Tax stamps?

[scooter748driver]

Looking at period photos for sale online, I notice many of them have what appears to be a postage stamp on the back (most seem to be $.02). Is this a tax stamp? And if so, how did that work? Is the stamp proof tax was paid?

 

[TerryB]

Between August 1864 and August 1865 there was a tax on photo images in the United States. I have quite a few examples, mostly from cities in the South that were under Union occupation, such as New Orleans, Memphis and Nashville. I think the average was about 2 cents, but it went up according to the price of the photo. At any rate the stamp dates the photo to the dates I gave above. Yes, the photographer charged the tax, just like a store would today, and he put the stamp on the photo as proof of payment. Then he paid the tax collector. Look on the top of a deck of cards for similar stamps, unless those are no longer taxed.

 

[John Hartwell]

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www.stamp-collecting-world.com

 

[Reconstructed Rebel]

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www.stamp-collecting-world.com

This was a very interesting bit of information from the above article for anyone collecting

The tax on photographs created and sold in the United States was repealed effective August 1, 1866. But, it is indeed quite possible that a collector could find a post-August, 1866, carte de visite card with an affixed tax stamp if a photographer was not aware of the recently repealed law. Such an item would certainly be very rare and collectible.

 

[Mk VII]

In England most legal documents at one time required to be signed over a stamp - a regular postage stamp, in that case.

 

[Reconstructed Rebel]

In England most legal documents at one time required to be signed over a stamp - a regular postage stamp, in that case.

Can you explain the thinking behind that custom? Was it just a source of revenue for the government or did it date the document in some way, depending on if the face of the stamps varied from year to year.

 

[Mk VII]

I think it was just a tax, and a postage stamp was the easy way to levy it.