The Huttig news., 1917-03-17


 pense is just begun when it is built. The quorum court should be re- quired to meet twice year. In December 1t should meet to inves- 1 tigate the probable revenue of the county for the next year and to provide for deficiencies if any
 Then, doing away with the coun- 1 ty assessor, let township assessors be appointed to make the assess ment, require him to visit the homes and require the property owner, not to value his property himself but to give fqll and cor rect inventory of his property to the assessor. Then let the asses sor do the assessing. In that way all property would be assessed equally. Do away with equaliza- tion board and let the quorum  court meet again, pass on the as sessments, hear the complaints of those who complain of their as easements, adjust the same, and then levy sufficient tax to- meet the estimate they have already made. In that way if the property assessment should be doubled the rate would automatically be cut in two. You would have no more taxes to pay then if your property were assessed at full value than if it were assessed at half value. The levy would only be made suf- ficient to meet the estimates al ready made and could not be more than sufficient to do that and there is no use trying to get along with less than it takes as we do today by going in debt all the time and hav- ing a high rate of taxation as well.
 Elections should be held only every four years. That would give lpeople time to rest from politics Officers should be made ineligible for reelection saving only judicial officers perhaps. Then they would not trim their sails to the political winds all the time and would at tend to their office as a matter of business regardless of fear or favor.
 Our supreme court should be in- creased to seven judges and pro- vision made that when our popula- tion reaches certain limits it could be increased to nine. Our supreme court judges are the hardest worked men in our state officers today. They work day and night and for very small salary.
 The old constitution was adopt ed when our population was one third as large as 1t is today, our wealth about one-sixth and our industry and business about one tenth. It provided for five judges which was ample for the first twen- ty-five years but has never been ample since because of the increase of work.
 Circuit judges should be elected as at present but. as in many of our states is the law today they should exchange circuits every year and no judge hold court in his own circuit more than one year any way during his term of office He would then know no political pulls or favorites and have no friends to reward or foes to pun ish Our circuit judges are all high minded, honorable and up- right men. No stain of dishonor has ever been laid at the door of one of them in the history of our state, but they are embarrassed and they would be more than hu- mdh if they were not, at times, un- consciously swayed by local in fuences and environment. The supreme court would assign to each judge his particular circuit for each and every year.
 The constitution should be so drawn as to ohviate the necessity for so much local legislation. Our legislature gets much abuse for in dulging in so much local legislation |