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Farm Bureau 

 Wins Tax 



- - ■ : I 



Equalization 



FARM BUREAU TAX COMMITTEE AND FARM ADVISER 

 Left to right, seated: E. C. Bardelmeier. Stanly Castle, Geo. C. 

 RinkeL- standing, T. W. May, iaim adviser. 



The Story of 

 Madison County 

 Farmers Struggle 

 For Tax Equality 



V ^y OWN in Madison county farm- 

 ^^1 ers are singing the praises of 



_ f y the Farnn Bureau these days. 

 For it is tax-paying time and rural prop- 

 erty owners arc reaping the fruits of more 

 than two years' persistent effort by Farm 

 Bureau members and their leaders to 

 wipe out glaring inequalities in the tax 

 burden. 



To be specific, the Madison County 

 Board of Review late last year cut farm 

 land assessments a total of $3,608,655. 

 It meant a saving — a very substantial 

 saving which we presently shall see — to 

 practically all the landowners of the coun- 

 ty. The story of how all this was brought 

 about comprises a shining and glorious 

 chapter in the history of Farm Bureau 

 achievement in Illinois. 



Suppose you discovered one day that 

 you had been paying taxes on an as- 

 sessment approximating 75 per cent of 

 the fair cash value of your land while 

 your neighbors in the near-by cities and 

 villages were getting by with an assess- 

 ment of only 35 per cent; all this in 

 spite of the fact that the state constitution 

 provides specifically that all property 

 within the state shall be taxed in propor- 

 tion to its value. 



The easy and natural thing to do would 

 be to kick about it to your neighbor, your 

 storekeeper, the elevator man and anyone 

 else you happened to meet. And that's 

 about as far as individual, unorganized 

 complaint would get. 



MISS FLORENCE JOHNSON 

 "Approximately 1000 property tronsiers were checked and com- 

 pared with their assessed valuations." 



But suppose you and your neighbors 

 had organized, set up township and coun- 

 ty committees, selected your leaders, 

 fought shoulder to shoulder behind them, 

 and won a great victory.' You would 

 probably feel like throwing your hats in 

 the air and giving three rousing cheers. 



This was and is the situation in Madi- 

 son county today. The fact that Madison 

 county is overwhelmingly industrial, 

 with the city population out-numbering 

 the farmers more than ten to one, makes 

 the accomplishment of the Farm Bureau 

 all the more notable. 



If you ask T. W. May, the Madison 

 county farm adviser, just who, in Madi- 

 son county, should have the most credit 

 for the successful conclusion of the tax 

 fight, he will say: "Stanly Castle of Al- 

 ton and his Tax Committee." 



And if you ask Stanly Castle, he will 

 tell you that it was the loyal support of 



the 22 township Farm Bureau tax com- 

 mittees and the entire Farm Bureau mem- 

 bership, along with the backing of the 

 lAA, its president, Mr. Earl C. Smith, 

 and its tax director, Mr. John C. Watson, 

 that made everjthing possible. 



"Our fight for tax equalization shows 

 the value of organization," said Mr. 

 Castle. "We couldn't have accomplished 

 anything without it." 



The average reduction in the assessed 

 valuation in the county was 28 per cent 

 and the cuts range from 10 to 41 per 

 cent per township. Each township was 

 given a different reduction so as to secure 

 better equalization between townships 

 and to give the reduction where it was 

 justified and needed. A preliminary 

 check-up among farm taxpayers, after tax 

 bills were out, showed that the first 357 

 farmers to reply secured an average re- 

 duction in taxes of $19.83 per farm. On 

 many farms the saving was several times 



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L A. A. RECORD 



