Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1897-01-14
me mernoa or reorganlzing.


Amendment No. 2 prohibits the govern
or from appointing to Office during the
legislative recess any person whom he has
nominated to the senate and who has been
rejected by that body The governors
have often taken advantage of the loophole
which this amendment is intended to stop
up.
| Amendment No. is the antiracing
bugaboo, preventing pool selling of any
kind at horse races.
Amendment No. provides for woman
suffrage at school elections
| Amendment No. provides for biennial
sessions of the legislature. Although Gem
eral Jewell has expressed himself in favor
Of this latter amendment it is opposed by
many leaders of public opinion. It is
pointed out that the railroads and corpora
lions favor it's passage simply to diminish
the danger of hostile legislation.
The amendments have all gone to the
| judiciary committee but Senator VOORHEES,
expresses purpose to push them to final
vote at an early date.
Eqnalizing Taxation.
ject toward which public interest is fast
tending, and it will occupy not little OF
the legislature time. There is DISPOSE
ton among some of the leaders to decline
to 20 into general discussion of the mer-
its of the question, on the ground that a
commission was appointed for that very
purpose by the last legislature; that this
commission has made a most thorough in
quiry, giving everybody an opportunity to
| be heard, and that the commissioners have
submitted the results in the shape of re-
| port, Just printed. The commissioners were
such men as John p. Stockton, Abraham
NJ. Reynolds, James T. Rushing, William
II. Vredenburgh and Charles G. Black, and
it is argued that it would be simply waste
of time for the legislature to go over the
ground which they have covered. The
commission admits that Hudson county,
which is making all the hubbub over the
failure of the railroads to contribute salts
factorily to her treasury, has grievance, in
that the absorption of so much of her ter
ritory by the great railroad terminals with
draws just so much property from its full
burden of local tax. 1t appears that in
Jersey City alone the railroad holdings
embrace nearly 3,000,0 900 acres out of a
total area of something over 10000 900
acres.
As a conclusion from this admission and
from other inquiries, the commission rec
ommends that the state relinquish in favor
of the respective localities it's revenue of
one-half of per cent, or S. on the 81 900
of valuation, derived from the property
used for railroad and canal purposes and
on real estate other than the main stem and
known as second class property. The value
of such property within the state is $41,
1870, 1916, from which the state derived an
annual revenue of 1905, COL o. The dis
tribution of this revenue among the differ
emit localities would be in proportion to the
amount of railroad property they respec
lively contain.
How the Money Would Be Divided.
This, in effect, would mean revenue as
follows: To Hudson county (the lion s.
share) $751; ,0S7 SO; to Camden, S.
74S; Atlantic 81, 067; Bergen, So, 800;
Burlington, $500; Cape May, $315; Es-
sex, $4,S72; Gloucester, 1892; Hunter
don, 50, 179; Mercer, So, 300; Morris, 3d.
10; Ocean, $588; Passaic, 1914; Salem,
$i56; Somerset, 1857; Sussex, $575; I'm
ion, $1,000; Warren, $2,91S The compu-
tation is here given by counties for con
venience. But the money, it must be re-
membered, would not go into the county
treasury, but into the treasures of the
several cities, boroughs, etc., within the
| counties.
The commi sion further reports, with the
exception Of the change noted iIss::.ss,,,. ~
the separate localities, that & sre present
railroad s ssz law (s.ct of 1884 should stand,
lsSSing 50 nearly perfect in its provisions
that 1t cannot be improved upon. 1t yields
SO large revenue as to render a state tax
upon the people unnecessary. It is be-
iieved that the loss the state would suffer
by the diversion of so much money to the
separate localities will soon be made up
by increased property valuations
Pretty much everybody is satisfied with
the commission report, except some of the
Hudson members who hold out for the
taxation of railroad property for local prlr-
poses by local assessors.
Both houses have adjourned to Monday
night next.