use of transfer and transaction taxes, and most have laid heavier hands on inheritances and successions. Here and there local taxes on polls and households have risen to extraordinary figures. But most cantons and a majority of communes have been unable to avoid increased pressure on property and income. Income taxes have been introduced where formerly only property taxes existed, and in one case a property tax where there had been only a tax on incomes. Withal there has been a sharper assessment of taxable property or incomes, with a sharper graduation of rates designed to secure more revenue from the larger contributors. In proportion as expenditures have been held in restraint or other sources of revenue developed, pressure on the property tax has been reduced, and a breakdown averted. The cantons where personal property is successfully taxed to-day are those which have managed to keep the pressure within reasonable bounds, and those which fail to do so are the ones that have done what the American States did during the last half of the nineteenth century. Not a few cantons have improved their methods of administration and imparted increased rigor to their tax laws. These measures have had excellent results when other conditions were favorable, but they have utterly failed to bring about a satisfactory assessment of personal property for taxation at the rates of $1 or $1.50 per $100. The fundamental factor in every canton has been the tax rate. A property tax levied at the rate of 50 cents per $100 is one thing, a tax levied at the rate of $1 or $1.50 per $100 is quite another. The former, as Swiss experience shows, may be enforced with conspicuous success; the latter never has been, nor can be, enforced in respect of any kind of property capable of concealment or undervaluation.

The taxation of incomes is in most cantons so closely connected with the taxation of property that I am constrained to refer briefly to the results attained. Speaking broadly, there can be no question but that the Swiss cantons have found the supplementary income tax on personal, professional, or industrial incomes a useful adjunct of the tax on property. It is enforced with at least tolerable success, yields a substantial revenue, and places under contribution a class of incomes which,

under a pure property tax, would pay nothing. At this point Swiss experience has been absolutely different from that of the handful of American States that have experimented with a tax on incomes, but with so little success that the average taxpayer hardly knows of its existence. Concerning the working of the double system of property taxation in Baselstadt, Baselland, Tessin, and Solothurn, I prefer within the necessary limits of this paper to say nothing. The picture, however, is not all light; it undoubtedly has shadows which sometimes are rather dark. In agricultural districts taxation of incomes partly or almost wholly breaks down. The farmer believes that the use of his house, the living which his family gets off the farm, and everything else except the savings he puts into the bank are not or at least should not be included under the head of taxable income; and accordingly he does not include them. Where agricultural earnings are taxed on the basis of taxpayers' declarations, entire districts of great fertility contribute little or nothing; and the burden of taxation falls, therefore, with undue weight on industrial or commercial centers where incomes can be better ascertained and assessed. Thus, a city that pays 16 per cent of the cantonal tax on property may pay 36 per cent of the tax on incomes, and one that pays 13 per cent of the former may pay 39 per cent of the latter. To meet this difficulty, one canton arbitrarily fixes the taxable income from agriculture at a certain percentage of the value of the land, and another fixes the tax on agricultural incomes at three eighths of 1 per cent of the value of the land. Nor is the difficulty of taxing agricultural incomes the only one encountered. Small merchants and manufacturers frequently do not know the size of their incomes, and, like the farmers, think they should be taxed only on what they save. In Baselstadt, where the larger incomes are supposed to be pretty fully returned, it is evident that smaller incomes evade assessment to a considerable extent. Naturally enough, persons receiving fixed salaries or wages are unable to escape, and in some cantons, particularly Bern, it is believed that this class of contributors is considerably overtaxed. Altogether Swiss experience, while not unfavorable to state taxation of incomes, shows that such taxes present difficulties much like those encountered in taxing personal

property, and for their successful operation require the very best methods of administration.

A subject that I cannot wholly ignore is state supervision of the assessment of property and income. In Switzerland, as in our own country, the assessment of property is, in the first instance, intrusted to local officials; and there, as here, it has been found advantageous to bring the process of assessment under state supervision or control. Swiss communes, like American municipalities and counties, naturally desire to attract or keep wealthy residents and large employers of labor; and to do so are often willing to make concessions inconsistent with both spirit and letter of the law. Actual bargains between assessors and taxpayers have probably been rarer in the Swiss cantons than in the American States, yet they are not unknown. Still more common are cases where local officials are unable to withstand the threat of withdrawal of property to some other commune, where tax rates are lower or the officials more given to hospitality. In cantons where local tax rates are usually high, there seem always to be cities of refuge where oppressed taxpayers are assured of a cordial welcome. On Lake Constance and on the Rhine there are said to be colonies of wealthy people, who in selecting their places of domicile have considered, among other things, the advantages of a low tax rate and perhaps a moderate assessment. Then there are cases where a small commune is dominated by a large corporation which employs a majority of the inhabitants. In one canton there is a commune in which all voters and officials are employers of a large company which, as a consequence, used to enjoy a kind and amount of "home rule" in taxation inconsistent with the interests of the cantonal treasury.

To meet such conditions, state supervision and control have been introduced. Most of the cantons now provide for revision of the local assessments by a special commission appointed by the cantonal authorities. I hesitate to compare these commissions with the boards of equalization known to most American States; but in some cantons at least it appears that the commissions of revision have failed to revise just as our boards. of equalization have usually failed to equalize, and for the squies reason lack of authority, time, and knowledge nee

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the task. I believe, however, that there have been cases in which the Swiss commissions have been able to accomplish valuable results. Not a few cantons go farther, and appoint members of the local assessment boards. One adds to each communal board a cantonal representative with merely consultative powers; three appoint a district chairman, very much like the county assessor of Indiana and some other States, who supervises the communal boards within his district; one appoints two members of each local board, and another appoints a majority of the members; one appoints the chairman of each board, intrusts the appointment of two members to the district, and allows the commune to appoint the other two; and one intrusts the whole work of assessment to district commissions appointed by the canton. The general results of cantonal supervision and control have been quite as good as those achieved by the tax commissions recently appointed by various American States, though perhaps not so striking, since the original conditions in Switzerland were generally better than in the United States, and the chance for improvement correspondingly less.

My last topic is popular lawmaking in its application to tax legislation. By the initiative and referendum the tax laws of most cantons are directly under popular control, and in financial matters the referendum has been very widely employed. I speak with hesitation of this subject, and am not yet ready to express an opinion as to whether, on the whole, popular lawmaking has worked badly or well. Some things, however, are too clear for dispute, and will be questioned by no one acquainted with the facts. The chief result has been everywhere to make a change of the tax laws exceedingly difficult, since most proposals are certain to be defeated. Laws imposing taxes on transportation companies, increasing the rates of the inheritance tax, or graduating more sharply the taxes on large fortunes or incomes are not infrequently accepted by the people, since the average voter knows that the result will be to increase some other fellow's taxes. But a general income tax affecting the mass of the voters, a reform needed to increase the effectiveof the property tax, or a proposal to raise the rate of taxadifficultor to avoid recurring deficits, has about four chances

in five of being rejected, and will be accepted only in cases of dire financial need. The introduction of property and income taxes during the last half of the nineteenth century was a work of the greatest difficulty, and the people of some cantons absolutely refused to accept a direct tax until their governments were on the road to bankruptcy. In Aargau the people bestowed upon themselves in 1870 the right of fixing the rate of the direct state tax, and then proceeded to fix it at zero. They were at length persuaded to divest themselves of this right, but they will not to-day consent to a slight increase in the rate of the state tax needed to meet a chronic deficit in the cantonal budget, and the canton has been obliged to borrow money in order to provide for accumulated deficits. Baselland had a somewhat similar experience, and secured the establishment of a state tax in 1892 only by reducing the rates of various indirect taxes and making certain concessions to the communes. The rates of taxation then authorized by the constitution have never been adequate, and the government to-day is at its wits' ends, since it knows well that it is useless to propose an increase. St. Gall's experience is equally interesting. Her antiquated tax laws had brought the canton to a pass where amendment was absolutely necessary, but in 1900 the people rejected a reform measure. Three years later, knowing that a new project would meet with a similar fate, the leaders of all parties agreed to enact a law and then endeavor to avoid a referendum. This was actually done, petitions for a referendum failing to receive the necessary number of signatures; but it is doubted by no one that if a referendum had been ordered, the new law, which has greatly improved the finances of the canton, would have been summarily rejected. Upon the other hand, it is clear that the difficulty of securing the adoption of new laws has made the cantonal governments extremely careful, and has tended to retard somewhat the increase of expenditures. In not a few cantons new laws have been accepted during the past ten or twelve years; and some persons, in an excellent position to judge, are of the opinion that, with a few conspicuous exceptions, the people have judged fairly well concerning the necessity of proposed legislation. Upon the basis of my present studies I am unwilling to accept or reject this opinion.