The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1892-08-24
AFTERNOON SESSION.

/ NoDle baldwin, made q speech show
ing clearly the wisdom Of retaining
the present method Of collecting the
taxes. II was cheaper and more eff
cient.
Noble Homer was the author Of one
OF these bills. His opposition to the
assessors had arisen from experience.
/ He had lived in California when the
| state was organized. His experience
IN that State had convinced him that
the assessors in-chief were a fifth
wheel TO the wagon IT was not that
they d1d not work, but their work did
not amount TO anything. They did
not DO any assessing or any letter
writing. Noble Baldwin said that
on his island they did a great deal of
ooth.j That might be so on Maui,
which was small island. The deputy
assessors could Just as well send their
/ accounts direct to Honolulu. The
" Immense labor" of the assessors-in-
chief amounted to nothing.
Rep. Ashford was a member Of the
! Government in 1888, when the law
/ was passed. He thought well of it
| then, and thought still better of it
! now. A harmonious and symmetrical
| system of taX-collecting was neces-
! sary, and that was what we were gra-
! dually getting. 1t could not bs car
! ried out all at once. The case sight
he compared to that Of q mean who
/ finds a plantation disorgan<eG, and
works it up and gets it to going
smoothly. Should he be removed as
soon as he had got everything to going
! like clock-wOrk ? Before 1888, the
tax-cOllecting was a farce. Incom-
| petent men were appointed. We had
a better system now. Let us keep it.
The work done by the assessors-in-
! chief was necessary. They were the
| brains of the taX-assessing. The asses
sOr in-chief on Hawaii had for months
in the year his head quarters in the
saddle.
Rep. Nawahi claimed that the books
were better and more correctly kept
before than now. The governors did
the work at $500 year. The tax
assessor costs $1,000. Where did the
cheapness come in
The Minister of Finance opposed the
bill.
Noble Thurston said he had dream
yesterday, and the member from Hilo
had one to-day. He said the tax asses
sor in chief had ypaid $50 his own
land at Eva while he charged a poor
native SO. That was pretty hard, if
true, so he had gone over to the tax
office to find out. He had taken the
figures offthe book, and found that he
paid S745. That was about as straight
as the member from Hilo usually got
things. There could be no manner Of
doubt that the taxes were collected as
they never had been before. If either
of these bills passed, we would simply
relapse into the old loose system.
The majority report was adopted,
and the bill laid on the table.
/ The President stated he had no
more business TO present to the House.
Noble Williams reported that the
report Of the Finance Committee was
printed and ready for distribution.
Notices of committee meetings were
\ given.
h Under suspension of rules, Noble
Thurston reported for the Committee
on Public Lands on Bill 1919. The bill
concerns fire walls, and the committee
recommend il to passage.
The report was adopted, and the bill
passed to engrOssment, to he read a
third time on Saturday.
Rep. Ashford from Opium Commit
tee No. presented minority report
on the petition of +. Turrill TO be paid
for his share of the much discussed
"F. T." opium catch, of April 2, 1890.
\ The report is very lengthy, and dis
lcusses the facts involved, very min
utely, taking the ground that Turrill
captured and delivered to the Collec-
tor-General $40 tins of Opium, for only
sixty Of which has the Government
settled with him.
1t Is declared, as among the facts
established by the inquiry, that the
+. r. mark was q novel one to the
customs officers. That upon first no.
ticing box so marked, Turrill, who
was Port Surveyor at the time, called
the attention of some of his guards to
it, asked if it were n new mark, and
ordered 81 special watch to be kept OF
oil packages bearing that mark. He
also ordered opened one of the first
chests that came ashore, and, having
business at the Collector Generals
office left his subordinates TO do the
searching, and went to confer will
his superior ON returning to the
wharf he learned that the opened
chest had been found to contain three
2O-tn Containers" of opium, and al
t once returned to report such fact tt
= the Collector General. The latter
official at once gave peremptorJ
orders to open no more of that lot o
chests, but TO send them unopened e
: the Custom House, along with TIN
! one already opened, and its con
tents. This was done, and TIN
Z Collector General took them int
his personal custody. For som
{ unexplained reason that officer dit
not at once open the remaining
= chests, twenty-nine in number, but
2 being asked as 70 their contents b.
TurrfIl day or two later, told TUT
Q rili, I'm affect to mind his own bust
. ness, and that he, the {. G., woul
r do the opening when he should 90
/, ready. That few days later, the {
G.. reported to Turrill that the chest
d had been opened and that they cor
tanned go tins OF opium, lincludin
T. the sixty tins taken from the chest o
l. the wharf, and he took Turrill to h
y private office and showed the twenty
&c six 20-tin Containers piled u
against the wall
il The Pnrt Surveyor kept iourn
to T in the Collectors office in which !
If wrote mp each morning, the events
Of the preceding day i'm his sphere. Q
April Cd the day after the discove
i'm Of the f. r. invoice, Turrill had ma,
We an entry i'm his Journal Of the facts,
far as then developed. But, II
knowing the number OF tins Of opiu
te contained in the unopened chests
,r, left in the entry q blink to he fill
on . later when no should learn n