One of the very generally accepted principles of taxation is that taxes may be levied according to the benefits derived; that is, the amount of each person's tax should correspond to the services which society renders him. Obviously, however, such a principle has, in practice, serious limitations. Sometimes those who are least able to pay taxes, need most the state's aid. The lower income groups, which pay a relatively small share of the school taxes, are the most highly favored by public education, for it would be cheaper for the well-to-do, in lieu of paying school taxes, to educate their own children in private schools. The truth of this statement becomes more striking when we consider that the property of unmarried persons and childless married couples is taxed for school purposes regardless of the fact that they receive no direct benefit in return. It has only been by short and somewhat halting steps that American society has arrived at the point where it is willing to abandon the benefit theory in levying school taxes. Not many years ago our state courts were "swamped " with suits instituted by property-owners in an effort to be relieved from being taxed to educate other people's children. In fact, in one populous Middle Western state the high school system owes its existence to the legal fiction that high school education is authorized by the statute which authorizes "common school" education. Numerous other exceptions may be found to the benefit theory of taxation. We do not inquire how much taxes an individual has paid when we admit him to a public hospital, a public library, or to a public park. It is indeed fortunate for society that the benefit theory has been partially abandoned, for it fails in general to make the strong bear some of the burdens of the weak. Even the well-to-do who receive no direct benefits from school taxes profit indirectly and in the long run; for public education, if it means anything at all, ought to stand for a more enlightened citizenship, for higher industrial efficiency, and for greater security for persons and property.