The Blackfoot optimist. [volume] (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1907-1918, 1912-01-18
Legislature Cow er1es


the habit of eXavlrng the assess
meHt rolls except as to their own
property / knew something of the
matter when I entered upon my preseilt
office, although not aware Of the ey-
tent of the evil. | endeavored to iln-
press upon you while in regular ses-
sicn the necessity of change in our
taxation system, and earnestly endeay-
ored to have you by proper legislation
provide a commission to revise our
revenue laws. State Auditor Taylor,
in his report for 1910, earnestly and
eloquently portrayed the evils OF the
system. most earnestly asked for relief
and wisely suggested a tax commits
sion among other things. Your time
was so occupied with many other mat
ters thcn seemingly of equal impor-
tance, that these suggestions were not
acted upon.
Immediately after your adjourn
ment in March last, I renewed my
study of our system of assessment and
taxation and soon became convinced
that it was my official duty to insist
upon compliance with the revenue
laws CT the state by the officers in
trusted with their execution, and that
in so doing I would greatly benefit
the state Immediately, and in order
to divest the matter of any political
significance, called a meeting of the
state board of equalization and re-
quested the assistance of its members
in my proposed efforts to enforce the
law. My proposition was enthusias-
tically received and unanimously
agreed to, and although afterwards
and at time when backward step
would simply have resulted in untold
confusion some of the board regret
ted their action, still to the other
members in marked degree is due the
results that followed. All county Of
ficers connected with the .enforc ement
of the revenue laws were at once noti-
fled to act in strict accordance with
the statutes, and an honest attempt
was made by most of them to do So
Our efforts evoked bitter opposition
and strenuous attempts were put
forth by many of our citizens and
some of our newspapers to defeat the
reform and continue the old methods.
The result was that after the state
board of equalization had finished its
labors we had raised the assessment
roll of the state in round numbers
from 1927 100000 to $330.000,0O0 and
had advanced the assessed value of the
state to about 70 per cent of it's actual
value, with the certainty of reaching
the full cash value during the coming
year, and the intolerably high tax
rate prevailing has been greatly re-
duced.
Law Enforcement Shows Defects
"This great reform successfully car
ried out against the most bitter oppo-
sition that ever assailed public
| measure in our state, has, as I anti
eipated beforehand, brought fully out
the many absurdities, contradictions
| Inconsistencies and improvident pro
visions of our revenue laws. 1t has
been we'll said the best method of Sc
curing the repeal of an obnoxious law
is to strictly enforce it. l would add
that the most effective way of secur-
ing needed changes in the law is by
insistently upholding the law and thus
! informing the law makers of its de-
fects That our system is antiquated
and ineffective; that it must for the
benefit of our people be materially
changed in many respects; that radi-
cal changes must not only be made in
our revenue laws but amendments
also had to the constitution of the
state, before Idaho can be in accord
with the best methods of dealing with
the problems of taxation, has been
fully demonstrated during the year
| last past
| "While the condition of the taxa
ton question is not, perhaps, such as
to absolutely require legislative ac-
tion before the next regular session,
still past experience has taught us
that during a regular session of the
legislature so many different subjects
engross the attention of the members
that it is impossible to perfect in the
limited time of the session any gen
eral law of great magnitude unless
such law has been prepared before,
hand and carefully studied by the