Clashing perceptions color struggle to repeal estate taxes.(Chicago Tribune)

WASHINGTON--When the House of Representatives votes on a proposed repeal of estate and gift taxes this week, Republicans who control the chamber will have people like Mike Nobis of Quincy, Ill., in mind.

Nobis, his brothers and sisters lost both parents 17 months ago when their motor home blew a tire and overturned. The parents left behind a family printing business and an estate tax bill of more than $370,000.

To prevent such a heavy tax burden from sinking a business his father started, Nobis, as company president, put off buying new digital equipment and persuaded its 45 employees to pay more than twice as much for their health insurance. The business brings in $5 million in sales each year.

"It's a horrible tax," said Nobis, 47, now an estate-tax abolitionist with a story that exemplifies Republican arguments that estate taxes hurt small businesses and farmers and should be repealed. The GOP calls it "the death tax."

Democrats look at the estate tax through a completely different lens. Instead of families like the Nobises, they see Rockefellers--wealthy Americans with large estates worth more than $5 million who pay more than half of all the estate taxes. Democrats note that the estates of only 2 percent of all people who die are taxed at all, and only a fraction of these people owned farms and small businesses.

These clashing perceptions have long colored the struggle to do away with estate taxes and with gift taxes as well, both of which were adopted early in the 20th century as a way to prevent wealth concentration.

Last year, both houses of Congress approved a 10-year phase-out of estate and gift taxes, only to be thwarted by President Bill Clinton's veto.