The Fairmont West Virginian. (Fairmont, W. Va.) 1904-1914, 1904-10-17
WHAT THEiR sPURPosE rs AND
siATST1E vlLLHAc 18Th i
III E STATUTES -
cENTLY ENACT = -
sPEcfAE SESSION CLEAR
EY ExPLAlNED5 ss35$ g
AND THE GREAT BENEFIT They II icy
WILL BRING SET Forts
cLEARLY5AND DIsTINcT
LYvoTERs, READ
s;s THIS.

From the Parkersburg State Journal
y The twenty-one tax laws passed at
the special session of the Legislature
Of 1O4 have been published and widely
distributed The acts cover 155 print
ed pages and as they appertain to the
entire system of collection, assessment
and disbursement of revenue, are OF
the utmost Importance and far reach
ing in their effect. They mark a de-
cided step forward toward fairer
and more just system Of assessment
and lower rates Of taxation and their
merits need onIyto be fairly consid-
cred and fully understood to meet with
general approval
What the Acts Are In Brief.
In brief, they reduce the State tax
rate from, thirty-fiye cents to five cents
on the hundred dollars by 1907; in
crease certain license taxes and create
new ones, thereby raising a large
amount of new revenue for the State
from these sources; reduce the max
mum county levy to sixty cents in
stead of the present limit of ninety-five
cents; limit the maximum levy for
inc DullAi4A$o ~
twenty cents instead Of forty; making
a total reduction of a5 cents in a total
of $1.7O or ONE-HALF; prohibit ln-
authorized expenditures by any Off
Ger of the State, county courts or
boards of education; require. thescoun-
ties having special Criminal Courts to
pay the salaries Of the Judges; pro
vide for a Tax Commissioner, who be-
comes the head OF the tax assessment
system Of the State; create a better
system of assessor and assessments,
much of which in regard to the duties
of the assessors goes into effect in
1909; provide for a re-assessnlent of
all the real estate of the State in 1905,
under the direction of the Tax Com
missioner, by commissioners appoint
ed by him, the valuation being subject
to review and correction by the County
Courts and by the State Board of
Public Works, as an equalization
board; make the first tax levies in the
new values or appraisement of real
estate apply in 1906; provide for as
sessments Of pipe lines, telegraph lines,
lines, car lines, railroads,
etc, annually by the Board of Public
Works, requiring complete and accu-
rate sworn returns of the true and &C
tual values of the property from these
corporations; increase and perfect the
collateral inheritance tax. change the
method of conveying prisoners to the
saving thousands of dol
lars annually; fix the fees to be
nd RAISING
old ones in the Offices Of Secretary OF
State and Auditor, which are to go to
the State hereafter as new revenue;
require that the regularly elected as
SCISSORS of the counties beginning in
1909, shall thereafter annually assess
the real estate as we'll as all other
the special re-assessment OF
real estate of 1905 holding until that
time; provide that corporate and all
other property shall be returned for
taxation at its true or actual value;
require counties to pay $4,000 year
toward the education and support OF
their reform school inmates and those |
IN the W. Va Asylum formerly called
he Home for Incurables); and num-
Der of minor matters of more or less
The general scope Of these bills is
to perfect the taxation assessment sys-
tenn and give it head and to cause
all property to be valued as the constl- |
tuition contemplates, at its real value,
in order that there may be d)uniform-
ty and honesty in valuations of similar
that CD the rates of local |
taxation be greatly reduced; that 60 |
direct State taxes may be wiped out I
as far as possible, and the needed
State revenues raised otherwise.
Our present system of unequal and
ow values with high taxes is fatally
defective. The object of the new laws
s to put corporate and al property on
he same equal footing, to assess all |
property at it's value, equally and uni
,ormly, and then to reduce State, coun-
y and municipal taxes.
1t will take no more money to run
ocal and State governments under one
system than another. A full tax val
ration therefore means low taxes. The
keynote of the bills is "fairer va1ua-
ions and lower taxation" With lower
invisible personal property
will more largely appear on the tax du-