swering voices give tongue until the swelling clamor filled the night with bedlam. When the group urge for vocal expression had been satisfied, the tumult would subside and the dark resume its wonted calm.

Fred Brown roomed on the top floor of Davidson's Block above Mead's drug store. One February

night he had been visiting in Thornton Hall and about midnight started to return home across the campus. Half way to his destination his attention was arrested by what he thought was smoke issuing from the roof of the Davidson building. After a moment he concluded it was some illusion of frost and continued on his way. But when he reached the sidewalk in front of the block it was all too clear that it was smoke and more; sparks and flame were distinctly visible. He looked about. No living thing was in sight. The silence and solitude were complete. He filled his lungs, threw back his head, and at the top of his voice shouted "Fire!" Again and again the cry rang through the astringent winter air. For a moment or two there was no response. Then a window flew up and an angry voice bellowed, "Go to bed, you drunken fool!" Other windows were raised and other voices joined the chorus, "Shut up, you're drunk!" "Go to sleep!" "Lock him up!" and advice of a similar tenor shattered the night air until the entire campus resounded with the hubbub. Meanwhile, the discoverer of danger, indifferent to satire and deaf to taunts, continued his endeavors to lift his own voice above the din and to arouse a stubbornly incredulous community to its peril. His frantic efforts only served to stimulate his detractors to new invention of epithet and more blatant shouts. His alarm increased.

The flames were rapidly approaching the room which sheltered his own lares and penates, such as they were, for it cannot truthfully be said that he ever devoted much attention to making his apartment other than an abode of Spartan simplicity. The situation rapidly became hopeless. The Dartmouth motto "Vox clamantis in deserto," adopted by Eleazer Wheelock when the greater part of New Hampshire and Vermont was shrouded in lonely leagues of green forest, was justifying a modern application; but the unheeded voice was crying not in a wilderness of silence, but in a wilderness of sound. At last, after ten minutes of uproar, someone divined that it was not all a joke and turned in an alarm. But the damage had been done. The building burned to the ground. More of the contents might have been salvaged had not those engaged in the work of rescue suddenly developed a refinement of taste hitherto unsuspected and paused overlong in Davidson's store making choice of articles of clothing of their own sizes and favorite designs before proceeding with their task. Legend has it that one deliberately tried on four pairs of

rubber boots and six Mackinaws before finding the proper sizes while the flames consumed the flooring at his very feet. To add to the excitement, two others, reported to be Ernest Martin Hopkins and Guy Ham, with great exertion and meticulous attempts to avoid scratches, dragged an upright piano to a third floor window and then dropped it crashing to the ground. In justice to the gentlemen named, it should be said that the report of their identity has never been confirmed. And it is probably safe to say that when Fred Brown again has a communication to make to the

citizens of Hanover, his words will be accorded a different reception than they received on that frosty midnight twenty-two years ago.

Doubtless it would be easy to justify the assertion that no New Hampshire chief executive has conIcluded his term of office without having errors of omission or commission justly charged against him. Some bold statistician has figured that if you are right three times out of five in solving the ordinary problems of life you are entitled to a place in the ranks of the truly great. How should we rate a governor then who maintains this average the while he grapples with questions infinitely more perplexing and about which too frequently the blind, unreasoning, relentless partisans are ranged in two great hordes? And yet how often that average is exceeded. The new governor will not prove infallible. Certain it is to those who

know him that he would be the last to claim infallibility. But it is equally sure that the sanity of mind which enables him to see things in their true perspective will not permit him to go far astray.

Already the misanthropes are crying trouble because it happens that a majority of the governor's council which, under our constitution, forms an integral part of the executive branch of the government are of Republican faith. May I be pardoned for venturing into the field of pro

phecy. The Jeremiahs will be disappointed. The members of the council are not unknown quantities. They are all men of ability who have had wide experience in public affairs and who enjoy the confidence of their fellow citizens to an unusual degree. There has never been a circumstance in their public careers which would justify the inference that they would resort to narrowly partisan or obstructive tactics in an effort to gain some petty personal or political advantage. Differences of opinion will undoubtedly arise; but they will be honest differences of opinion which will be composed on both sides in a spirit of mutual toleration and co-operation. They will be confronted by difficult and urgent problems. Instead of wasting time and effort in dissension, there will be a concerted effort to give to New Hampshire the best administration of which they are capable.

And now one suggestion to the councilors. Some day when you are gathered in the high-vaulted council chamber under the benign gaze of those old governors who look down upon you from its walls, and the pressure of business relaxes so that you have an idle hour upon your hands, persuade this new governor to tell you tales drawn from his experiences on the diamond, in the courts and the political arena. For he is a raconteur of parts.

T

HE most important and difficult question before the coming legislature is the question of taxation. Taxation has always been and always will be a continual problem, but in New Hampshire today it is particularly acute. All students of our state tax system have long realized that our system of taxation is antiquated, and entirely inadequate for modern conditions. Moreover, the tremendous increase in recent years in the amount of money raised for public purposes has made the inequalities of that system especially burdensome. The causes of the inequalities are two. First, the unequal assessment of property subject to taxation. Second, the large amount of wealth which escapes any contribution to the public expenditures. Of these two causes, the second is by far the more important. Eighty per cent. of all the taxes in the state are raised from real estate which includes, of course, buildings and improvements. The balance of twenty per cent. is largely covered by taxes on live stock, stock in trade, automobiles, and savings bank tax.

The wealth of the state represented by investments in securities, stocks, bonds, and notes contributes practically nothing. This amount of wealth has been estimated at anywhere from $500,000,000 to $1,000,000,000. It undoubtedly exceeds the total amount of all taxable wealth, which is between $500,000000 and $600,000,000. Stock with the exception of that of national banks is not taxable at all in any form. Bonds and notes are taxed as property at the going rate of

taxation and at their full face value. This method of taxation is clearly confiscatory. A thousand dollar railroad bond paying five per cent. interest or fifty dollars per year is assessed for one thousand dollars, and at the average rate of taxation for the state of $2.50 per hundred would pay a tax of $25 per year, or fifty per cent. of the income. The result of this method of taxation is to force people to sell their bonds. or evade the tax.

The only class of investments which make substantial contribution are savings bank deposits. Savings banks pay annually three quarters of one per cent. on the amounts of all deposits, excluding the amount loaned out on New Hampshire real estate at five per cent. or less. This in effect is a tax upon depositors, since all savings banks by law are mutual companies not operating for profit. The state tax merely reduces by that amount the interest payable to depositors. This tax is equal to fifteen per cent. of the income from savings bank depositors. This is a very burdensome unjust tax levied upon a class of people least able to pay.

It will be obvious that this system of taxation is particularly burdensome to real estate, and especially to certain forms of real estate, farms, and small homes, and city and village property. Moreover such property is generally more highly assessed than any other class. of property, because it is held in small units, frequently changes hands, its market value is easily ascertained.

Briefly stated, the problem is to find new sources of revenue. Such

increased revenue, of course, must be used to afford relief from the unjust burden now laid upon real estate, live stock and other forms of tangible property, and not merely to encourage increased expenditures. This is a difficult problem. under any circumstances. In New Hampshire it is further complicated by the restrictions laid upon the legislature by the Supreme Court in its construction of the taxing power given the legislature in our constitution. Some brief statement of the history of our taxation and the interpretation of the constitution is necessary to an understanding of the difficulties of the problem.

In the main, our system of taxation is that adopted when the state was founded more than one hundred and twenty-five years ago. In those primitive times real estate, live stock and stock in trade covered practically all the wealth of the state, and that system was just. adequate, and a fairly accurate measure of the ability of men to pay.

In the grant of power to the legislature to levy taxes, the constitution provides that the "taxes must be reasonable and proportional." In its earliest decisions, the Supreme Court took the position that "proportional" required all property to be treated alike. Any property or class of property might be exempted entirely from taxation, but if taxed, must be taxed by the same uniform method. This rule of uniformity of treatment was a sound rule applied to primitive conditions when property was more or less uniform. Under our modern developments of property such a rule is senseless and is entirely responsible for our present unjust, unreasonable distribution of the tax burdens.

by the Court there is no way by which the class of wealth represented by investments, salaries, professional earnings can be reached. The only method of dealing with this kind of property or income is on the basis of an income tax. Such a tax has generally been supposed to be contrary to the constitution, although the Supeme Court in its last opinion, indicated that it might be still an open question. The constitutional convention of 1912 and the last constitutional convention both submitted to the people amendments giving power to the legislature to impose income taxes. Both times these amendments failed to receive the necessary two-thirds majority.

Consequently there will be two different questions before the coming legislature. First, what action can it take under the constitution as it is to-day? Second, what steps can be taken to secure the necessary changes in the constitution?

Unfortunately, there is little that the legislature can do under the present constitution, and even some of these proposals are subject to constitutional doubt.

There are three changes in our present tax law which have been suggested. First, a different distribution of the railroad tax. At present one fourth of the railroad tax is distributed to towns and cities where railroad property is located. The remaining three fourths is distributed first to the communities in which stockholders reside, the balance, representing foreign stockholders and stocks held by trustees or institutions, is retained by the state. Since railroad stock is not taxed nor taxable, there is neither logic nor justice in distributing part of this tax to communities where stockholders reside. This

by the state.

distribution is a benefit to a few cities and towns and is unjust to the rest of the state. It is proposed that hereafter the three fourths of the railroad tax should be entirely retained by the state. This will This will increase the state revenue by about $125,000 a year, and will make possible a corresponding reduction in the direct state tax.

It is also proposed to increase substantially the rates of taxation upon collateral and direct inherit ances. The rates in New Hampshire are lower than those in other states and the amount of revenue derived by the state could be about doubled without hardship and without making our rates out of line with other eastern states. Here again, though, there is a constitutional question involved. While the constitution expressly gives the legislature power to levy inheritance taxes, it is held by some lawyers that this general power does not include power to levy graded taxes, with higher rates upon the larger estates. Our direct inheritance tax has exemptions and is graded. So far the question has not been tried out as to whether or not this present graded tax is constitutional. Undoubtedly an increase in the rates would bring about a trial on this question.

A large part of the increase in taxation is due to the maintenance of our highways. We now secure from automobiles a larger revenue per automobile than any other state in the Union. It is proposed to reduce somewhat the present tax on automobiles and levy a tax upon gasoline. This tax would be levied upon the wholesale companies selling gasoline in New Hampshire, and eventually, of course, would be borne by the users of gasoline. Many states have adopt

ed a gasoline tax. Obviously it is a much fairer way of distributing part of the burden of the maintenance of the highways. Moreover it would secure a much larger contribution from out-of-the-state cars, which use our highways. This proposal has received general public approval. However, here again, a constitutional question is involved. Undoubtedly, such a law, if passed, would be questioned, and carried to the Supreme Court. In view of some of the decisions of the Court in the past, it is extremely doubtful what the action of the Court would be.

the

These three measures, if adopted and upheld by the Court, would probably add to the state revenue in the vicinity of $1,000,000. While it is desirable to secure this additional revenue if possible, it would go but a small way towards giving the necessary relief to real estate and other tangible property. Obviously, no substantial relief can be afforded except by securing a reasonable contribution from owners of securities, stocks, bonds, and so-called intangibles. It has been suggested that even without constitutional amendments some revenue could be derived from this class of wealth. In Governor Spaulding's administration, the Supreme Court handed down an opinion stating that the income from stocks, bonds, and money at interest might be taxed as local property and at the local rate. Such a tax would be entirely inadequate from the point of view of revenue, and it is extremely doubtful if it is worth the attempt.

What can the coming legislature do to bring about the removal of the constitutional limitations which now prevent the adoption of just and reasonable tax laws? There