Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 July 1912 — STATE HAPPENINGS RECORDED IN BRIEF [ARTICLE]

STATE HAPPENINGS RECORDED IN BRIEF

NEWS ITEMS FROM ALL OVER INDIANA. PROTEST AGAINST TAX RATE Adams Express Company Seeks Injunction to Prevent Auditor of State Certifying to Valuation of Its Property. Indianapolis, July io.—Suit was filed in the federal court by W. M. Barrett, president of the Adams Express company, against W. H. O’Brien, auditor of state, in which the court is asked to issue an injunction to prevent the auditor of state from certifying to the auditors of counties through which the lines of the company pass the valuation placed by the state tax board on the Adams Express company’s ; property in Indiana.

The complaint sets out that the actual value of the company’s physical property in Indiana is $68,982, while the state tax board placed the valuation at $578,208. In arriving at this latter valuation the state tax board, it is alleged, estimated the value of the express company’s capital steel- to be werth S3BO a share, and then apportioned the valuation of the stock according to the mileage of the company in this state.

The complaint denies the right of the state tax board to make the appraisement in this manner and says that the-board had no right to place a valuation of anything more than the $68,982 worth of actual personal property in the state. The suit is similar to other suits filed by the same company against the auditor of state of the same purpose in the last two or three years and which are still pending in federal court. If the express company wins its suit it will mean a loss of many thousands of dollars .in” taxes to the counties in Indiana through which the company operates its lines.