Williams news., 1905-03-11
SOME LOOPHOLES
 IN BULLION BILL

gently gave to the Phoenix Repub- lican his views on the bullion tax bill as follows:
 The proposed tax on the prod ucts of mines appears to me like putting penalty on mining. As whole, the mining industry in the territory needs fostering rather than further restriction, which will certainly be the tendency of the proposed legislation. The success of two or three companies after years of endeavor, lavish expendi- ture, and the incidental creation of immense amounts of taxable property by their operations, seems to have blinded some people to the far greater number which are still in the development stage and whose product is worth only fraction of the money being spent in such de- velopment, but which. nevertheless, contribute their proportionate share in the way of tax on their property and Improvements, and incident ally are adding greatly to taxable wealth by their operations.
 I am moved to make these re- marks, by the reports of proposed legislation providing for taxing the products of mines and by reading copy of the bill recently intro duced by MT. Kruger. I wish to call attention to some inconsistent cies in the proposed rates of taxa tion on the different metals in MT. Kruger's bill. These rates do not bear the same proportion to market value in each case. For instance, if copper is assumed at 15 cents per pound, the tax of one mill per pound is equivalent to two-thirds of one per cent of the price. In the case of silver at sixty cents per ounce, two thirds of one per cent is four mills, as given in the bill, although the market price of silver huctuates widely, as is we'll known. In the case of gold, at it's legal value of $2O67 per ounce, two- thirds of one per cent is 1878 cents instead of 10 cents, as proposed in the bill. In the case of lead, at the average market price of $4.50 per 100 pounds, two-thirds of one per cent is three cents per 100 pounds instead of four mills per 100 pounds. It will thus be seen that the proposed rate on gold is proportionately nearly one third less than on copper. and the rate on lead is only about one eighth of what it should be to be proportion ate to copper. There is evidently no justice in taxing gold and lead at less percentages of their market values than copper.
 The fluctuations in market prices of the metals will, of course, vary the percentage which the proposed tax rates bear to the values of the metals. Arbitrary rates of taxa ton per unit of weight can, there fore, never be just and uniform for all
 A striking instance of the un- wisdom and injustice if the pro- posed tax is at Tombstone, where we have been fighting water for two years and paying taxes on all the expensive machinery and improve ments, besides upholding the taxa ble valne of all other property in the district. The bill as drawn would still require payment of taxes on the improvements and practically the same amount addi tional on the product of the mines, even though that should have been insufficient to cover the cost of pro- duction. The game may be said of many, might almost say of most, of mines in the territory at present.
 I have given the above illustra tions merely to show the scant care which has been devoted to the con- sideration of a bill of such far reaching importance in its bearing on the chief industry of the terri