I take it that Mason joined the list after the George discussion began. In any case, here is a link to the citation. http://eh.net/pipermail/hes/2006-May/006412.html I was quite surprised to find that the abstract is not available on the web. In any case, if you contact me privately, I can probably arrange for you to get access to the paper. Herbert Davenport on the Single Tax by Professor J. Patrick Gunning Abstract Despite a recent claim to the contrary, Herbert J. Davenport was firmly against the Henry George proposal to try to raise all public funds from a tax on land. This is evidenced by two papers he wrote on the subject. Davenport argued that a single tax on land would prompt the inefficient use of substitutes for land, that it would tend to destroy the base upon which the tax was levied, and that it would offend our sense of justice, or the equal treatment principle. The most important and effective of his arguments appears to be the first. It was, more specifically, that in the event of a land tax, individuals would economize on land. They would farm more intensively, they would constructing higher buildings, and they would exploit potential underground living space. This paper describes Davenport's arguments and shows why they have been misinterpreted in the past. There is also a rough chapter-by-chapter description of Davenport's two major books, which I wrote while I was researching them back in the mid 1990s at the following website: http://www.nomadpress.com/gunning/welcsubj.htm#Selected_Quotations The first book, Value and Distribution (1908), is probably the best HOT book for the period and it was certainly the best written from the perspective of the "new economics" that was prevalent in America at the time. The second, The Economics of Enterprise (1914), was his best work, in my view. Chapters 11-13 may be of particular interest to Georgists. Frank Knight said about Davenport's work that it was often difficult to comprehend. He writes: "Another discordant factor was the combination of a logical mind and a craving to generalize with a bent for realism, somewhat opposed to abstraction and theoretical refinement as such. He even liked to play with ideas and words, so that his works are not easy reading; but he was not concerned to think his conflicts through." Knight Frank H. (1931) "Davenport, Herbert Joseph." In Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. Vol. 5 (8-9). New York: Macmillan. Pat Gunning