PRINCIPLES OF TAXATION. 



S9 



practically brouglit before them, is indicated by reference to the 

 following decisions : 



The Constitution of the State of Pennsylvania provides (Article IX, sec- 

 tion 1) that " all taxes shall be uniform upon the same class of subjects 

 within the territorial limits of the authority levying the tax, and shall be 

 levied and collected under general laws." In June, 1885, an act was passed 

 by the Legislature imposing a tax of three mills on the dollar on mortgages, 

 moneys loaned or invested in other States, money capital in the hands of 

 individual citizens, and other classes of property. The act did not extend 

 to corporations, which were taxed at a similar, in some cases at a higher 

 rate, under a statute of 1879. The act of 1885 was opposed on the ground 

 that it violated the constitutional rule of uniformity, but it was declared 

 valid by the Supreme Court of the State, which held that substantial uni- 

 formity had been obtained. 



A decision in New Jersey turned upon a constitutional jirovision that 

 " property shall be assessed for taxes vnider general laws and by uniform 

 rules, according to its true value." In 1884 the Legislature of the State 

 passed an " act for the taxation of railroads and canals," which imposed 

 a tax upon the lands and tangible property used by railroad and canal 

 companies and their franchises, and touching no other property. The 

 constitutionality of this law was questioned by most of the leading com- 

 panies, but was affirmed by the State Court of Errors and Appeals, which 

 held that as the law was a general one, framed in general terms and re- 

 stricted to no locality, it operated equally upon a whole class of property, 

 whose characteristics enabled it to be dealt with separately. The court 

 further declared, that as a previous act had secured the companies against 

 being required to pay more than their full share of tax, a substantial uni- 

 formity was thus secured. 



These and other like decisions of the State courts of the United 

 States show that in order to sustain a tax law under the require- 

 ment of generality or uniformity it is not necessary that all prop- 

 erty should be taxed, and that a State has the right to select prop- 

 erty for taxation at its discretion. Of course, discrimination may 

 result from the exercise by the State of the power of dividing the 

 objects of taxation into classes, but while persons of the same 

 class and property of the same kind are subjected to an equal 

 burden, the constitutional requirements as to uniformity seem to 

 be satisfied. 



The fourteenth amendment of the Constitution of the United 

 States, which prohibits any State from depriving any person of 

 property " without due process of law," is also in conformity with 

 the principle enunciated in the above citations ; for taxation 

 without jurisdiction, and therefore without the possibility of the 

 correlative return of any protection as compensation, would obvi- 

 ously be an arbitrary exaction and not due process of law. But 

 if property is otherwise (than by taxation) taken by the Govern- 

 ment (as by the so-called law of " eminent domain "), full and 

 fair pecuniary return must be made for its value. This is a prin- 



