choice of members of the city government. The poll-tax being limited to two dollars, the voter who has nothing else to pay, does not feel the burden of his vote for a new town hall, or a costly school-house, or public park, and may decide the question of such expenditures quite contrary to the judgment or the wish of those who must pay the taxes necessary thereto. If he is a laborer, the very vote which puts a new mortgage on his neighbor's farm, or factory, or dwelling-house, may give him employment, with the best of wages and a sure paymaster.

The value of a direct pecuniary stake on the part of every voter in the amount of appropriations voted, as a means of enforcing that economy in expenditure which alone can secure what all economists agree is the best tax, "that which is least in amount," was recognized in that provision of our law which declares that the assessors shall assess upon the polls, as nearly as may be, one-sixth part of the whole sum to be raised.

In the ideal New England community, where each voter and tax-payer was the head of a family, had a "settling lot" equal in area and value to that of his neighbor, an equal share in the common lands, and a pew in the meeting-house, perhaps the whole tax might have been justly and proportionably levied as a capitation, or poll-tax, while no great inequality was produced in raising the whole one-sixth of the tax in this manner, even after the people had departed quite extensively from the earlier New England type. But changes wrought by the growth Anc. L. and Ch. of villages and cities, and the increase of trade and manu- 1828, 143, § 8. factures, made so much difference in the abilities of citi- R. S. c. 7, § 27. zens to contribute to the public charges, that it became 1862, 158. necessary to limit the tax to one dollar and fifty cents, and again, in 1862, to two dollars.

How far short the tax falls, at this limit, from the onesixth of the whole tax raised, will be seen from the following figures:

p. 70, c. 21, § 3.

1830, 151, § 2.

1859, 157.

A very large proportion, nearly one-half, of the polls of the Commonwealth is embraced in its cities, the figures for 1873 being as follows:

No. of polls in Whole number of polls in the state,

state.

408,131

197,687

210,444

In our largest city the whole number of polls assessed in 1874 was 84,684, of whom 66,415, or over 78 per cent., were assessed on polls only. Undoubtedly, the proportion of voters who pay only a poll-tax is liable, in many places, to be so large, that some general provision is highly desirable for impressing them with a sense of direct pecuniary responsibility for their votes. While the voter in a city cannot throw his ballot directly for or against any certain scheme, yet his power to elect or reject the city officers by whom appropriations are ordered, is hardly inferior to the direct vote cast by a citizen of a town; and there would seem to be the same propriety and advantage in making each feel and bear a certain share of the burdens which great expenditures impose. How many loans of municipal credit have been voted to railroads, which would have been withheld, had the voters who favored them known that their taxes would thereby be increased! Extravagance is as likely to result from careless power over one's neighbor's purse, as is economy likely to follow the necessity of caring for one's own.

Two methods have been proposed for the end desired. The first is to rate the poll-tax at a certain valuation in making up the assessment. Under this method, the per

son now taxable for his poll, merely, would be entered on the lists at a fixed sum, say $200 or $300, which sum would be carried into the valuation, and on which a tax would be assessed, when the rate should be determined, equal to the amount assessed upon the same amount of real or personal property. This tax would then vary with the rate,—each fresh expenditure swelling its amount. If the assumed valuation were $200, and the rate $10 per thousand, the tax would equal the present maximum poll tax. If the rate were $15 per thousand, it would be $3; if $20 per thousand, $4, and so on. In Monroe, which has the highest rate this year, $41, the poll tax would be $8.20, while in Nahant, with a rate of $5, it would be $1. Whether this would be a just tax in Monroe may be doubted.

The difficulties in this plan seem to be,—

First. The different standards of valuation in the diferent towns would make it difficult to determine upon an assumed valuation for the poll, which should work substantially equal results throughout the state.

Second. The presence in the valuations of the several cities and towns of these assumed valuations set upon polls, but representing no actual property, would disturb the equalization of the state tax.

Third. There are tax-payers who would be slow to understand the system, and, failing to comprehend it, would not recognize its justice. When the collector presented the tax bill, or they examined the valuation lists and found themselves taxed upon a valuation of two hundred dollars, or any other sum, they would insist that they had no such amount of property, and were therefore entitled to an abatement.

The other system, suggested by the assessors of Marblehead, makes the minimum poll-tax two dollars, and provides that, when the amount of a town tax to be assessed exceeds one per cent. of the valuation of the previous year, the poll tax shall be increased twenty-five per cent., or to two dollars and fifty cents. When the amount to be

raised equals or exceeds one and one-half per cent. of the valuation of the previous year, the poll-tax shall be increased fifty per cent., or to three dollars; and when the amount to be raised equals or exceeds two per cent. of the valuation of the previous year, the poll-tax shall be doubled, that is, raised to four dollars.

Under this plan there would be four rates or grades of poll-taxes, two dollars, two dollars and fifty cents, three dollars and four dollars,-depending upon the proportion which the money voted to be raised bears to the last ascertained valuation of the town. The voter who paid a poll-tax only, would then have a plain and obvious pecuniary interest in keeping down expenditures.

There may, perhaps, be some question whether both of these schemes are not open to criticism, as being contrary to the provision of the constitution respecting "proportional and reasonable assessments." The point is, whether the assessment of an inhabitant upon his poll, at an assumed valuation, in the one case, and, in the other, at a sum determined by the proportion which the amount to be raised bears, not to the whole taxable estates which are to share the burden, but to the valuation of the previous year, is "proportional" in the sense of the constitution.

But it is difficult to see how either of the proposed plans is more open to this objection than the system now in vogue, and which, in substance, has always been in use in the state, both before and after the adoption of the constitution.

A brief glance at the history of the tax in the state will show that the legislature have been in the habit of fixing the poll-tax at an arbitrary sum, or not to exceed an arbitrary limit, either year by year or by general acts.

The rules for assessment and exemption of persons and estates were formerly set down in the several yearly acts granting taxes; and the general direction to assessors, found in chapter 50 of the acts of 1785, section 1, for the assessment of the state tax, is :

"And the assessors so chosen and sworn, shall assess the polls of, and estates within such town or district, their due proportion of any tax, according to the rules set down in the act for raising the same, and make perfect lists thereof,” etc.

i

The manner of apportioning and assessing town, county and other rates is thus prescribed in section eight of the same act:

1 General Laws

of Mass. ed. of

1823, p. 217.

"Sect. 8. And be it further enacted, That all county, town, Ib. p. 221–2, district, precinct, plantation and parish rates and taxes shall be assessed and apportioned by the assessors of the several towns, districts, plantations, precincts and parishes within this Commonwealth, upon the polls of, and estates within the same, according to the rules that shall, from time to time, be prescribed and set, in and by the then last tax-act of the general court; and such assessors shall cause attested copies," etc., etc.

In 1812 and 1813 the poll-tax was twenty-seven cents, with a proviso that it should not exceed one-third part of the whole tax. From 1813 to 1822 it was fourteen cents, with proviso that it should not exceed one-sixth of the whole. This, of course, must be understood to be the poll-tax ordered as part of the state tax; and the several tax acts directed that, "in the assessment of all county, town, parish, or society taxes, the assessors . . shall assess the polls therein in the same proportion as they may be assessed to pay a state tax." But no poll-tax should be more than one-third or one-sixth of the whole.

In 1829, by the act known as chapter 143 of the year 1828, many matters of assessment were regulated by perpetual act; and, by section three, the assessors were required to assess one-sixth of all taxes upon polls, with a proviso that the whole amount of poll-taxes on any person in any one year, for city, town and county purposes, highway taxes excepted, should not exceed one dollar and fifty

cents.

The act of 1859, chapter 157, confined the exception relating to highway taxes to those separately assessed.