64 P. 307 | Or. | 1901
Lead Opinion
after stating the facts in the foregoing language, delivered the opinion of the court.
To the same purpose is Brauns v. City of Green Bay, 55 Wis. 113 (12 N. W. 463), wherein the court say: “It has often been held that discriminations in the valuation and assessment of property arising from mistake of fact or errors in computation or judgment on the part of assessors do not necessarily vitiate a tax, but that an intentional disregard óf law in such discrimination does.” And in Andrews v. King County, 1 Wash. St. 46 (22 Am. St. Rep. 136, 23 Pac. 409), the court say: “We think the uniform ruling of the higher courts has been that, while equity will not interfere to correct mere mistakes or inadvertencies, or to contravene or set aside the judgments of assessors or boards of equalization in relation to1 values, it will interfere when the officers fraudulently, capriciously, or tyrannically refuse to exercise their judgment by adopting a rule or system of valuation designed to operate unequally, and to* violate a fundamental principle of the constitution.” It is, perhaps, unnecessary to- cite and quote so largely from adjudicated cases, as this court has promulgated the identical doctrine in West Portland Park v. Kelly, 29 Or. 412 (45 Pac. 901); and we should not have done so but for the contention that what was there said was unnecessary to the decision, and therefore not controlling as a precedent. In McDonald v. City of Escanaba, 62 Mich. 555 (29 N. W. 93), fraud was not an element in the controversy. True, the learned chief justice who rendered the opinion used language which would seem to indicate that there was no remedy, even in the case of fraud, except criminally or by civil process against the officers; but it must be considered in the light of the case before the court, which related to an unfair, but not fraudu
Real estate or “land” is required to be assessed at its “true cash value,” which “shall be held and taken to mean the amount such property would sell for at a voluntary sale made in the ordinary course of business” : Hill’s Ann. Laws, § 2752, as amended by Laws 1893, p. 6, § 1. A railroad, considered in a commercial sense, differs widely from other property. Sales and transfers are so- infrequent and unusual, except for the purposes of reorganization, that a current value cannot be said to attach to- it. And it is not easy to determine what such property will sell for at a voluntary sale in the usual course of business. Ordinarily, property will sell for what it is worth for the purpose for which it is adapted, and, in the absence of a market value, its condition and uses must be considered in estimating its assessable value. In speaking of railroad property, Mr. Justice Brewer says: “When the statute provides that such property shall be assessed at its ‘true cash value,’ it means to require that it shall be assessed at the value it has, as used, and by reason of its use”: Pittsburg, etc., Ry. Co. v. Backus, 154 U. S. 421, 430 (14 Sup. Ct. 1118). The subject has received intelligent discussion at the hands of Mr. Justice Cooper, in Franklin County v. Nashville, C. & St. L. Ry.,
To the same purpose is the following excerpt from People v. Hicks, 40 Hun, 598: “The estimate of value of any portion of the road cannot be intelligently made without some knowledge or information of it as a whole, and its business, earnings, and ordinary expenses. Railroads are constructed with a view mainly to revenue and profit upon investments, and hence the productive capacity and its earnings are matters for consideration in the estimate of their value. And the extent to which actual net earnings of a road should govern or aid such estimate is dependent upon circumstances. No arbitrary method can be prescribed of ascertaining value. In some cases the earnings of the road may be entitled to much more consideration than in others. The cost of the road is also usually to' be taken into account, and the value depends upon relations present and in reasonable contemplation, because the value of property may considerably be dependent upon defined unappropriated means and facilities for increased business connections and relations, and the importance of the consequences to follow. * * * And the average net earnings of the entire line of a railroad for a number of consecutive years may properly be shown to aid the estimation of the value of the several portions of it.” Again, Mr. Justice Andrews says, in People v. Commissioners of Taxes, etc., 104 N. Y. 240, 246 (10 N. E. 440): “The rental value of real estate is frequently resorted to as a guide in fixing its aggregate value. In many cases it is a reasonable assumption that real property is worth a capital sum equal to that represented by the capitalization of its ordinary net rental. So, also, the property of a railroad corporation may be worth a sum capitalized on the basis of its average income and earning capacity. But, since the income is derived from the use of its real and personal property and also of its franchise, it is manifestly quite im
In the meanwhile, however, — that is to say, between the time of his election and the time fixed by law for qualifying and entering upon the discharge of his duties as clerk, a period of one month, — he listed with much pains and detail all the property of the Oregon & California Railroad Company upon the assessment roll, fixed and extended the valuations, and fully completed the assessment thereof; but he neither assessed nor placed upon the roll the property of any other corporation or person. When he had completed the assessment in the manner indicated, he attached the following certificate, omitting the venue and signature: “I, George A. Jackson, assessor of Jackson County, Oregon, do hereby certify that the foregoing is a correct assessment of all the property owned by the O. & C. R. R. Co. in Jackson County, Oregon, this 27th day of June, A. D. 1896.” The assessment roll was subsequently completed by Henry Klippel, who was appointed to succeed Jackson; but no change was made in the assessment of the railroad company’s property made by Jackson, which was as follows: 65.28 miles roadbed and franchise, at $10,000 per mile, $652,800; 65.28 miles rolling stock, at $635 per mile, $41,452; depots and depot grounds, $25,770; 371,044.12 acres congressional land, $348,661; 97,794.56 acres indemnity land, $172,248; 12,504.05 acres contract land, $39,019; 800 cords of wood, $2.50 per cord, $2,000, — total valuation, $1,281,950. It will be observed that he assessed the roadbed the same as in 1895, but the congressional and indemnity lands at a materially larger figure. When the board of equalization met,
Mr. Jackson, explaining his said assessment, says in his affidavit filed with a motion to vacate the preliminary injunction and made a part of the testimony in this case: “In making such assessment of said roadbed and placing a valuation thereon, I took into consideration the fact that said company had borrowed $30,000 per mile on all its lines of roadbed through Jackson County and State of Oregon, the cost of its right of way and clearing and grading the same, the cost of ties, rails, culverts, and bridges; and I also took into consideration that since the same was bonded or mortgaged for $30,000 per mile said company has made expensive improvements thereon in the way of new steel rails and extensive fills in the place of the old trestles on the line of its said road in Jackson County. I also took into consideration in fixing said value on said roadbed that the same line of road through Siskiyou County, California, was assessed at $17,408.00 per mile, and the tax at such valuation was being paid by the railroad company.” When questioned as to whether the board took into- consideration the earning power of the railroad, he replied, in effect, that the matter was talked about when the petition for reduction of the assessment was presented, but that the board did not consider it at all as an element or basis of assessment, and that they did not regard the income as a proper rule for valuation of such property. He further testified that Mr. Koehler admitted the road would cost $20,000 per mile to rebuild it, and that
It will be noted from this brief reference to the testimony that the central and controlling idea which prompted and finally induced these functionaries to assess the roadbed at $10,000 per mile, and maintain the same at that figure, was that the California & Oregon Railroad, which passes through Siskiyou County, California, adjoining the State of Oregon on the south, was assessed at over $17,000 per mile. To show that the basis thus assumed is an erroneous one, the law and manner of assessment in California need only be stated and defined. The law requires the franchise, railway, roadbed, rails, and rolling stock of all railroads operated in more than one county in the state to- be assessed by the state board of equalization: Cal. Pol. Code, § 3665. J. S. Swan, a member of the said state board, testifies that the Oregon & California Railroad is owned by the Central Pacific and operated by the Southern Pacific Company, and, employing his language, he continues: “Each member of the state board held, and very correctly so, that, the nearer the center of population this railroad was located, the more valuable it was: as, for instance, to illustrate, say, in San Francisco, the value would be $100,000 per mile; outside of Oakland, in Alameda County, say $30,000 per mile; and so on, decreasing in value in proportion to the distance said road might be from the center of population. Then adding up the value of the road in each county would give an approximate value of the roadway, roadbed, rails, and rolling stock, being the constituents that go to make up the value of the plant. To this would be added the value of the state franchise, which is
It is in evidence, also, that the mileage rate of assessment of the roadbed of railroads within this state, in other coun-' ties, from 1891 to 1896, ranges from $2,000 on branch lines to $5,500 on main lines, and of the Oregon & California System from $2,000 to $4,500 per mile. It may be safely affirmed that real property, other than that belonging to the railroad company, was assessed in Jackson County in 1896
The most thorough and .painstaking' assessment of the congressional lands seems tO' have been made by Woolridge in 1893, and his 1894 assessment was taken, therefrom. He and his deputy visited every section of the county, and fixed the values as they went. True, Mr. Hoffman states that when Mr. Woolridge came to cast up the aggregate values he concluded that the assessment was too high, and reduced it by reclassification and scaling down, commencing at the place where he started, by an aggregate of $100,000; but he says that no' reductions - were made upon the lands lying to the east of the Willamette Meridian. Now, a very large, if not by far the greatest, proportion of the raise made by Jackson in 1896 was upon the lands lying to- the east of this meridian, so the fact of Woolridge’s change in this particular had little, if any, bearing upon Jackson’s assessment. Mr. Jackson says that in assessing the congressional lands for 1895 and 1896 he took into consideration Woolridge’s assessment, and made but few changes therein. This is in a manner true as to the 1895 assessment, but with respect to
Modified.
Rehearing
Decided 24 June, 1901.
On First Petition for Rehearing.
delivered the opinion.
By the petition of defendant for a rehearing of this cause our attention has been attracted to- a manifest error in' our deductions as it respects the value of plaintiffs’ roadbed for assessment purposes. We adopted as a basis for the ascertainment of such value the net earnings of the railroad company averaged for a series of six years, because no other appeared under attending conditions sufficiently reliable from which to make the estimate. These earnings were capitalized at a basis of 5 per cent., adopting the estimates as shown by plaintiffs’ table, known in the record as “Exhibit No. 42.” The total of such capitalization for six years is $66,800, one-sixth of which, or $11,133, represents the value per mile of the roadbed, rolling stock, depot grounds, and improvements. The same table shows the value per mile of the rolling stock, depot grounds, and improvements, which for six years aggregate $6,172; the average being $1,028. Mr. Koehler testified that the figures representing these latter values were obtained by making a compilation of the assess
Rehearing Denied.
Rehearing
On Second Petition for Rehearing.
A petition to' modify the computation of values set out in the opinion rendered 24 June, 1901, was overruled. No opinion. Rehearing Denied.