[FromTheSidelines]

I posted facts - you didn’t.

So can you tell me how taxing our own consumers will make America successful again?

Can ANY of you protectionists tell me how we’re going to tax ourselves into prosperity?

[Cringing Negativism Network]

Tariffs do not tax us.

Tariffs tax our competition.

[central_va]

The U.S. Constitution of 1789 gave the federal government authority to tax, stating that Congress has the power to "... lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States." Tariffs between states is prohibited by the U.S. Constitution and all domestically made products can be imported or shipped to another state tax free.

Responding to an urgent need for revenue following the American Revolutionary War, after passage of the U.S. Constitution the First United States Congress passed, and President George Washington, signed the Tariff Act of July 4, 1789, which authorized the collection of duties on imported goods. Four weeks later, on July 31, the fifth act of Congress established the United States Customs Service and its ports of entry where customs duties (also called tariffs or Ad Valorem taxes) were to be paid. Tariffs were originally recommended in the U.S. by the first Treasury Secretary, Alexander Hamilton, in 1789 to tax foreign imports to provide the Federal Government with money to pay its operating expenses and Federal debts and the debts the states had accumulated during the American Revolutionary War.