The nature of state administration varies widely from state to state and over time. Making generalizations is, as a result, a hazardous business. Fisher focuses on the implication of two common changes in the property tax structure in the middle part of the 19th century, and, by example, how those changes played out in Kansas. These are constitutional or legislative provisions mandating uniformity and universality in property taxation. Uniformity means that all property that is liable to the tax is taxed at a uniform rate.
Universality means that all valuable property in the state is subject to taxation.
Uniformity combined with universality implies that all property in a state, tangible and intangible, land, buildings, inventories, animals, equipment, etc. must be assessed and taxed at the same rate. Uniformity and universality are important both as a reflection of the political climate of the mid-19th century, and for the confusion and difficulties they ultimately created in the administration of the property tax. After the debt crisis of the early 1840s, when state governments began moving toward rather than away from the property tax as their main source of revenue, the property tax became the fiscal mainstay of both state and local governments. It was at that point that uniformity and universality provisions were widely enacted as reform measures. The reforms opened up another can of worms, perhaps one bigger than the universe.