Laws, 1907 (c. 160 as amended by c. 253, Laws, 1907)

Laws, 1907 (c. 160 as amended by c. 253, Laws, 1907). The Connecticut law contains a provision which permits any person to take or send any note, bond, or other chose in action, or a description of it, to the state treasurer, and pay a state tax of 2 per cent on the face amount for five years, or for a longer or shorter time at the same rate. The treasurer makes an endorsement upon the contract or gives a receipt stating that the tax has been paid. The instrument is then exempt from all other taxes. The state treas- urer classifies all notes, bonds, choses in action upon which the state tax has been paid according to assess- ment districts, and sends these lists to the town c’erks.

History. Laws, 1897 (c. 381 as amended by c. 25, Laws, 1898). It was the duty of the assessor to list for state and county purposes, at three-fourths of their value, all investments paying interest or yielding an in- come. Mortgages were included under investments. All such property, whether situated within the state or elsewhere, whether owned or held in trust, was to be assessed, unless it was taxed in some other state or county. It was declared to be the intention of the act to tax the owner and not the borrower or debtor, and any person asking, demanding, contracting for, or receiving any money or consideration on account of the tax or in reduction of the tax, or any person who imposed or tried to impose the tax or any part of it upon a debtor, was to be deemed guilty of a mis- demeanor and subject to a heavy fine.

Where the creditor was a non-resident, the debtor was liable for the tax in the first instance, but must deduct the amount paid from the interest due or ac- cruing on the debt. If the creditor refused to allow this deduction, he was to forfeit all the accrued inter- est and the debtor was not to make any payment to a creditor living outside of the state until the tax had been paid.

Railroads and other companies paying a stipulated tax in lieu of all other taxes were not included under the provisions of the law.

The tax amounted to thirty cents on the one hun- dred dollars of the assessment as made and returned by the assessor, and, as a rule, one-fourth of the money collected from this source went to the state, and three- fourths to the county.

In the case of E. G. & T. Co. v. Donahoe (3 Pen- ij< class="msoIns">’s Del. Rep. 191, 1901) the court held this law unconstitutional. The original act was for the purpose of equalizing taxation for state and county purposes. The amendment considered municipal taxation a? well without proper designations in the title. The court held that so much of the amending act as related to taxation for municipal purposes was unconstitutional and void under the constitution because not embraced within the title of the act, and that since the uncon- stitutional part could not be separated from the resi- due without emasculating the statute, that, therefore, the act as amended was unconstitutional and void.