108 THE COMMISSION OF INQUIRY, 



of the Tax Commission, to raise the assessments of these lands, in 

 these counties, good as were the intentions, seem absurd, especially in 

 view of the following: 



If we take sixteen of our north counties of the southern, and twelve 

 counties of the Northern Peninsula (leaving out Keweenaw, Houghton 

 and Marquette as pre-eminently mining counties), we have an area of 

 14,500.000 acres, making up about 40% of the entire "State, of which 

 fully 96% is unimproved land, and nearly 90% is not taken up for set- 

 tlement. This large portion of the State, according to the report of 

 the Tax Commission, had in 1905 a total assessed valuation of $67,- 

 000,000, while the State on the whole had $1,574,000,000 worth of prop- 

 erty, so that this 40% of the land area of the State represented less 

 than 5% of the total assessed value. From this it is evident that the 

 taxation of the State on the whole is not materially afiEected by any 

 changes which the legislature may see fit to make regarding the'taxa- 

 tion of property, such as forests in these north counties. 



The case where the, local paper of a county received more money for 

 advertising- delinquent lands than the county paid in the form of State 

 taxes, has occurred and apparently exists today. 



Recurring to the homestead lands, that is, those lands which have 

 been deeded by the Auditor General to the State and which have then 

 been sold or granted as homesteads,, we wish to add : 



The examinations of the special examiners have developed the fact 

 that pvactically all homesteads in the northern tiers of counties 

 have been taken for their timber values only and 'that after this timber 

 has been removed or sold, the lands are practically invariably allowed 

 to revert for taxes and abandoned'. That the supervision in this branch 

 of the homestead business is extremely lax is shown by such homesteads 

 as were granted, for instance, to Lewis F. Pitz, John G. McNabb, Wm. 

 H. Cunningham and others. In the case of the Pitz homestead, it is 

 clear that the law was never complied with. The only building that was 

 erected on this land was a small hut about ten feet square, and, although 

 it was clearly evident that no home was intended, a deed was given 

 Nov. 13, 1902. 



In the case of McNabb, he did not even take the trouble to build a 

 house of any description, but was apparently able to use a small shanty, 

 which had remained on the land from the time that the original pine 

 was lumbered, as a basis for proving up, and the State evidently deemed 

 this suflflcient. Immediately after receiving a deed from the State, he 

 sold his homestead to saw mill men, and it is almost needless to say 

 that the place is now deserted. 



That these abandonments are to be expected in certain sections, is 

 clearly shown by the report of the ^oil conditions. In the hard wood 

 district the soil conditions are generally good and the experience shows 

 that when a homestead is taken up in such a district, it is usually main- 

 tained. In the northern pinery lands, where soil conditions are quite 

 poor, the abandonments are more frequent, and in the Jack pine plains, 

 where the soil is always poor, the lands are never taken for any other 

 purpose than for the timber, or under a misconception of their value 

 for farming and in the latter case the low price at which these lands 

 are sold frequently proves attractive. 



However, if a minimum price of $5.00 per acre, or more, had been 



