Morris tribune., 1909-03-06

NOR
same ground, only adding that be-
cause men of wealth evaded the taxes
on their credits was no reason at al
for exempting them from the opera
tion of the law. The right thing te
do would be to enforce the law. The
most effective point was raised, how.
ever, by Mr.. Thayer, who attacked
the constitutionality of the bill. The
amendment of the constitution as car
ried In 1906 declares that all persona.
property in excess of 5000 shall be
subject to taxation. Credits are de-
fined in the statutes as personal prop
ertY, and that definition the people
had in mind when voting on the con-
stitutional amendment. In his opin-
ion the courts under the circumstances
would hold that not merely tangible
personal property would come within
the meaning of the constitution, but
that the credits it is now proposed to
exempt would be embraced therein.
The house apparently thought Mr..
Thayer's point well taken, and the bill
was referred to the judiciary commit
tee to consider this point.
Mr.. Stuart made an extended argu :
menu in favor of his bill, as did also
Carl Wallace of Minneapolis and Mr..
Dalzell. The strong points made were
/ two. First, that creditors always
found some way of shifting the bur-
den of taxation from their shoulders
to those of their debtors, and, second,
that if there were no taxes on mu-
nicipal bonds, etc., they would be
bought by the people of the State and
the interest on them instead of being
paid in the East would be kept at
home. The further point was made
that the law did not now accomplish
it's object; that these credits for the
most part evaded taxation, and that
the system of taxing them put a pre-
MUM on perjury and tax on hon
esty. AS indicating how ineffective
the law is Mr.. Stuart quoted from the
tax returns to show that in several
counties the tax levied on dogs was
many times greater than the tax levied
on credits. One trouble, he thought,
was that the credits couldn't bark.
The next subject of a gabfest was
the proposal to amend the constitu-
tion so as to make provision for the
initiative and referendum. What this
means has never been quite clear to
me. and I dare say to a good many
other people, and as to the part of the
proposed clause defining it is quite
brief will quote it in full:
"The legislative authority of the
State shall be vested in the legislature
thereof, except that the people ex-
pressly reserve to themselves the
power to propose by a petition in writ
ing laws and amendments to the con-
stitution of this State and to enact or
reject said laws and amendments at
the polls, independent of the legisla-
ture, and also reserve power at their
own option to approve or reject at
the polls any act of the legislature or
any one or more items, sections or
parts of such act, and the reflections
of any items, sections or parts shall
mot prevent the remainder of such act
from becoming law" The power to
propose law here given which is
vested in per cent of the voters is
the initiative; the power to approve
or reject law or part of law passed
is the referendum and can be exer-
cised on the petition of per cent of
the voters of the State.
Under the bill as proposed by MIR.
johnson of Candy initiative and refer
endum powers are also conferred on
"the legal voters of every municipal
ity and district as to all local, special
and municipal legislation of every
character in and for these municipali-
ties and districts" The subject was
given quite serious consideration by
the house. The debate upon it was
lengthy and the vote for the amend
ment, 45 to 6s, was surprisingly strong.
Probably the best argument in favor
of the bill was made by Mr.. Lobeck,
who rarely seriously addresses him.
self to subject which he does not
illumine; but the sensational feature
of the debate was the charge of bad
faith made by Mr.. johnson against
certain unnamed members of the
judiciary committee. I quote Mr..