Why should the government collect taxes on jewelery I pass down to my children? I already paid income taxes on the money I used to buy it and sales tax at the point of purchase. Why the hell are they entitled to more?

Why should your children not pay tax on the valuables that they acquired without any work, when everyone else has to earn money and both pay income tax and then pay sales tax to acquire the same jewellery?

(And you don’t enter into the equation. You are dead by the time the taxation happens.)

I'm not an accountant or tax lawyer (in fact, I'm not any kind of lawyer). My layman's understanding is that value -- from goods and services -- is taxed when it moves between legal entities, be those people, estates, or corporations. This is not a prescriptive legal framework as far as I know, but is a descriptive framework which I have observed and which makes sense to me morally.

You paid income taxes on the money when you earned it because it left your employer's pocket and went into yours: the ownership of the value (money) has moved. You paid sales tax when you bought it because you exchanged money for the ring: the ownership of value (money, and a ring) has moved. And you pay an estate tax on it when it transfers from your estate to your children because, you guessed it, the ownership of value has moved.

To prevent royalty. That is literally the reason. To prevent family dynasties.

How do you feel about gift taxes?