SO MISC. PUBLICATION 218, U. 8. DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE 
the laws provide for assessment at 60 percent of the full value, in 
Minnesota 33% percent (for the class to which forest property belongs), 
in Montana 30 percent (for the class to which forest property belongs), 
in North Dakota 75 percent, in Vermont 1 percent, and in Wash- 
ington 50 percent (38, pp. 153-161; 50). In Arkansas the State tax 
commission is authorized to file with the assessors annually a cer- 
tificate showing percentage of market value to be used in assessment. 
These are the only exceptions to the rule that 100 percent of rural 
real estate value is by law the value to which the tax rate must be 
applied. And even in those States which are the exceptions, it is, as 
noted above, the duty of the assessor to find first the full value and 
then apply the legal percent. 
ORIGINAL ASSESSMENT 
ORGANIZATION 
ASSESSMENT DISTRICT 
The process of assessment is prescribed by the constitutions and 
laws of the several States. These provide for assessors and for some 
method of review of the acts of these assessors. Each State is divided 
into assessment districts, within which one assessor or board of 
assessors is responsible for the valuation of all property not exempt 
by law from the property tax or not assessed by a State board. Public 
utilities are generally assessed by a State board, and mines are some- 
times so assessed. 
In the New England States, in New York, Pennsylvania, and New 
Jersey, and in the North Central States of Michigan, Wisconsin, 
Indiana, Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, North Dakota, South 
Dakota, Nebraska, and Kansas, the town or township is the assess- 
ment district. In some of the above-mentioned North Central 
States there are county officials who supervi-e the township assess- 
ments. In Maine the northern part of the State is without town 
organization and is constituted a single assessment district in which 
the assessment is made directly by State officials. In New Hampshire 
and Vermont certain unorganized towns are likewise assessed by 
State officials. In 28 States, including all of the Pacific and Rocky 
Mountain States (excepting in the two Washington counties which 
have township organizations), and in all of the Southern States, the 
assessment district or unit is the county, although in a number of 
States where the county is the legal unit the work of assessment is 
actually done by townships (38, pp. 163-161, 147-152; 60). 
Where the township is the assessment district, the boundaries are 
sometimes so chosen as to include a large area of uninhabited forest 
region. As much as 600 square miles are assessed annually by one 
of the township supervisors in Michigan, whereas the ordinary 
township is only some 36 square miles in area. 
In Michigan incorporated villages are assessment districts of 
themselves, overlapping and included within the township assess- 
ment district. As a result, village property is subject to two inde- 
pendent assessments—upon one is applied the village tax rate, and 
upon the other the combined State, county, township, and school- 
district tax rate (83, Rept. 16, p. 8). In Connecticut 2 of the cities 
and 2 of the boroughs, not consolidated with towns within which they 
are located, are assessment districts, making assessments entirely 
