Grand River times. [volume] (Grand Haven, Mich.) 1851-18??, 1853-05-11

taxaoie properly OF the State. The people OF
la school district owning a good school-house,,
ought no sooner to ask another district TO pay
the taxes on 1t for Them than to keep it insured,
or furnish it with fuel
You next ask "Would it be right to sell that
house at the tax sales for the benefit Of an adj,
joining district that has failed to contribute a
cent towards this State labor 7"
The house cannot be sold for the benefit of
an adjoining district, it can only be sold for fail
ing to pay its own taxes. Thecarpenter or the
painter may sell it for refusing to pay them
what it owes them, and why should not the
township, the county and State have the same
privilege! aef li 22
B. We do not pretend to know who or'what
these "men who took practical views of life"
meant to "hit," when they framed our exemp-
ton laws. We know they " bit" the laborers
who occupy suburban" cottages, very unjustly,
for the benefit OF every " old ShyIock" who has
more property exempt from taxation than they
are worth in the world
One of those :" in this country who have
scarcely any thing but what they wear on their
Backs" we will suppose happens to strike n
streak Of good luck, and begins to crawlinp in
the world. The first property he buys, will be,
perhaps, forty acres of government land, and the
next, yoke Of oxen to help him clear it, He
goes into the woods catches the ague, lies on
his back all the summer and fall, and the first
day of January finds him penniless, poor as u
sick rat. Now, these men who take practical
views" of life have got him. He has the taxes
on his own property to pay, and his proportion
of what his neighbor Gold Shylock), ought to
pay, on his two hundred dollars worth of fur
niture, on his broadclotls and his wife's silks,
on his six months supply of choice eatabes and
drinkables; in short, on what may amount to-
one thousand dollars. He can't raise the dimes
to pay his taxes His cattle are seized, adver-
tised and sold. On the day Of sale, old Mr..
Shyock steps over, takes practical pie,o of the
cattle, and bids them off at five dollars. The
tax, we will suppose, amounts to six dollars
consequently, his land must be returned for the
balance due, and the expenses of sale.
A few days before the annual sale Of lands
for delinquent taxes, Mr.. Shylock takes anoth-
err practical view of life on his neighbors farm,
and when the time comes, rides TO the county
seat, in his coach, and bids it off for the taxes.
He goes quietly home, and deposits his certif-
cate of purchase in his strong box. His poor
neighbor finds that his place has been sold, but
consoles himself with the thought that the law
gives him year to redeem it. But old Shy
lock" marks him well, and i'll luck pursues him.
All the dead horses" he ever became liable to
pay for in his life, suddenly seem to start from
their graves, and their hideous spectres, with
constables in attendance, haunt and harrass him
the whole year, at length he despars, and gives
up the unequal contest of poverty, and misfor-
tune, against capital and cunning. Redemption
expires, and Shylock" has added another forty
acres to his broad domain. Can you make that
poor man think that the exemption laws which
taxed his one hundred dollars worth of property
to the last cent and let old Shylocks" thousand
90 free, "works we'll? We would not like to.
try the experiment, especially if he was an irri-
table man.
The hundreds Of poor laborers who occupy
" suburban cottages" in the outskirts of most
our towns, who work on our docks, and carry
the hod, who saw our wood and make our gar
dens, and whose wives do our washing, do not
often ask place in our lunatic asylums, though
they be so eccentric as to be poor, and own no
property except the cabin which shelters them.
Lunatic asylums are oftener occupied by old
Shylocks who go crazy over their money bags.
Our laboring population as class, are ready
and willing to pay their proper share of public
expenses but don't like to see these decided
" hits" in the way of unjustly exempting the
property of men who are richer, and better able
to pay than they are.
Time and experience have no more proved
that the exemption laws work well or are expe-
dent and necessary, than they have proved that
our old system of assessment was superior TO
the new. The bare fact that they have been al
lowed to remain upon the statute book, proves
nothing, except that those who are wronged by
this unjust system of exemption have not hith-
erto had sufficient influence to procure their re-
peal. We should have more faith in the practi-
cal working of our laws, if their trainers would
;tot . in THAR o. oIneat