Papal income tax

Income tax

An income tax is a tax levied on the income of individuals or businesses . Various income tax systems exist, with varying degrees of tax incidence. Income taxation can be progressive, proportional, or regressive. When the tax is levied on the income of companies, it is often called a corporate...

was first leveled in 1199 by Pope Innocent III

Pope Innocent III

Pope Innocent III was Pope from 8 January 1198 until his death. His birth name was Lotario dei Conti di Segni, sometimes anglicised to Lothar of Segni....

, originally requiring all Catholic clergy to pay one-fortieth of their ecclesiastical income annually in support of the Crusades

Crusades

The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...

. The second income tax was not levied until the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215, and constituted only a triennial twentieth.

This precedent was frequently continued by the successors of Innocent III, enforced by ecclesiastical censure, by sequestration

Sequestration (law)

Sequestration is the act of removing, separating, or seizing anything from the possession of its owner under process of law for the benefit of creditors or the state.-Etymology:...

, and frequently by the use of force. The first time the tax was imposed, contributors were promised that a quarter of the penances would be rebated if payments were made willingly and honestly; the second time, non-compliance was simply threatened with excommunication

Excommunication

Excommunication is a religious censure used to deprive, suspend or limit membership in a religious community. The word means putting [someone] out of communion. In some religions, excommunication includes spiritual condemnation of the member or group...

. On a few occasions popes convoked a general council before imposing an income tax, but more often imposed the tax solely on their own authority.

The power was later used for Crusades outside of the Holy Land

Holy Land

The Holy Land is a term which in Judaism refers to the Kingdom of Israel as defined in the Tanakh. For Jews, the Land's identifiction of being Holy is defined in Judaism by its differentiation from other lands by virtue of the practice of Judaism often possible only in the Land of Israel...

. For example, Pope Gregory IX

Pope Gregory IX

Pope Gregory IX, born Ugolino di Conti, was pope from March 19, 1227 to August 22, 1241.The successor of Pope Honorius III , he fully inherited the traditions of Pope Gregory VII and of his uncle Pope Innocent III , and zealously continued their policy of Papal supremacy.-Early life:Ugolino was...

 in 1228 levied a one-tenth income tax to fund his war against Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor

Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor

Frederick II , was one of the most powerful Holy Roman Emperors of the Middle Ages and head of the House of Hohenstaufen. His political and cultural ambitions, based in Sicily and stretching through Italy to Germany, and even to Jerusalem, were enormous...

. By 1253, the phrase "ecclesiastical revenues and receipts" was defined more carefully, and interpreted to include temporalities as well as spiritualities. In 1274, the lessons from the past taxes were aggregated and compiled into a set of instructions for the collectors in France under the direction of Gregory X

Pope Gregory X

Pope Blessed Gregory X , born Tebaldo Visconti, was Pope from 1271 to 1276. He was elected by the papal election, 1268–1271, the longest papal election in the history of the Roman Catholic Church....

, in the tear that the Second Council of Lyon

Second Council of Lyon

The Second Council of Lyon was the fourteenth ecumenical council of the Catholic Church, convoked on 31 March 1272 and convened in Lyon, France, in 1274. Pope Gregory X presided over the council, called to act on a pledge by Byzantine emperor Michael VIII to reunite the Eastern church with the West...

 ordered a sexennial tenth. Pope Boniface VIII

Pope Boniface VIII

Pope Boniface VIII , born Benedetto Gaetani, was Pope of the Catholic Church from 1294 to 1303. Today, Boniface VIII is probably best remembered for his feuds with Dante, who placed him in the Eighth circle of Hell in his Divina Commedia, among the Simonists.- Biography :Gaetani was born in 1235 in...

 included the tax code in canon law

Canon law

Canon law is the body of laws & regulations made or adopted by ecclesiastical authority, for the government of the Christian organization and its members. It is the internal ecclesiastical law governing the Catholic Church , the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches, and the Anglican Communion of...

 in 1301.

Fourteenth and fifteenth century popes leveled similar taxes for personal uses as well as for wars against the Ottoman Turks and others. Taxes could be imposed either on the universal church, the clergy of a single country, or even on a group of provinces. Whereas the first crusading taxes were paid directly to crusaders, by the middle of the thirteenth century it became customary to pay the tax directly to kings, princes, or nobles who promised to join the crusade; if the crusade never took place, the money was to be returned to the Apostolic Camera

Apostolic Camera

The Apostolic Camera, or in Latin Camera Apostolica or Apostolica Camera, is the central board of finance in the Papal administrative system, which at one time was of great importance in the government of the States of the Church, and in the administration of justice, led by the Camerlengo of the...

. Nonpayment of papal taxes was rampant, and secular rulers of even modest power could usually succeed in placing restrictions on papal taxes collected within their realm, if not in obtaining a portion for themselves, or even persuading the papacy to merely act as an intermediary in levying their own taxes (with or without the pretext of the crusade). For example, Edward I

Edward I of England

Edward I , also known as Edward Longshanks and the Hammer of the Scots, was King of England from 1272 to 1307. The first son of Henry III, Edward was involved early in the political intrigues of his father's reign, which included an outright rebellion by the English barons...

 and Edward II

Edward II of England

Edward II , called Edward of Caernarfon, was King of England from 1307 until he was deposed by his wife Isabella in January 1327. He was the sixth Plantagenet king, in a line that began with the reign of Henry II...

 succeeded in obtaining more than half of the customary tenth for themselves, as did the French kings during the Avignon Papacy

Avignon Papacy

The Avignon Papacy was the period from 1309 to 1376 during which seven Popes resided in Avignon, in modern-day France. This arose from the conflict between the Papacy and the French crown....

.