Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1903-01-31
RAILWAY TAXATION IN WISCONSIN.
THE RAILROAD SIDE OF TIE QUkS-
TON.
Amount Of License Tax Paid by WisCon.
Sin Railroads.
Ossued in Behalf Of Wisconsin Railways.)

ISSUED in Behalf of Wisconsin Railways.)
The railroad companies of Wisconsin be-
fieyc they are already bearing their full
share of the burdens Of maintaining the
government of this state. Consequently
they feel that to add anything whatever to
the taxes they are now paying would be
unfair, and to add such 81 eat sums as
have been proposed in some quarters would
be a long step toward the absolute confisca-
ton of their property.
Such being their views, they ask the PEG
pie Of Wisconsin to suspend judgment
to this controversy until they have pre-
sented their side. They promise to do this
in the shortest space possible and in the
simplest manner which the facts will permit.
They will submit the facts they wish TO
present in series of articles Of which this
Is the first.
the point, at issue clearly stated at the out
set If this is not done, much time is
wasted in the discussion of questions that
have little, and very often nothing at AZ,
to do with the real question. To prevent
this waste OF words let state what the
Issue III this controversy is and also what
It Is not. This is the question before us:
DO the railroads pay their full share of the
taxes? If it can he shown that they dc pay
their full share, it makes no difference to
:he people of Wisconsin in what form the
taxes are collected or what they are called
We have stated what the question before
us is. Now let us state what it is not.
The question is often discussed as though
it could with equal accuracy, be put this
way: Do the railways pay the FULL
value of their property the average rate Of
taxation which is paid by other property
ON its ASSESSED value. OF course the
question is never put in this bald. direct
form because the injustice of such a com
pariSon would be seen by everybody; but
the question is nevertheless discussed as if
1t were fair to compare the late the
full and even much more than the fnI
value of railroad property with the rate
paid on the ASSESSED value of other prop
erty which is almost invariably much less
than its full value.
If the statement of the subject we have
before US, which has just been made, is
corr ect, then 1T Is fundamentally important
to ascertain, on the one hand, what Is the
total actual value of the real and personal
property IN the state and the total amount
of taxes paid on this property; and on the
other hand, the total value which should
be placed on the railroads and the total
taxes or license fees paid by the railroads
The whole question Of whether or not the
railroads bearing their full share of the
cost of running the government depends OF
the correctness Of these figures. This is
true because the total taxes collected from
subject to taxation divided by the full value
of this property gives the average rate paid
by these forms Of property; and the total
sum II license fees or taxes paid by the
railroads divided by the full value of the
railroads gives the average rate paid by
this kind of property: A comparison Of
these two rates will show whether or not
the different kinds Of property are paying
their full share of taxes.
So much has been said during the last
three four years about the outrageous
way in which the railways escape taxation
that a great many people now doubt
whether the railways pay any taxes at all.
To show that we do pay taxes and that
the SUMS are really ve1y large whatever
way they are taken we present below the
total sums paid by all the railways in Wis
consin during the last twelve years and
the amounts paid by the leading roads dur
ing the year 1900.
The payment of license fees by the rail
roads in Wisconsin, from the table present
ed below shows that as the state has de-
veloped the payments have Increased.
These statements are fl ON official data and
we've carefully prepared