80 Canadian Forestry Journal. 



"Under the eommon practice of intrusting to local oflficers 

 the levying of taxes upon real estate, forests are assessed, almost 

 without exception, on the basis of agricultural land; that is, the 

 land is estimated to have a certain value if cleared, and the stand- 

 ing timber is worth so much more, or is viewed as an incumbrance. 

 The latter case is by no means rare in hardwood sections. In 

 many instances, perhaps in most, the assessment is fair so far as 

 the value of the property is concerned. In many others it is far 

 too high, because the land is not fit for farming, and therefore 

 valueless, except to grow trees. At the same time, the timber 

 often has only a potential value, since it can not be marketed for 

 want of roads or some other temporary unreadiness. The 

 argument is entirely apart from the admitted inability of many 

 of the assessors to truly value woodlands, and who therefore 

 resort to guessing, and from the quite general belief that in cases 

 where the owner is a corporation or a non-resident with no local 

 interests, the property may be taxed to the limit. These things 

 are not to be avoided' under any system. In short, whether the 

 assessment be made fairly or unfairly, the forest is considered a 

 form of property which should be realized on at the earliest 

 possible moment and the more it can be made to yield to the 

 county, prior to its extinction, the better for the county. 



"One can easily understand the temptation that confronts 

 the assessors in regions where everything is wanted — roads, 

 schools, pubUc buildings — to use the taxing power for present 

 advantage, yet instances are plenty of communities established 

 on the returns from forest property and utterly abandoned as 

 soon as the original timber was all cut. The few farms that had 

 been taken could not keep up the roads and other public works. 



"But the wisdom or unwisdom of raising a revenue once for 

 all upon forests is only a small part of the question. The forest 

 land is not farm land uncleared, and a forest is not the crop of a 

 season. The problem concerns itself chiefly with those areas 

 which in their nature are fit only for tree growth, and with a crop 

 representing the accumulated investment of the owner for as 

 many years as were required to bring the trees to maturity. If 

 a man buy a mature forest, he acquires the investment of another; 

 if he plants or waits for a natural one to grow, he gets no return 

 for many years. In either case, his forest serves the public by 

 providing a common necessity — wood — and by the beneficent 

 influences that it gives freely. 



"These considerations make it apparent that the forests 

 occupy, or should occupy, a separate place on the tax list; that 

 they need to be treated differently from farms and town lots and 

 mines. In fact, it will be necessary to show that growing trees 

 should be considered personal property, not real estate, as they 

 are now by practice or by law invirtually every state in the Union. 



