Bisbee daily review., 1905-06-27
THE TERRITORIAL
 BOARD OF HUMILIATION.

BOARD OF HUMILIATION.
 It is reported that the territoria board of equalization has made new departure in calling for complete dup licate copies of the assessment rolls of the various counties. A statement comes from Phoenix that the purpose of this new order is to get more def nite information concerning the. in dividual assessments of the territory +- The duty Of the territorial board oi equalization is to equalize the assess ment of property in the several coun ties and not to assess it.
 It is the duty of the territorial board of equalization to assess the railroads of the territory: this duty was performed in Phoenix on the first of the present month and it is the gen eral opinion that a very poor job was made of it. In this connection it win not be out of place to here reproduce a couple of editorials which were pub iished in the Graham county papers this week:
 The action of the territorial board of equalization demonstrates that the demand made on the legislature by the Guardian to repeal the law creat. ing the board, was correct.
 The assessment fixed shows, to say the least, incompetency on the part of the board to transact the important public business imposed upon it by law About the only redeeming fea ture in the whole transaction is where the board raised the Southern Pacific company MORE than $100 a mile making it a total of SHIPS.
 The matter of the assessment of the G. ", G. & N. Ky is little short of an outrage on the people of thi; county, and a breach of faith on the part of the board. This road had ar exemption from taxation, granted bl legislative enactment, of ten years We have it on good authority tha the road is mortgaged for s16,00O pel mile. They should, at least, have beer assessed at one-half this amount. This made an absolute saving to that com pany, in the ten years, of s256,0O0. Af ter the people generously donated thi: amount to encourage the construction of the road, it's agents went before the territorial board two years agC and that body generously donated { few thousand more by assessing th' road at what was termed one-hal value. Geo. A Olney was a membe1 of the board at the time and vigor ously protested against this action but finally got an agreement that tn road should be assessed at full valu last year. When the board met las year 1t repeated the dose of the yea previous, which caused Mir. Olney t resign. This year the board gracious y fixed the rate at $3,12S70 per mile en increase of a few hundred dollars
 Tn this connection we wish to cal the attention of the members of tn board to the fact that the Gila Valle road is not a charitable institution
 
 and in fixing its rate Of taxation lowe than it should be is simply compel ing other taxpayers to pay out Of the hard earnings for the benefit Of th railroad. To be sure the railroad va damaged by the floods this year, bI { so was every other road, and for fl damage the S. P. was raised NOR than s100 per mile! Too bad,
 Such coarse work as this is one the factors that will force governmer control of railroads. But this is the future. In the meantime let th territorial board of equalization abolished, and place the assessing ( railroads in the hands of the differeI county boards, the same as otht property is."-Guardian.
 Commenting on the railroad asses ment made by the territorial board ( equalization the Clifton Copper Er well says:
 Taking the Arizona and New Me, jco railroad as a basis for asseSsmen because it is unquestionably valued { a higher rate. according to the bu mess it is doing, and the amount ( rolling stock it owns. than any otht road in the territory. we find the fo lowing:
 The Arizona and New Mexico valued at s5.504 per mile, while th