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A poll tax, head tax, is a tax of a portioned, fixed amount per individual in accordance with the census (as opposed to a percentage of income). When a corvée is commuted for cash payment, in effect it becomes a poll tax (and vice versa, if a poll tax obligation can be worked off). Poll taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments from ancient times until the 19th century. There have been several famous (and infamous) cases of poll taxes in history, notably a tax formerly required for voting in parts of the United States that was often designed to disenfranchise poor people, including African Americans, Native Americans, and white people of non-British descent (e.g., the Irish). In the United Kingdom, poll taxes were levied by the governments of John of Gaunt and Margaret Thatcher in the 14th and 20th centuries, respectively.

The word poll is an English word that once meant "head", hence the name poll tax for a per-person tax. In the United States, however, the term has come to be used almost exclusively for a fixed tax applied to voting. Since "going to the polls" is a common idiom for voting (deriving from the fact that early voting involved head-counts), a new folk etymology has supplanted common knowledge of the phrase's true origins in America.

Sharia

Jizya is a poll tax imposed under Sharia. Certain classes of non-Muslims (classically, able-bodied men of military age) are required to pay a tax, called jizya, to the Islamic authorities; in exchange, non-Muslims are allowed to practice their faiths, be exempted from military service, and the like. In practice, jizya has often been implemented as a form of discrimination against non-Muslims, and amounts to a kind of “protection” money. In 1855, the Ottoman Empire abolished the tax, as part of reforms to equalize the status of Muslims and non-Muslims. It was replaced, however, by a military-exemption tax on non-Muslims, the Bedel-i Askeri.

There were two main legal rationales for jizya: the Communalist and Universalist. The former believed that jizya was a fee in exchange for the dhimma (permission to practice one's faith, enjoy communal autonomy, and to be entitled to Muslim protection from outside aggression). The latter, however, assumed that such rights were every person's birthright (Muslim or non-Muslim), and the imposition of jizya on non-Muslims similar to the imposition of Zakat (one of the Five Pillars of Islam, an obligatory wealth tax paid on certain assets which are not used productively for a period of a year) on Muslims.

Jizya was applied to every free adult male member of the People of the Book. Slaves, women, children, the old, the sick, monks, hermits and the poor,were all exempt from the tax, unless any of them was independent and wealthy.

United States

A poll tax (in the sense of capitation) plays a significant role in the history of taxation in the United States and the adoption of income tax as a significant source of government funding. The second meaning of poll tax, namely a tax to be paid as a prerequisite to voting, is more widely known in the United States today. The term was widely used in the South after the turn of the 20th century in combination with other measures to bar blacks and poor whites from voter registration and voting.

Recent debate has arisen about whether requiring citizens to purchase a state identification card acts as a poll tax and bars poor voters from voting.[1] To reduce cost, some state are offering free identification cards for those who can demonstrate the need. However, significant additional costs can be incurred when acquiring a "free" ID. In addition to travel cost or potential lost wages, a certified copy of a birth certificate costs from $10 to $45 depending on the state, a passport costs $85 and certified naturalization papers cost $19.95. Further, about 12 percent of voting-age Americans currently lack a driver's license.[2]

Capitation and federal taxation

The capitation clause of Article I of the United States Constitution, reads "[n]o capitation, or other direct, tax shall be laid, unless in proportion to the census or enumeration herein before directed to be taken." Capitation here means a tax of a uniform, fixed amount per taxpayer.[3] Direct tax means a tax levied directly by the United States federal government on taxpayers, as opposed to a tax on events or transactions.[4] The United States government levied direct taxes from time to time during the 18th and early 19th centuries. It levied direct taxes on the owners of houses, land, slaves, and estates in the late 1790s, but cancelled the taxes in 1802.

An income tax is neither a poll tax nor a capitation, as the amount of tax will vary from person to person, depending on each person's income. Until a United States Supreme Court decision in 1895, all income taxes were deemed to be excises (i.e. indirect taxes). The Revenue Act of 1861 established the first income tax in the United States, to pay for the cost of the American Civil War. This income tax was abolished after the war, in 1872. Another income tax statute in 1894 was overturned in Pollock v. Farmers' Loan & Trust Co. in 1895, where the Supreme Court held that income taxes on income from property, such as rent income, interest income, and dividend income (but not income taxes on income from wages, employment, etc.) were to be treated as direct taxes. Because the statute in question had not apportioned income taxes on income from property by population, the statute was ruled unconstitutional. Finally, ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1913 made possible modern income taxes, by removing the requirement of apportionment with respect to income taxes.[4]

The United States government does not levy capitation taxes today. Some American conservatives, such as Rush Limbaugh, have expressed sentiments for replacing the current multi-tiered federal income tax code with a "flat tax" or, alternately, repealing the current income tax code completely and replacing it with a fixed rate value added tax. Neither is a capitation tax. Some placards in support of this were observed at the Tea Party protests held throughout the country on 15 April 2009.^{[citation needed]}

Tax on voting

A poll tax, in the sense of a discrimination tax which was a pre-condition of the exercise of the ability to vote, emerged in some states of the United States in the late 19th century. After the ability to vote was extended to all races by the enactment of the Fifteenth Amendment, many Southern states enacted poll tax laws which often included a grandfather clause that allowed any adult male whose father or grandfather had voted in a specific year prior to the abolition of slavery to vote without paying the tax. These laws achieved the desired effect of disfranchising African-American and Native American voters as well as poor whites who immigrated after the year specified.

The United States government did not levy poll taxes which blocked access to voting rights. The national government collected its revenues in the form of income taxes and other excise taxes rather than from capitation. A capitation would have required apportionment among the states.[4] The national government did not conduct elections for its offices, and instead delegated conduct of elections to the states.

The 24th Amendment, ratified in 1964, outlawed the use of the poll tax (or any other tax) as a pre-condition in voting in Federal elections. The 1966 Supreme Court case Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections extended this explicit enactment as a matter of judicial interpretation of a more general provision, ruling that the imposition of a poll tax in state elections violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution. The Harper ruling was one of several that rely on the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment rather than the more direct provision of the 15th Amendment. In a two-month period in the spring of 1966, the last four states to still charge a poll tax laws had those laws declared unconstitutional by Federal courts, starting with Texas on 9 February. Decisions followed for Alabama (3 March) and Virginia (25 March). Mississippi's $2.00 poll tax was the last to fall, declared unconstitutional on 8 April 1966, by a Federal panel in Jackson, Miss.[5]

United Kingdom

The poll tax was essentially a lay subsidy (a tax on the movable property of most of the population) to help fund war. It had first been levied in 1275 and continued, under different names, until the 17th century. People were taxed a percentage of the assessed value of their movable goods. That percentage varied from year to year and place to place, and which goods could be taxed differed between urban and rural locations. Churchmen were exempt, as were the poor, workers in the Royal Mint, inhabitants of the Cinque Ports, tin workers in Cornwall and Devon, and those who lived in the Palatinate counties of Cheshire and Durham.

14th century

The Hilary Parliament, held between January and March 1377, levied a poll tax in 1377 to finance the war against France at the request of John of Gaunt who, as King Edward III was mortally sick, was the de facto head of government at the time. This tax covered almost 60% of the population, far more than lay subsidies had earlier. It was levied three times, in 1377, 1379 and 1381. Each time the basis was slightly different. In 1377, every lay person over the age of 14 years who was not a beggar had to pay a groat (4d) to the Crown. By 1379 that had been graded by social class, with the lower age limit changed to 16, and to 15 two years later. The levy in 1381 was particularly unpopular, as each person aged over 15 was required to pay the amount of one shilling, which was then a large amount. This played a role in provoking the Peasants' Revolt in 1381, due in part to attempts to restore feudal conditions in rural areas.