Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-10-08
ALL ON FULL VALUE.
Commissioner Mercer Demands Honest
Assessment Methods.
HE WANTS THETAXES EQUALIZED.
No Reasons Now Exist Why County Valua-
tiOns Should Differ.
SOME OF THE INEQUALITIES SHOWN

If the views held by County Commits
sioner Mercer and Chief Clerk Siebert
and enunciated at the late convention of
County Commissioners from all over the
State were given the benefit of practical
test there is no doubt that county debts
would soon be wiped out, and that many
whose taxes are now burden would find
them lowered by equalization. 1t will re-
quire the hardest kind of work to secure
men of sufficient standing, as well as hon.
esty, to effect the reform, not that Assessors
are essentially dishonest and sinners beyond
all other men; but simply that they are
human and like office even though it may
not pay more than S2 day, and the assessed
are not any more honest than they ought to
be, and as long as their OK is not gored they
will sit calmly and see injustice done. The
triennial assessment will be made in a few
weeks and it is pertinent to call attention
at this time to some glaring abuses that
ought not to be allowed to be perpetrated.
As Mr.. Mercer said at the convention, it
is not only necessary that County Com
missioners should be honest, but also that
they know their business and know when
to send an assessor walking and force him
to do honest work. 1t is also necessary that
the Commissioners have the courage to
force sycophantic or dishonest assessor
to do his work.
ASSESSMENTS ARE MISLEADING.
Mr.. Mercer calls attention to a species of
rascality in which there is at present no
profit, and which seems to be maintained
either through ignorance or apathy, and it
is misleading to those who would like to
form an approximate estimate of the land
value of the State from assessment returns.
Once the State laid tax on real estate, and
County Commissioners, in order to cheat
the State, would direct the assessors to
value land at one-third, one-half or two
thirds of its value. The cause of it was
something like this: For instance, Ale
gheny County Commissioners would discover
that Westmoreland county had been
assessed at but one-third of its value, while
Allegheny county had been assessed at one
half. They would call the attention of the
assessors to the fact that Allegheny county
had been gouged by being made to pay more
than its share of State tax. Accordingly,
to get even, the next year Allegheny county
valuations would be pulled down, and as the
aggregate pull would be much greater than
in Westmoreland the latter would get the
worst of it. In this unchristian-like way
the counties clawed at each others throats.
BY and by, however, and good many years
ago, too, the State ceased to tax real estate,
but still the partial valuation plan was fol-
lowed and is still, and so many counties are
assessed at one-third, one-half, two-thirds,
three-fourths and at full rates. The old
iniquitous system still exists in rudiment-
ary form just as some unused parts of the
human body do, though they have ceased to
perform their functions for, perhaps, thou
sand generations or more.
HOW THE OLD PLAN WORKED.
The following table shows the work of the
old system, while the cutthroat motive that
it has no longer force.