essayed, with his
five main divisions and 64 subdivisions, to sweep the whole field of
political economy. He compassed the gamut of human emotions. He argued
de novo for the abstract rights of man, equal, natural, original, and
inherent; and in support of his thesis he marshaled in stately array the
moral, philosophical, and religious sentiments of mankind.
Mr. Shearman was not a man of hobbies. His taxation work he regarded as
by far his best investment for the interest of his fellow men. Here are
his own words:
I do not estimate very highly the value of my own work in
any direction, in business, in the church, or in public affairs. But I
can see more substantial fruit of my efforts in the direction of a
higher development of humanity through the reform of taxation that in
any other direction whatsoever. Obscure as my work has been, .... it
has marked a channel in which an ever swelling tide of human energy
will flow..... It has given a direction to the spirit of reform which
will ensure great results after I have left the work forever.
In a single book, Natural Taxation, a volume of scientific, prose
reasoning, he supplemented George's eloquent exhibit with a cold and
exact statement of an energizing, enacting clause without which no
reform can be made operative. He set out to elaborate the special
economic advantage of a natural tax, and followed with wonderfully clear
deductions as to its effects. Mr. George made small pretense to
calculation of the volume of economic rent, and attempted little
illustration of that feature of his subject. For himself he said: "What
I have endeavored to do is to establish general principles, trusting to
my readers to carry further their application where this is needed."
Mr. Shearman, who wrote a dozen years later, and who revealed in their
application, as well as in the principles themselves, labored with
almost infinite pains to collect data and frame reliable estimates of
the volume of rents such as have not been superseded, because no one has
been found with faculty and patience to bring these calculations down to
date. Meantime events have very largely verified the proposition, and
enhance the substantial accuracy of his calculations. In view of his
admitted thoroughness we may be assured that his opinions deserve
respect. He was a judge who could be trusted to let complete evidence
and full consideration precede his decision.
Economists, especially the professionals, sometimes had been sharply
criticized for not enrolling themselves under the banner of Henry
George. If such an enrollment meant a commitment simply to his tenet of
the single tax, harmonization might not be despaired of, but if such an
enrollment work to commit them by implication to others of his remaining
sixty-three economic tenets, is easy to see how their difficulties are
multiplied many fold, a complication which in their frank opinion even
the justice of the situation does not demand.
It is probably true that the professors as a body are far from agreeing
with Mr. George in his general theory of production in distribution,
while in "beating together the ample field" of political
economy in the large, there would be the certainty of collisions without
number. Very many economists incline with favor to Henry George as to
his land value tax, but with the jealous reservation of differing with
him upon many of his other contentions. One would naturally think that
upon Mr. Shearman, with his one platform and one plank, the professors
might unite without hazard to inherited dogma on the one hand, or risk
of speculative heresy on the other.
Disregarding the voluminous moralizations (the basis of much
obstructive argumentation even among those who do not differ), Mr.
Shearman, like Mr. George, buried his lance directly in the heart of the
social problem. Without convoying his disciples through the wilderness
of three or six thousand years of wandering thought, he reached the
Henry George gold by a simple scientific route.
Perhaps nothing could add more weight and dignity to the reasonableness
of this humble petition than to recall something of the gifts and
accomplishments of Shearman, the publicist, philanthropist, and
religionist, whose economic prestige can never be dimmed.
At the memorial services in Plymouth Church his luminous
characteristics were assembled in bold relief by various speakers.
His pastor, Rev. Newell Dwight Hillis, said of him that --
out of a passionate love for his fellows he tried to turn
the principles of Jesus Christ into the writings and practice of a
great lawyer..... This great church has had heroes -- in Mr. Beecher,
the greatest preacher of the love of God that the world has seen since
the Christian era began, and in Mr. Shearman another..... One of the
strongest, best, and bravest men of his generation that this country
has produced..... During the forty years of his career he appeared
upon the platform over seven hundred times to urge the rights of the
black man, the Indian, the Armenian, and the poor and despised of
every city and nation.
Mr. Shearman was born Nov. 25, 1834, in Birmingham, England, of English
parents. His father was a versatile man, in turn physician, writer, and
preacher. Denominationally a Baptist, he was a great student of the
Bible, and a great reader and lover of Shakespeare. What education Mr.
Shearman had was the work of a gifted mother, a teacher of practical
excellence both abroad in at home. A copy of the new Testament is
treasured in which he read at the age of four.
Through lack of family fortune he was early thrown on his own
resources, and as Dr. Hillis continues --
mainly self-educated and self-made, his intellect was
hammered out upon the anvil of adversity..... At 12 he was out in the
world for himself. At 13 his school days ended for ever. At fourteen
he entered an office, where he received apprentice's wages of $1.00 a
week for the first year and $1.50 for the second..... Fifteen years
found him deliberately fashioning his English style upon Bunyan for
simplicity, Baxter for unity and orderly movement, and Macauley for
picturesque narration..... At thirty-one he was identifying and
tabulating out of his own unaided memory over seven-hundred court
cases..... When in 1875 the great storm burst upon Mr. Beecher he
urged his pastor to devote himself to his regular work, took all
responsibility upon himself, practically retired from his law
practice, and out of his own fortune anticipated all expenses for the
great trial, until he had advanced over $70,000 of his own money, for
which, he however, he was afterwards reimbursed.
Nothing could account for a personal devotion like this except the fact
that Mr. Shearman believed in Mr. Beecher. Dr. Hillis, in cataloging Mr.
Shearman's gifts, said: He had a strong intellect, great analytic skill,
memory, sound judgment, fidelity to conviction, courage unyielding and
all conquering, frankness to friend and foe, moral earnestness,
sympathy, enthusiasm, thoroughness, and a steadfastness that never was
defeated. Although he had no diplomacy and little tact, he was great
notwithstanding.
Mr. Rossiter W. Raymond, superintendent of Plymouth Sunday school, gave
two side-glimpses of Mr. Shearman. One picture shows him on the way to a
Plymouth Sunday school picnic, sitting on the deck of the steamer,
himself childless, covered with children who hang on his shoulders and
arms while he tells them fairy stories; the other, at a Coney Island
outing of the little ones in which he took part.
There he lies on the sands while they cover him like
flies, and when they want to wade in the water, and he is afraid to
let them go it alone, the great lawyer, the friend of Henry Ward
Beecher, the political economist, the Superintendent of Plymouth
Sunday school, takes off his shoes and stockings, rolls up his
trousers, and, clasping hands with a chain of merry boys and girls,
wades out into the surf. Mr. Shearman's love for the children, and the
children's love for him, tells the story of his real character.
According to Mr. Raymond, who was privileged to be the only laymen
intimately and constantly associated with the great lawyers who defended
Mr. Beecher, "All of these men gave their services at great
pecuniary sacrifice, in aid of a righteous man unjustly accused."
Neither Mr. Shearman, who did more than all the others, nor his partner,
Mr. Sterling, who shared in the deprivation of his services at great
sacrifice to the general business, would except anything. To this
testimony may be added that of an intimate coworker: "His life
taught a larger lesson, the lesson of constant and willing giving. I
never knew a man who, on the whole, was so benevolent with his purse."
In a life abounding with ceaseless benefactions, Mrs. Shearman who
survives him, is daily executing his will. Stephen V. White, deacon of
Plymouth
Church, a leading broker and later a member of Congress, then
associated "very very largely and very, very closely in business
and in consultation with Mr. Shearman for 30 years," bore this
enthusiastic testimony:
I consider his character and his career the most
unique character and the most unique career of any man whom I ever
knew, or of any man of whom I have read..... By reason of his
remarkable faculty for generalization in collaboration, he was enabled
in a few months to become a walking digest of the decisions and
statutes of the state of New York. In 1857 Mr. Shearman was appointed
one of a committee to codify the statute laws of the state of New
York. The Chairman, David Dudley Field, "lion of the bar of the
city and of the country," being too busy to give his personal
attention to the work of the committee, arranged with Mr. Shearman to
pay him $2,500 for what time he could spare without neglect of his own
clients, and inside of a year a report was sent to the Legislature by
this commission in a book of forest embracing 273 pages in which every
stroke of the pen was made by this young man not 18 months in the
practice of law..... In eight years from that time he was a partner
with David Dudley Field, with one-third interest in the immense
business of that firm.
Of Mr. Field it has been said:
He was a giant, physically and intellectually. He
never knew fear. He was not small in any respect. He resorted to no
legal tricks for his success. The success of the firm of Field &
Shearman was due as much to their correct knowledge of the code of
procedure as to intimate or deep knowledge of the principles of the
law itself. No firm in the city of New York was ever abused by bar or
press as much as that of Field & Shearman. Most of the points,
however, on which Mr. Field was at times severely criticized by his
brother lawyers were, to the great credit of Mr. Field and Field &
Shearman, subsequently sustained by the highest court in the state.
An eminent contemporary once wrote of Mr. Shearman:
I have always thought that he had the greatest
intellect of any man of his generation at the bar, but it was Mr.
Field who gave Mr. Shearman the opportunity to bring out all that was
within him, and without such opportunity, which was exceptional, Mr.
Shearman would never have been known except as an author. That, after
all, gives more fame than any honor won at the bar, for books live
after men die; and the reason why Mr. Field will be known what all the
lawyers of his own and preceding generations of the United States are
forgotten is because of the innovation he brought about by the
introduction of his codes, the object of 40 years of diligent pursuit.
In that respect he was like Justinian.
It speaks for itself that Mr. Shearman at thirty-five should have
commended himself to intimate relations with a man who was the father
of a worldwide reformed "common-law procedure," who with one
brother, Cyrus W., the father of the Atlantic cable and another,
Stephen J., 34 years chief justice of the United States, formed the
celebrated Field triad. His firm being at that time (1869) the
attorneys for the Erie Railroad, its officers bargained with them to
have Mr. Shearman come and sit in anteroom of their office simply for
consultation, at $25,000 for his year's salary. Succeeding the Black
Friday, September 24 of the same year, various suits had been brought
in the courts, involving more than $50,000,000. Shearman &
Sterling,[1] who had succeeded
to Field & Shearman, were retained to defend them, and the law and
facts were decided as Mr. Shearman contended that they should be.....
Before he had been four years at the bar, in connection with Mr.
Tillinghast, Mr. Shearman had printed and published a treatise on
pleadings and practice in the state of New York, which was a work in
two volumes, aggregating more than one thousand pages, and the second
volume was entirely his own work. In connection with Mr. Redfield, a
few years later he published in elementary treatise on the Law of
Negligence, which has run through more editions, as we understand,
than any other elementary work published in this country in this
generation..... Mr. Shearman would draw and execute contracts
involving the largest amounts of property and money of any man that
has stood at the American bar in this generation, and then come home
to Brooklyn to this "prayer meeting" and speak words of
consolation to those who were afflicted and suffering; to take his
place in the Sunday school and Sunday school teachers meeting, to give
kindly cheer to those with whom he came in contact.
Dr. Lyman Abbott, Beecher's successor in the Plymouth pulpit, said of
Mr. Shearman:
He was by professional lawyer; by temperament in
nature he was a reformer..... He watched the welfare of the poor and
suffering, the outcast and the unfortunate, and he studied how to
relieve them. This it was that made him interested in labor
organizations, that made him a single tax man, and a civic and
municipal reformer. He gave a large measure of his life and brought
all his energy to problems that touched the lives of others, and did
not touch his own.
Edward M. Shepherd said: "I declare of Thomas G. Shearman that few
men of our land, or of our time, have nearly approached in zeal for the
rights of the plain people, as against the craft and strength of the
more powerful.
Something of general interest of all real students, but especially to
those of the law, is found in the critical analysis of a
fellow-craftsman, a partner for some years previous to his connection
with David Dudley Field, Mr. Amasa J. Redfield, who wrote of Mr.
Shearman:
His mind was pervaded by "an original, intrinsic
equity.".... If a particular judgment had wrought an injustice,
he instinctively questioned or peremptorily denied its authority to
control in any other cases, however eminent the court which pronounced
it. As he conceived it, the aim of law is to accomplish the ends of
justice, or, as put by Burke, "there are two, and only two,
foundations of law -- equity and utility." He was never dismayed
by a multitude of cases bearing upon a given point of law, however
various their particular facts, or apparently irreconcilable their
several judgments with each other; he seemed to have an intuitive
perception of the real principle at the bottom of the whole mass of
adjudications, and brought it forth to the light, in a single
comprehensive statement, marvelously brief and clear. At the same
time, as I have had many opportunities of observing, his precise and
logical habit of mind tended always to moderation of statement and the
avoidance of excessive generalization. He had a faculty of instantly
catching sight of an important point of any narrative or argument --
or the absence of any -- on each page of a book as he rapidly turned
leaf after leaf. He seemed to have had Macauley's knack of never
reading the lines of a printed page, but took in the whole of it at
one sweep of the eye, from top to bottom, discovering at once whether
it was worth a more careful perusal. In him the man was greater than
the lawyer. His professional obligations were many and insistent, but
such were the sincerity of his sympathy and his large view of things,
that he never lacked the time nor the grace to step aside to help a
friend, nor the will to devote his powers, without a suggestion of
personal advantage, to the promotion of every civic and civilizing
endeavor. "[2] .....At
this time the professed friends of every reform in which I am much
interested insist upon mixing it with retrograde movements or have
adopted a policy of bitterness and vituperation or have thrown it
entirely overboard. There is no one left, except Mr. Fillebrown, with
whom I can co-operate. I have told him that I will do anything for and
with him that a New Yorker can do for a Bostonian."
Mr. Shearman left an estate not far exceeding three-hundred thousand
dollars. It would have been much larger had it not been for the charity
he was constantly dispensing. Although his business was domiciled in
Wall Street, he was not a speculator. The size of his estate was not the
result of real estate transactions but of his savings from income. It
was not due to especially large fees. Those that he received were
moderate. He did a great deal of professional work without any charge
whatsoever, from sentiment for the unfortunate or as a charity. He had
an exceedingly keen mind, and an exceptionally retentive memory, and to
these two distinguishing qualities he was, to a most extraordinary
degree, indebted for his success.
The foregoing will give the reader an outline picture of the type and
caliber of a man who gave his best years and best efforts to present
principles and possible practice of the single tax, cleared of all
economic entanglements, in such plain form that they can be
intelligently studied by taxing authorities, economists, and all others
who are interested. It is believed to be of educational value to present
here his own delineation of taxation as a science, together with his
prediction of what betterments it may be expected to work in the line of
social welfare.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The Shearman & Sterling of today at 55 Wall Street, New
York City.
[2] In view of the foregoing tributes, the writer trusts that he does
not violate the proprieties when he betrays an ambition to couple his
name in ever so humble a way with that of a man whose life was so full
of laudable accomplishments, by inserting here a quotation from the
private correspondence of Mr. Shearman, who had been speaker of the
evening at four of the series of banquets then being given by the
Massachusetts Single Tax League. On his last vacation he wrote from
Geneva to a favorite Sunday-school pupil, now Mr. C.J. Northrop: "In
all times it has been the misfortune of reforms that some of their
advocates have made it impossible for others to do any effective work
for them for considerable periods.
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