12 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ceived any higher consideration from the public than that of being 

 denounced and laughed at. And most naturally; for what woman 

 would tell her age or the amount and value of her jewelry and 

 finery, and more especially to a stranger invested with brief official 

 authority as an inquisitor and assessor? 



Again, a very large part of what is termed " personal property " 

 is, through the necessities, policy, -or organization of governments, 

 made exempt from taxation; as, for example, all instrumentalities 

 and property of a government — national, State, or municipal — espe- 

 cially the bonds, notes, currency, and certificates of indebtedness 

 issued by the United States. The several States also generally 

 exempt or lightly tax the deposits and surplus of savings banks, the 

 accumulations of mutual insurance companies, the property of char- 

 itable, religious, or educational organizations, and also a compara- 

 tively small amount — but large in the aggregate — of personal prop- 

 erty in the form of household furniture, clothing, working tools, vehi- 

 cles, and animals, and the produce of farms not sold but consumed 

 by the producers; and that the present tendency of State legislation 

 is furthermore to continually enlarge the list of exempt property. 

 The aggregate money value of such exemptions can not be accurately 

 stated, but there is reason to believe that they include about one 

 fifth of all the personal property of the United States.* 



Taxation of the Instrumentalities of Commerce. — Exten- 

 sive as has been the foregoing review of the inherent difficulties 

 attendant on the attempt to equitably and efficiently tax personal 

 property, the results of taxing the instrumentalities or objects of 

 commerce are especially worthy of additional notice in this con- 

 nection. 



A little reflection ought to abundantly satisfy that to tax the 

 instrumentalities or objects of commerce in one locality, and to 

 exempt the same from all direct taxation in another, will clearly not 

 permit the former to enter a common market on an equal basis for 

 competition with the latter. And yet this unjust discrimination is 

 exactly what does result from the attempt of a majority of the 

 States of the Federal Union to tax all such instrumentalities or 



* The New Jersey State Board of Taxation, in their annual report for 1895, call atten- 

 tion to the fact that, out of the total amount of assessed property in that State in 1894, 

 nearly ten per cent, or $72,786, 5*71, was exempt from taxation. The amount of tax exemp- 

 tions in Newark, N. J. (a city which within recent years has been nearly bankrupt by 

 excessive indebtedness and taxation), is reported for 1897 at $18,076,568, made up in part 

 as follows: Churches, $4,081,750; private schools, $196,900; city property, $4,924,950; 

 cemeteries, $893,800; charitable institutions, $1,231,700; public parks, $4,654,867. Sol- 

 diers' and sailors' widows have exemption to the amount of $523,675 ; firemen, $79,445 ; 

 the National Guard, $36,475. These figures do not include the railroad exemptions, which 

 are under the charge of the State Tax Commissioners. 



