Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 2).pdf/191

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POWER v. LARABEE.
165

ner affecting the rights of the taxpayers, were made after the time fixed for a review of the assessment roll. After this time had expired, the supervisor then made up the formal assessment roll, which was an exact copy of the roll of 1873 as changed prior to the day fixed by law for review, with the unimportant exception referred to. Said the court at page 393: “For all the purposes of this review parties whose property was assessed could at the time fixed obtain as full and accurate information from the assessment roll of 1873, as altered, as they could had a copy of the same been made and then altered, of an entirely new assessment been made, without any reference whatever to the roll of 1873. The roll as changed and as exhibited at that time no longer stood for the roll of 1873 for that purpose, and as it then stood it was the roll for 1874; and the fact that it became necessary after the supervisor had reviewed and completed this roll, for him to make a literal copy thereof, to which his certificate should be attached, and which should afterwards be examined by the board of supervisors, equalized and certified to by their chairman, and which should thereafter be and remain the original roll for 1874, would not, in my opinion render such roll or the taxes afterwards assessed upon the basis thereof, illegal and void. It may frequently become necessary, on account of the imperfect manner in which the assessment is first made and the changes and corrections made during the review thereof, that a new roll or copy should be made and used thereafter as the original roll, and I should hesitate to hold, where such a necessity existed in the opinion of the supervisor, and a legible and correct copy thereof had been made and adopted and used thereafter as the assessment roll, that third parties, with no other foundation to stand upon, could with the aid of a court of equity, escape the payment of their just proportion of the public burdens.” It is apparent that the court considered that the taxpayer was not deprived of his hearing; that there was exhibited to him on the day for review the assessment against him as it was afterwards transcribed; and that he could have had no greater opportunity to challenge its accuracy had it been transcribed before the day fixed for review. In Burt v.