The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-07-02

tuitik lS TtBut, III aSkiu8 tHht tutD NVtir ventien reduce the tax limit tn the Constitution under which we now live. Because we ask this on behalf of the people who are back and behind us in this great movement, are we to be charged with an attempt. or q, desire to play for personal popularity? No. MT. President. the intelligence of this Con- vention will mount above plane like that. It will come upon a high plane. and reason about this great question and settle 1t as becomes true Alabami- ans.
 We are told, MT. President, that we would put the State in a terrible con- dition if we should make this reduction Gentlemen seem to forget that we have given the Governor the right to bor- row three hundred thousand dollars, and that three hundred thousand dare say gentlemen of the Convention, will tide over any state Of Circum- stances, 1t matters not how embarrass- iny they may become.
 We are confronting the people of AL abama, or will ere long, with a new Constitution. It is not like Legisla- ture that assemblies here and adjourns and reconvenes every two years. It IS something new. It is odd. Twenty-Five fifty and sometimes hundred years roll over the heads of States before the fundamental law Is changed. The peo- pie of Alabama are looking to this con- ventiop for a wise document In the way of an organic law. They are not en- ttrely pleased with the progress that the Convention has made, 1t is true, but they do not understand what tn.s Convention Is doing and the work that 1t has to do. But when we close that door, and go away from here with Constitution to be stamped by the 3D. proyal of the sovereign voters Of Ala bama, we must have document that will appeal to their judgment, to their sense of right, and their patriotism, and if you go out from this Convention with the proper suffrage plank. and reduction of the tax, l care not Wiiat the opposition may be, 1t cannot stand before the people as they march with this Constitution to glorious approval. What we need, MT. President and ge:.- tlemen of this Convention, Is honest returns, and honest assessments, and taxes. Millions O. dol- lars worth of property in Alabama es- cape every year. The poor man with his goods in sight bears the burden of taxation today. The farmer with his lands and stock where the assessor can see them, and where the neighbors can talk about them, makes 1t mat ter of common knowledge, and he can- not hide 1t away. But the man with pri- vate securities, the man with his money hoarded away. and corpora tions, too, largely escape their fair share of the burdens of taxation in AL abama. Reduce this limit then strike down this inequality of the law along the line of taxation, and let every man march up 10 the full line of his duty, and give in his property as he should, and you would not even need your sixty five cents. Thirty-seven and half would be fully ample. In New England State, in. a small town, few years ago, there lived a man, supposed to be wealthy. They supposed him to be worth about a million of dollars. He gave in his property at one hundred thousand. He died, and his executors scheduled his personal property, and 1t was found that that man, in that small New England town, was worth six millions of dollars, and as soon as the tax assessor of that city placed 1t upon the assessment roll, it reduced the tax rate one-half in that town. This illustration I gathered from a speech of ex-President Harrison on the subject of taxation.
 I do not desire to detain this Conven- tion. and 1 will not do so, but gentle men tell us that we must leave it to the Legislature; that the Legislature will adjust the matter; and my distin- has told this Convention that in 1896 the Legislature appropri- ated So much. that they doubled that nearly in ninety-eight, and they doubled 1t in 1900. With due regard and respect to the members who com posed the last Legislature, they were as being too extravagant with the peoples money. It was talk ed of all over the State. Your newspa- pers had a great deal to say along that line. Gentlemen suggest here that this State and a few others, are the only ones that have a tax limit lodged in the fundamental law of the State. Well, the sooner the other States fall into line, the better it will be for than. dare say that the delegates of this are convinced that if you were to remove all tax limit, you could Rot, in ten years, have such a Consti- tuition ratified by the tax payers of
 
 and trust it to the Legislature, and they will tell you the last Legislature appro- priated everything, and went to the limit in the old Constitution, and they would go to another one if you made it a dollar, or a dollar and half. or any other amount.
 MT. Oates-I do not wish to interrupt the gentleman from Chambers. but want to suggest to him, in connection with what he has said, as part of his that there never was any con limit upon the rate of taxa tion in this State until the Convention of 1875 put it there, and the reason of that was that the carpet-bag Legisla- ture preceding had appropriated every thing III sight and anticipated every thing to come, and rendered the State and many of the counties insolvent.
 MT. Hefiin (Chambers)-I thank the gentleman, MT. Presi- dent, for that suggestion. We have long since passed over the shattered ruins of reconstruction. Alabama has walked out from under the gloomy clouds that lowered over her in that awful time of distress and defeat, and like a young giant, up the mountain side to victory and glory and true progress, she moves today unfet- tered and unhampeSed by anything that chung to her and manacled her limbs in reconstruction days. Seventy five cents was necessary then; sixty five cents Is. fully ample now.
 am fully convinced, after hearing the able argument of the chairman of this commit tee. He comes in with a report to which there is not one dis senting voice from the committee. as it. It is the unanimous