Under the bill before me the assessment will be levied by the local authorities. This would result in many cases in a dozen different sets of local authorities assessing the value of different parts of the same franchise. It is on every account far better that this assessment should be delegated to the State authorities who will necessarily ascertain all the conditions affecting the franchise and obtain information which will enable them to judge of the value of the franchise in the different localities in which it is exercised. The Board of State Tax Commissioners can collate the facts, compare conditions and determine values as a result of a wider range of observation and experience than can be obtained by local officers, and under them the system of assessment will tend to produce justice, harmony and uniformity. This is the system adopted under the Nichols law and it has worked well in practice. Furthermore, the bill before me fails to take account of the fact that, in a very unequal and irregular way, many corporations do already pay a certain, though usually an utterly inadequate sum in taxes. Some pay nothing at all to the local municipalities, but others pay sums varying from one to five per cent on their gross earnings. The amounts have been determined in the most haphazard manner and bear no proportion whatever to the value of the franchises or to their earning capacity. It is obviously unjust, when introducing a system under which we believe that these franchises will for the first time be fully and fairly taxed according to their respective values, not to allow for this existing and inequitable taxation. Accordingly it should be provided that from the sum assessed by the State authorities as the tax which a corporation must pay because of its local franchise, there shall be deducted the amount already annually paid by it to the locality for such franchise. In no other way is it possible to tax these corporations with uniformity and equity. It is contended by the advocates of the bill that in reaching the value of the franchise under the new law the amount thus paid away in taxes must be allowed for and deducted anyhow; but it is not certain that this would be done, and in any event the principal should be definitely established by the law itself. There can be no possible opposition to putting it in the law by any man who is anxious to tax corporations as other property is taxed, and who believes that this end can be attained by taxing them as realty. Either by taxing them as realty we shall tax them at their full value, or we shall not; if, as we hold, the former is the case, it would be unjust to tax them for more than their full value, and this would happen were not these existing taxes deducted.