The Aberdeen examiner. [volume] (Aberdeen, Miss.) 1866-current, 1883-07-05
'Thc Mississippi plan'' of ASSESS
ing.

The Jackson New MIssIssIPpIAN
is complaining loudly of the heavy
per centage of taxation i'll that city,
but does not, so far as we have fol-
lowed its editorials, charge any ex-
travagance against its city admins
tration or misappropriation of public
money, If we are right in supposing
that the funds of that city are econo-
mically and honestly disbursed, we
would respectfully suggest to our
contemporary that it is the tax asses
sor and not the tax collector of
Jackson, who needs to be looked after;
and if this is the case we have no
doubt but the evil of high taxes can
be traced there as in many other
cities, towns and counties that we
know of, directly to the property
owners and tax payers themselves,
who insist upon listing their property
at figures vastly below its actual
value, and then howl about "high
taxes"
The aggregate wealth of the city
of Jackson would seem to an outsider,
to compare favorably with that of
most towns of its size in the United
States, yet the city makes poor
showing upon the Assessors rolls
when compared with towns Of much
smaller size, such as Aberdeen and
Columbus-whIe they themselves are
greatly underestmated in theirannual
assessment. We make no point upon
jackson in this particular, for the
habit of low assessments was born of
the reconstruction days when taxes
were levied without regard to the
necessities of administration; when
per centages bore no relation to ag-
gregate values and the only escape
from confiscation was i'll reporting
property at nominal figures to the
assessor.
This habit of assessing low has
grown upon us and is we suppose
common to every town and county Ill
the State, and we have httlo doubt
but that if our cotemporary will take
a glance at the assessors books of his
city, he will find that many persons
who have complained to him of heavy
tax burdens are only taxed upon
third or even fourth of the value of
thier property; and what is true i'll
this respect of Jackson, is true of
every town and county in the State,
for Mississippi can boast the broadest
chasms between selling prices and
assessed values of any region on the
face Of the habitable globe.
If this peculiar condition of things
was well understood abroad it would
do us little harm; but as it is, every
stranger judges us by his home stan
dard, and if told that the tax on real
and personal property in Jackson is
one per cent, naturally understands
the phrase to men one cent on every
dollars worth, whereas if he examined
the rolls he might discover that it
was only a cent on four dollars
worth, or actually one fourth of one
per cent.
Doubtless Ignorance of this Missis-
sippi custom has deferred many men
from investing their capital in Jack
son, and we suggest to our cotempo-
rary. that war upon illegal ASSESS
ments waged to success at the State
capitol, would set an admirable
example to us all; an example that
would be as contagious as small pox
and spread like a prairie fire; while
cry of ''high taxes" without regard
to meagre assessments, is calculated
to achieve an opposite result from
the one desired, by deterring stran-
gers from investing, and thus causing
stagnation in property transactions
actually tend to reduce values to the
present rates of assessment, thereby
making low taxes impossible in a
city where there are no revenue
leaks or frauds.