Civil Government in the United States Considered with - Some Reference to Its Origins by John Fiske
page 69 of 467 (14%)
page 69 of 467 (14%)
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their town to render a true statement as to their property. The most
approved form is for the assessors to send by mail to each taxable inhabitant a printed list of questions, with blank spaces which he is to fill with written answers. The questions relate to every kind of property, and when the person addressed returns the list to the assessors he must make oath that to the best of his knowledge and belief his answers are true. He thus becomes liable to the penalties for perjury if he can be proved to have sworn falsely. A reasonable time--usually six or eight weeks--is allowed for the list to be returned to the assessors. If any one fails to return his list by the specified time, the assessors must make their own estimate of the probable amount of his property. If their estimate is too high, he may petition the assessors to have the error corrected, but in many cases it may prove troublesome to effect this. [Sidenote: Cheating the government.] Observe here an important difference between the imposition of taxes upon real estate and upon personal property. Houses and lands cannot run away or be tucked out of sight. Their value, too, is something of which the assessors can very likely judge as well as the owner. Deception is therefore extremely difficult, and taxation for real estate is pretty fairly distributed among the different owners. With regard to personal estate it is very different. It is comparatively easy to conceal one's ownership of some kinds of personal property, or to understate one's income. Hence the temptation to lessen the burden of the tax bill by making false statements is considerable, and doubtless a good deal of deception is practised. There are many people who are too honest to cheat individuals, but still consider it a venial sin to cheat the government. |
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