What They Say About Taxing Subscription Lists

The Ann Aubor Register is the vietim of a new departure of the board of review of that city, who have decided that the subscription list of a newspaper ia taxable property, and proceeded to place the lists of some (not all) of the newspapers of that city upon the tax roll. The case should be conteated, as the subscription list is to a great extent a record of debt against the publisher, as every subscriber who pays in advance is a creditor and the publisher a debtor. It is the first time we have ever seen a case of a man bei ng taxed upon liis debts. It is evident all fools are not dead in Ann Arbor. - Livingston Herakl . il The Ann Arbor Board of Review has entcred into a new line of taxation. They have placed the newspaper subscription lists upon the assessment rolls! The reason given is that when a plant is sold, the list is sold and because of that is taxable properly. But no effort is made to tax a lawyer's practice or a doctor 's ride, although sales of such good-will ore often made at high figures. Then, again, while a list is property, it not infrequently is a liability, for if advance-paid, it is nothing but the repreeentative of the publisher's debt. The Ann Arbor assessors have made a weak case, and it is to be hoped that papers will fighl against paying taxes on such "property.'' - Ypsilanti Sentinal. The Ann Arbor Board of Review, during lts recent session, got after the newspapers, and in some cases taxcd their subscription lists. A subscription list reprasents monoy spent, and raoney not received, and is not legally taxable. It would be just as reasonable to tax a laborer's wages already received iand paid out, as to tax subscriptions previously paid. It would be as reasonable to tax unearned wages as subscriptioDS not received. If an editor has unspent woalth, it can be taxed directly in the usual way. To tax unpaid subscriptions, is to tax what a person has not and may not get. The members of the Board of Review have been standing on their heads. They are heads that need