State Tax Head Says He Asked $1.05 Meal Rate

If the University had charged $.99 instead of $1.05 for dinners, the Commonwealth would have levied a tax on weekly board rates, Henry F. Long, State Commissioner of Taxation, told the CRIMSON last night.

Long's statement answered the question, repeatedly asked by graduate students, especially at the Law School, as to why University officials didn't juggle meal rates so as to elude the Commonwealth's five percent old age tax on restaurant food. The tax applies only to meals of one dollar or over.

The tax commissioner said he had met with an attorney representing the University early this year to discuss Harvard's meal taxation status.

"Taxes... Not Anything Else"

At that time, he said, he decided some tax should be placed on board rates because institutions like Harvard, Radcliffe, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology already have enough tax exemptions as it is. "I'm interested in collecting taxes, not anything else," Long said.

"After all," he added, "the present Harvard students will someday be old. This tax will eventually benefit them."

"The Commonwealth gave Harvard its existence," therefore it should be willing to come to certain agreements, said Long, commenting on a statement by Vice-Dean Livingston Hall of the Law School that the new meal prices were a case of "giving" in the "give and take" relationship the University has with Massachusetts.

In reference to a remark by Hall that a 99 cent dinner charge would be "unethical and unpolitic," Long said, "You wouldn't think Harvard would be anything but ethical."

But irate law students cited a decision by Judge Learned Hand, "it is every man's duty to minimize his taxes."

Long noted that educational institutions pay some funds to the city in which they are located "in lieu" of direct taxes, but that none of this goes to the state.