USA > Rhode Island > Providence County > Providence > State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations at the end of the century : a history, Volume 3 > Part 20
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In 1679 also the assembly passed a law imposing a fine of £10 upon towns that were delinquent in levying taxes and added that sum to the town's proportion of the tax. If they still failed to act, the law empowered the governor or deputy-governor and their assistants to appoint "five honest persons to levy and proportion the rates". This law marks a new departure in the legal aspects of taxation. Pre- viously the state had subjected only delinquent individual taxpayers to fines. It now subjected towns to penalties for failure to comply with its orders to assess a tax. It thereby elearly recognized the eorporate town as a legal individual and as a part of its own legal machinery. The passage of this general law empowering the governor to appoint tax assessors also relieved the legislature of the necessity of repeated action in regard to delinquent towns, and very properly shifted the supervision of them from the legislative department to the administra- tive department-the governor and assistants. In 1682, if the tax as- sessors thus appointed neglected their duty, they were made liable for the whole town tax, ineluding the £10 fine and all costs of enforeing
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the penalty upon themselves. Soon also the varied custom of pay- ment by the taxpayer directly to the creditor of the colony or town or to the general treasurer, or to the town treasurer to be by him account- ed for to the colonial government, or to a specially appointed commit- tee, was abandoned, and in 1684 the constable, a locally elected official who with the sergeant had acted only in case of delinquents, became the regular tax collector, to whom all payments were made. In the same year it was also enacted that "if any person in any [ of] the respective towns, have ought due to him, from the collony and desire to be paid either out of his own rate and the rate assessed in the town where he dwells", he was to secure the magistrate's approval of his account and the constable was to "discount and offset so much."
Thus in 1684 the question of the selection of the official tax machin- ery, which had involved the fundamental question of home rule, was settled by a partial compromise. In ordinary cases the localities were free to select their own tax officials and thus local autonomy was preserved, yet in the last analysis the supremacy of the central govern- ment was maintained in its recognized authority to levy reasonable taxes in the same way that it passed other laws, and in cases of neces- sity, when the towns neglected or refused to act, to supervise the assessment and collection of its levies by officials of its own selection. At the time this arrangement seemed as reasonable as any that could have been devised, but the concessions then made to localism contained within them the seeds of future difficulty. Such difficulties could only develop as methods of valuation became important.
As questions relating to the selection of tax officials approached their final solution, methods of valuation had already become important topics of the general subject of taxation. Our discussion therefore naturally shifts to them.
The year 1680 was approximately a turning point in early Rhode Island history. It marked the end of the period during which the new form of democratic government may be said to have been on trial ; it marked the time when the contest between localism and centraliza- tion ended in the practical establishment of the latter. The Indian war of 1675-76 had exterminated the hostile natives, and the king in 1679 confirmed to Rhode Island jurisdiction the whole southwestern portion of the colony which Connecticut had claimed, and as his decision was based largely upon priority of purchase from the Indians, all land titles thereby acquired a degree of certainty not before pos- sessed. Thus the mainland portions of the colony were on the eve of a new economic and governmental development.
In the earlier years of the settlements when all property was com- prised in the crude and tangible forms of an agricultural people, every citizen could know the wealth of his companion. Self-assessment and self-valuation would be likely to result in equity. As late as 1650 both
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Providenee and Portsmouth levied taxes on livestoek only. They next taxed lands and cattle, and as late as 1679 these two forms of wealth comprised the total ratable estates of Providence. In Portsmouth in 1687 the list of taxable property included only "Inelosed Lands, Cat- tell, horskind, Sheep and Swine above one year old". In Newport, as we have already noticed, taxes were assessed aeeording to both "strength and estates", and it is probable that here the taxable valua- tion of "strength and cstate" began to be based on other forms of property than lands and cattle. That taxable wealth was not confined to land and livestock elsewhere we know from a list of personalty which the assembly ordered to be inventoried in Westerly in 1671. Personal estate included "houses, household stuffs, goods, eattle, horsekinde or any other chattels whatsoever". Until 1673 the colony left all matters of valuation to the towns, and it had been the eustom to set a fixed value upon all kinds of property, live stock being valued aeeording to age at so mueh per lead, from £2 to £4 each for a horse or cow, 6d. to 4s. for swine and goats, and meadow and planting land at £3 to £4 per acre. . At other times a specifie tax was levied on specific forms of property, varying according to the amount required to be raised from 1d. to 6d. on each four year old ox or two year old horse, and about the same rate per acre of arable land. The method was reasonably equitable and simple in operation. The lack of equity lay not between individuals of the same town, but, owing to the method of apportionment of state taxes among the towns by guesswork, be- tween individuals of different towns.
In the year 1672 the " Assembly considering the great dissatisfaction and irregularity that hath been by makinge rates or raisinge a common stock for public charges and the necessity there is for public charge to be borne and the justice it should be done according to equity in estate and strength", passed a law directing that every one should be in- formed when a rate was made and should be required to make a true valuation of "theire estate and strength, every thing that is any estate to them be valued which they are not rated for to another place". Estates were to be valued according as they would "be worth to pay debt in old England", i. e. about one-half of the local value, and taxes were to be paid in country pay.
The tax law of 1672, however, besides fixing property values for purposes of taxation at fifty per cent. of its sale value and requiring an individual and personal valuation, directed that taxes should be laid on this valuation at so much in the pound. The aet was, therefore, complicated and permitted evasions. Only one tax seems to have been assessed under it. But some months afterward, "under severall pretenees few or none paid", and the towns were compelled to nominate two men each to go to each tax payer and "demand what their estates" amounted to and "take an account of the same". Ow-
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ing to the Indian wars the next tax does not seem to have been assessed until 1678, when the towns were empowered to make or to appoint freemen to make "an equal rate according to their best under- standing amongst the freemen and inhabitants of each respective town". Portsmouth and Newport appointed officials to rate the prop- erty of the towns, but ratable estate in the former town and in the mainland towns seems to have included only the kinds of property previously reckoned as such.
In 1690 Warwick petitioned for redress from overrating, and the assembly acknowledged that "the manner of rating towns by guess" was "no suitable rule", and determined that for the future all rates should be levied at "so much in the pound". A committee was ap- pointed "to draw up some rule for apprising of lands or cattle, to be valued, to known men's estates by", but nothing was done by them. But by this time commerce and trade were developing rapidly. Wealth was no longer confined to livestock and real estate. The Newport men though engaged in legitimate commerce, made large gains by slave trading, privateering and smuggling, and some of the colony officials grew wealthy by conniving at such practices. Tax laws, there- fore, were passed, specifically providing for valuing and assessing tangible property in the form of trading stock and other personalty in intangible forms. In 1695 a committee reported a "way for the rating all lands and meadows, and merchants, trades- inen and housings" so much in the pound according to value. Each town was to choose yearly two or three able and honest men to take the view of the "lands and meadows ; and so to judge of the yearly profit at their wisdom and discretion; and so also of the merchants and tradesmen, and to make this part of the rate according to the yearly profit, or as they, where they shall have had a more narrow inspection into the lands and meadows, shall see cause to set by the acre". The three men were to order each person in the town to bring in the propor- tions of their estates which they were "to inspect and make their assessment accordingly". In the case of a colony rate the assembly was also to choose a commissioner to aid the three local assessors. The act provided for a specific rate on certain livestock. Later in the year a tax of one penny in the pound was levied and 1s. 8d. was laid on negro men servants and 10s. each on negro women servants. Under this law the sum of £146 18s. was collected, and in the following year a tax of two pence in the pound was substituted for a tax of £300. From these data the taxable valuation of the wealth of the colony seems to have been about £36,000, and as property was taxed at one- half its real value and doubtless some of it escaped taxation, we may approximately estimate the wealth of the colony in 1700 at £80,000 or £90,000.
This plan of direct taxation on individual wealth, as the ultimate
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nnit by the colony, instead of apportioning the tax upon the towns as the unit, though using the loeal tax machinery for the purpose, was followed in only two assessments, the second yielding only £219 of an estimated tax of £300. In 1698 the colony returned to the method of apportioning a tax among the towns, and no ehange has been made sinee that time. In this year also a poll tax, which had been first levied by Andros in 1688, was imposed by the colony on all males between the ages of sixteen and sixty. The attempt to reaeli trades- men and intangible personalty seems to have been a complete failure. The eommeree and trade which had developed between 1690 and 1710 was almost wholly confined to Newport. Of the twenty-nine vessels owned in the colony in 1708, all but two or three belonged in that town, and in the agricultural prosperity of the period Newport had had her full share. We should therefore expeet to find Newport's portion of the state tax inereasing rapidly. Sueh, however, was not the ease. In 1690 twenty-seven per eent. of the tax was assessed on Newport. In 1698, immediately after the time when the assembly should have ob- tained some definite data from the individual returns required under the taxes assessed on individual wealth in 1695 and '96, it bore 28.12 per eent. of the taxes, but in 1707 its portion was only 28.5. On the other hand, Providenee, which had no eommeree and almost no trades- men, bore 13.1 per eent. of the total tax in 1690, and 16.1 per eent. in 1707. Portsmouth's share had deelined from 20 per eent. to 15.8 per eent., while Kingston, wholly agricultural, had inereased its share from 9 per cent. to 17.5 per cent. All of the other towns except Westerly, which showed but slight ehange, bore a much smaller portion of the taxes in 1707 than in 1690.
But if between the towns some injustiee continued, the efforts made in 1695 to reaeh all kinds of property resulted in a eloser approxima- tion to equity as between individuals within the towns. When the colony in 1698 returned to the gross tax system, it was specifically enaeted that within the towns assesssments and valuations should be made on the basis of property taxable under the law of 1695. In sub- sequent taxes this principle was followed, and in addition to the reg- ular assessors and eonstables aeting as eolleetors for some years, a set of offieers ealled inspeetors, or persons to take aeeount of individual "stoek", were appointed. By a law of 1704 the towns were required to eleet three rate-makers annually, and they were empowered to administer an oath to those making the personal property returns required in the law, and in 1706, owing to some eases of embezzlement by the eonstables, the assessors were required to return copies of their rate lists, divided aeeording to the preeinets allotted to each eonstable, to the general treasurer.
In 1699 the laws intended to tax tradesmen were amplified so as to inelude non-resident peddlers and merchants. Inasmuch as they gath-
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ered "up quantities of ready money" and carried "it off", but were not subject "to those charges the freemen and inhabitants are at", it was enacted, in order that the government might "receive some pro- portional consideration from them", they should pay 2 1-2 per cent. on the invoices of goods brought in by them for sale at retail. Mer- chants, factors and wholesalers paid at the rate of 1 per cent. In 1700 the rate was increased for peddlers to 5 per cent., and in 1701 non-resident merchants remaining in the colony one month were made liable to such rates as others (inhabitants) were subject to, with such modifications as the colonial authorities should think proper. The former taxes were local and were to be devoted to the poor and mend- ing the highways and bridges. The law of 1701 may have applied to colony taxes only.
Exemptions from taxation seem to have been used as inducements to settlers in the colony of Massachusetts, as Bristol lands were ex- empted by the general court for seven years, but in Rhode Island the only exemptions of this period were the house, land and conveniences of the governor while he was in office. (Law of 1707.)
It is impossible to estimate accurately the proceeds of the various taxes until about 1695, partly because the administrative machinery was not sufficiently developed to enforce payment of them, partly because, although Peter Easton, General Treasurer, by order of the assembly began to keep a treasurer's book in 1672, the accounts are by no means complete and cannot be balanced, but chiefly because owing to the scarcity of English and New England money many trans- actions were carried on in terms of the Indian money, peage, until 1662, when it was declared to be no longer legal tender, and subsequently until near the end of the century largely by processes of barter. From 1662 until 1695 taxes were assessed in terms of New England silver. The colony taxes assessed, however, between 1647 and 1664 reduced to "country pay" aggregated £1,200. From 1664 until 1700 the nominal sums assessed in various money media amounted to about £4,450, while from 1700 until 1710, when all taxes were assessed in terms of money, they amounted to £11,700. Until 1690 taxes were frequently unpaid, as we have already seen, for many years. But beginning in 1695 they seem to have been collected with comparative promptness, owing to the improved administrative machinery, and with comparative ease, owing to the increase of wealth. Of a tax of one penny in the pound, amounting to about £150, assessed in October of that year, £146 18s. was collected within the time limit. Of a tax of £400 assessed in March, 1701, and payable before October 20 of the same year, £380 17s. 2d. had been paid by July 2.
The cost of collecting the taxes was not great as long as the system of voluntary assessment and payment was operative, but soon became
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large. From 1684 the eonstables received two shillings in the pound for eolleeting. The inspectors and assessors had wages from 1695 at the rate of two shillings six penee a day, but by 1703 the eonstables' fces were reduced to one shilling in the pound. There were also fees of the town elerks for copying the rate bill and fees of the treasurer for receiving and paying the tax of from one shilling in the pound in 1695 to six penee in the pound in 1705. The colony paid for "in- speeting", assessing and collecting £750 of the £800 rate of 1698, £108 7s. 8d., of which £37 10s. was the treasurer's fee. The additional fees for eolleeting the remaining £50 amounted to £7 10s., making the total eost £115 7s. Sd., or over fourteen per eent. of the tax.
The exeise on liquors and the lieense for the sale of them were mat- ters of social rather than fiseal importance. The dangers to the peaee of the community eaused by the sale of intoxieants to the Indians resulted in numerous and severe laws, the fines for breach of which were greatly in exeess of the rate of lieense. Three to twenty shillings was not an unusual penalty, while the rate of license varied from one to ten shillings.
The code of 1647 gave the towns authority to lieense ale houses and taverns, and though Newport and Portsmouth issued sueh lieenses, Providenee seems not to have done so. In 1654, in addition to the money payment for a liquor lieense, the duty of providing entertain- ment for strangers was imposed on such as sold liquors. The local lieense rate was left to the towns to fix, but in 1655 the assembly enaeted an exeise law providing for an import duty of five shillings on every anker of liquor and every quarter eask of wine. All liquor must be entered or recorded, and the fee of the town elerk for recording was three penee per anker. The towns were, however, given authority to provide for greater exeise rates at their discretion, and the excise duty, like the loeal lieense, was paid to the town treasury for town uses. An attempt was also made at this time to limit the price of liquor to four shillings a quart, but on complaint of the "ordinarie keepers" the price limit was removed. The rate of excise on liquor was reduced in 1669 to ten shillings a hogshead, or less than one-half the former rate, and that on wines to ten shillings a pipe, or about one-fifth of the former rate. The fees for entering were approximately the same. But neither the exeise laws nor license ordinanees were enforeed, and in 1674 the excise was taken from the towns and appropriated to the colonial treasury. For the more "effeetual performance" of the laws, it was then farmed out to loeal eolleetors. This law seems to have been equally inoperative, and in 1686 all laws relating to exeise, to selling' liquors to Indians and houses of entertainment, were repealed. With the beginning of activity in eommeree and the inereasing needs of the treasury in 1696 exeise was again imposed on all liquors imported from
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foreign places.1 The proceeds of the duty were to be "improved" by the governor "for the collony's use". Capt. Samuel Cranston, after- wards governor, was appointed collector of the duty and had ten per cent. for "receiving and paying."
In 1680 the failure of some of the towns to enforce the license laws led to the transfer of license powers from the towns and town magis- trates to the town councils, and as in some towns (Providence) the taxes paid for licenses were appropriated by, and in other towns. (Portsmouth) were voted either in whole or in part to, the members of the town councils who had previously served gratuitously, the laws were more strictly followed.
The first general assembly in 1647 passed a reciprocity tariff law, providing that all "Dutch, French or other Alliants or any English- men inhabiting among them" should pay "like customs and duties, as we doe among them", for all goods except beaver, but the law was not enforced, and no other customs duties except on liquors and negroes seem to have been exacted until near the end of the colonial period. A duty of £3 per head was laid on negroes in 1708. The price of negroes was from £30 to £40. The duty therefore was about ten per cent. The number imported seems to have been about twenty-five a year ; the income should have been in proportion. The law, however, seems to have provided no penalty for failure to notify the collector of the port or the naval officer, and so "the good intentions of the act were wholly frustrated" until a more stringent law of 1712 provided fines, penal- ties and methods of search for failure to make reports to the official of number, age and sex of the cargo.
In accordance with the acts of Parliament relating to trade and commerce, a naval officer was established in Newport in 1682. All masters of vessels were required to pay for the entry and discharge of their vessels at the rates of 2s. 6d. for vessels under forty tons, and 5s. for vessels over forty tons burden. With the beginning of commerce, however, and the need of forts and lighthouses at the entrance to the bay, laws exacting specific tonnage duties were enacted. The first bears date of 1690 and imposed a charge of one shilling or a pound of powder per ton on all vessels owned outside the state having over ten tons burden. The money was to be used in supporting a magazine or powder house for the Island's use, and later (1701) for fortifications in the town of Newport. In 1704 coasting vessels carrying grain or provisions were exempted. Presumably some of these duties were collected as fees were provided for the officers. The treasurer had a slight income from rental of ferries across waters lying without town bounds. Within town limits the town of Providence directed the
'The rates were ten shillings to twelve shillings six pence, according to quality for wines. The rate for brandy, rum and other distilled liquors was one penny per gallon; molasses paid a duty of one-half penny per gallon.
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priees of ferriage. The free transportation of magistrates, deputies and jurymen was the first publie exaetion required of those in the ferry business. In 1700 Josias Arnold, his heirs and assigns, were granted a seven years' monopoly of publie ferriage between Conanieut Island and the mainland, at a rate of £2 10s. a year. Subsequently other ferry lines were established in other seetions and the usual annual rate of rental was £4.
There was a slight ineome also from the sales of lands belonging to the colony, but there is no record of the amounts received, and in 1705 they were devoted to paying the expenses of the proposed Canadian Expedition.1 The greater portion of the lands in the colony belonged to the four original towns, or to the proprietors and purehasers in them, and the proceeds of the sale of sueh lands went to the towns themselves. But the proceeds were small in amount, as most of the land in Portsmouth, Newport and Providenee was granted to sueees- sive neweomers at the same priee contributed by the original settlers ; namely, two shillings an aere.
During the first half eentury fines and fees provided the most im- portant part of the ordinary ineome of the towns and the colony. The towns fixed the fees of loeal offieers, the colony those of the general offieers. The amounts of fines were fixed in the same way, but the officials seem to have rendered no accounts of them. There is no reeord of the amounts of fees received, but they pertained to every loeal and colonial offiee.
It is suggestive of the peculiar mixture of despotism and freedom, that this nearest approach to real demoeraey that the world had then seen should have been of necessity accompanied by a system of heavy fines for failure to exercise the privileges and to perform the duties of eitizenship. During the first few years, when local affairs were still managed by the original proprietors' corporations, and when the idea of unanimous and voluntary eonsent rather than majority vote seems to have been thought necessary to validate a law, penalties were exaeted not only for absenee from town meeting, but for being late or departing without leave, and the fines varied from one to two shil- lings-the latter being the price of an aere of land. When at a later period government had advaneed one stage, and a majority vote and the establishment of a legal quorum facilitated publie business, these fines were abandoned. Failures to perform publie service were usually punished by fines, at first of an amount equal to the annual ineome of the offiee. Those refusing to serve as town magistrate or eolonial deputy were fined £5, while the fine for refusing to serve as eonstable
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