The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-03-06

bis, heither does it provide an effee-
tive manner of penalizing those who
do not comply with the statutes.
IL mas come to the notice of your
COMMITTEE that, through recent de-
eisloh OF the Supreme Court, back
taxes on certain real estate have been
decided as noncollectible. thereby de-
prlylng the Territory of certain reve.
nue. winch was its just due and which
would have been available, had the
law relative to the collection of taxes
oeen enforced at the time. We take
TINS opportunity of mentioning this
point, IN view OF the present urgent
question of additional revenues for
the maintenance of the Territorial de-
partments. 1t is quite evident to your
COMMITTEES that if all of the taxes and
revenues which are justly due the Ter.
rifory, under the law, were collected
ana the laws relative thereto strictly
enforced, the treasury would find it.
sell IN a much better condition than
now exists
W would suggest that a special
legislative committee be appointed to
look INTO the existing license and tax
laws, whose further duty If would be
TO consider legislative matters and all
proposed bills which may be brought
before the Territorial Legislature. it
beng the further duty of this com
mlttee to confer with like commit
tee from the Chamber of Commerce.
and if possible, act jointly.
1t is stated that out of thirty or forty
commission merchants here only seven
have paid their license fee for doing
bnslness-S100 each; and that the gov
ernment IS losing any amount of money
by not collecting such fees.
Shippers Wharf Tax.
MIR. Paris then said that Senator
Chillingworth had asked him to bring
up the question of whether or not it
would be advisable to legalize the
quarantine wharf tax For the past
decade this tax has been paid over to
committee of the Chamber of Com
.merce, tax on certain goods brought
into the country of so much per tom
The fund has been used to fight cpl
denies and has largely aided the Board
of Health in caring for the health of
the port. Mr.. Paris said that the sug-
gestion for legalization had come from
some sources and suggested that if
legalized the bill designate for what
specific purpose the money shall be de-
voted. He said it was only a question
of time when some business men
would refuse to pay the tax.
He spoke of the revenues from yari-
Gus articles of merchandise imported
on which the tax is levied. There were
some commodities on which the tax
was not paid. Mr.. Paris said he did
not want the money to go into the
treasury to be squandered as the gov
eminent officials saw fit.
Mr.. Petrie of Castle & Cooke Com
pany, said the wharf tax fund amount
ed to about $4,000 per annum. He
said as far as he knew the only ones
evading it were the coal and lumber
people. The objection of the coal peo-
pie is that the value of their goods is
SO small compared with its bulk that
they considered it unjust to collect q
tax per ton, which is worth about So
compared with a small merchandise
package worth about $1,000 on which
there may be charge of but ten cents
Mr.. Angus of Davies & Co. did MOI
believe in legalizing the tax or in any
way doing anything to affect the fund
which would put it into the public
treasury sfto be squandered. Mr.. Pc
trie added. on behalf of the shippers
that they have felt for some years thai
they did not wish to be responsible fol-
the collection of this money, although
it does seem as though the tax was al
equable as possible. He thought il thu
tax was legalized it would be spent by
the county government, possibly Ihl'
caused smile.
Mr.. Won Hamm thought it best t.
leave well enough alone. The money
was an excellent fund for the shippers
to use in fighting epidemics, but Il
legalized and the money was tied III
in the treasury the merchants would
probably have to dig down in theil
pockets for an emergency fund.
Mr.. Petrie suggested that the atten
ton of the Shipper s Wharf Commit.
tee might be called to the coal and
lumber omissions to pay the tax fund
Mr.. I.neas of May Il Co. warned the
association that the time is coming
when the bulk of shippers would stop
contributing to the fund. He did not
think it was equable, and certainly
was not, taken in connection with the
grocery business The coal and luln'
Der men, etc, could easily add the
amount of the tax to ton of coal and
have the consumer pay it, but. IN his
business it was difficult to do this, and
his firm, he thought, was actually
digging down into its pocket to ecu
tribute to the fund.
It was also thought by some mem-
bers that by legalizing the fund 1t
was practically adding another govern
mental tax to their business. and they
thought this wrong in principle.
Delinquent Taxes.
Mr. Riggs said that much money
was due the government in delinquent
taxes. If the government officials
were diligent in enforcing the law
they could collect vast amount of
money which would be very acceptable
to the government just now. Mr.
King suggested that the law is weak,
but Mr. Riggs said the weakness was
in the proper enforcement OF the
laws.
As to the wharf tax. it was decided
to take no vote on the question, but
leave it where it was. The Merchants