only one column marked 'value,' or where there is no column for income, the assessment is valid. So, an irregularity in issuing the notice of the meeting of county clerks, who act as board of assessors, or the failure of tax officers to list all the property in their districts liable to taxation, or other irregularities and informalities which make the roll not in strict conformity to the requirements of the statute, are regarded as directory. Where a board of supervisors were required, at their June meeting, to add to the assessment any taxable property omitted by the assessor, it is said that such a requirement as to time is directory, and a collection at a later meeting, by which property is made to bear its due proportion of the public burden, is valid. But, if there had been anything in the act to show that the legislature intended the time fixed as a limitation, it would have been invalid."

In Torrey v. Milbury, 21 Pick. 64, the court said: "In considering the various statutes regulating the assessment of taxes, and the measures preliminary thereto, it is not always easy to distinguish which are conditions precedent to the legality and validity of the tax, and which are directory merely, and do not constitute conditions. One rule is very plain and well settled-that all those measures which are intended for the security of the citizen, for insuring an equality of taxation, and to enable every one to know with reasonable certainty for what polls and for what real and personal estate he is taxed, and for what all those who are liable with him are taxed, are conditions precedent; and if they are not observed, he is not legally taxed, and he may resist it in any of the modes authorized by law for contesting the validity of the tax. But many regulations are made by statute, designed for the information of assessors and officers, and intended to promote method, system and uniformity in the modes of proceeding, the compliance or noncompliance with which does in no respect affect the rights of taxpaying citizens. These may be considered directory; officers may be liable to legal animadversion, perhaps to punishment, for not observing them; but yet their observance is not a condition precedent to the validity of the tax."

By a statute of the State of Michigan property was required to be assessed for taxation at what the assessors believed to be the true cash value thereof, and the assessors were required to authenticate the assessment-roll with a certificate to that effect. In Clarke v. Crane, 5 Mich. 151, the certificate was: "We have estimated it" [the land in suit] "at a sum which, for the purposes of assessing, we believe to be the true value thereof." The word cash was left out. It was ruled that this vitiated the assessment, and the sale made for its payment. The court said: "The object of the certificate appears to be twofold-to authenticate the assessmentroll, and to secure equality in taxation; and with a view to this object, the assessors are required to state in their certificate, that

they have assessed the property mentioned in the assessment-roll at what they believe to be the true cash value thereof. If this be the object, and we can see no other, the tax-payer alone is interested in this part of the law. It is for his protection. . . He pays more or less tax than he should pay, when his property is assessed at a sum above or below its cash value." A former statute of Michigan had required the assessors, after they had completed the assessment, to sign it, and also to attach to it a certificate signed by them, etc. In Sibley v. Smith, 2 Mich. 486, the assessment was not signed by the assessors, but there was a certificate signed by them. The court held that the certificate could not supply the omis sion of the assessors to sign the roll itself, and that for want of such signature the assessment was void. See, also, Thames Man. Co. v. Lathrop, 7 Conn. 550; Keene v. Houghton, 19 Me. 368; Blossom v. Cannon, 14 Mass. 177; Johnson v. City, 21 Wisc. 184.

of

The following authorities are not in harmony with this view: Van Rensselaer v. Whitbeck, 7 Barb. 133; Mills v. Gleason, 11 Wisc. 470; City of Davenport v. R. R. 38 Ill. 633; Buck v. People, ex rel., 78 Ill. 560. In Van Rensselaer v. Whitbeck, the court said: "If the assessors have performed their duty in making the assessment-roll, as they may be presumed to have done, the certificate amounts to nothing more than a solemn declaration on their part, that they have performed such duty. It forms no part their adjudication, upon which the action of the board of supervisors is to be taken. It is but the evidence of what the assessors have done, and therefore, it seems to me, would not, even in a direct proceeding bringing in question the validity of the assessment, be subject of review. At any rate, the entire want of such certificate, much less the omission of the assessor to adopt the form prescribed in the statute, could not invalidate a tax charged by the board of supervisors upon the persons and property specified in the assessment-roll, if the assessment itself were in all respects conformable to law. The board of supervisors is required to examine the assessment-rolls returned to them, for the single purpose of ascertaining whether the valuations of real estate, in one town or ward, have a just relation to those in the other towns or wards in the county; and if they do not, the board is authorized to change such valuation, so as to produce such relation."

In Mills v. Gleason, supra, it was said: "It is also objected, that the assessors did not meet for the purpose of hearing objections, as required by the charter. We shall attempt to determine what would be the effect of an entire omission of this meeting by the assessors. It is undoubtedly a matter of much difficulty, both upon principle and upon authority, to determine with what degree of strictness the directions of the statute in regard to taxation must be followed, in order to prevent the entire tax from being illegal. On one hand is the evil of illegal and oppressive taxation upon

the citizen; and on the other, the danger of defeating entirely the collection of the public revenue, by the neglect or omissions of the officers to whom it is intrusted. Perhaps, the only method of solving the difficulty would be, to hold that no objection which did not go to the very groundwork of the tax, so as to affect materially its principle, and show it must necessarily be illegal, ought to have the effect of rendering the whole invalid. But, when the objection is a mere non-compliance with some direction of the statute, notwithstanding which the tax may have been entirely just or equal, it ought not to have that effect."

In Hilliard on Taxation (ch. 1, § 78), it is said: "Upon the question, whether the taxing power, and the forms and proceedings by which it is exercised, are, in doubtful cases, to be construed in favor of the government or the citizen, it is held that a tax is to be presumed to have been properly levied, and that taxation for public purposes is to be construed liberally. . . . The operations of governiment cannot be carried on without the expenditure of money, and that expenditure must be supplied by taxes, collected from its citizens. The power to tax is, therefore, inherent in government. From the very nature of the case, such a power is supreme."

In Buck v. People, ex rel., 78 Ill. 560, it is held: "It will be presumed that taxes are properly and legally assessed, and are legally and justly due, in the absence of proof to the contrary." In that case it was said: "All of the objections in this case are merely technical, and devoid of merit. There is no pretence that the property of objectors is not liable to be rated, nor that they are unfairly or unjustly assessed; nor do they claim that a greater rate is imposed upon them than on other citizens of the district; nor that the amount levied is not indispensable to the county and township governments, the keeping of roads and bridges in repair, and for the maintenance of schools, and the preservation of order in the villages of the county."

We have quoted thus elaborately from text-writers and adjudged cases, to show the general drift of judicial determination on the question in hand. We concur in opinion with the Supreme Court of the United States, that those legislative directions which have for their object the protection of the tax-payer against spoliation, or excessive assessment, must be treated as mandatory. But, if there be enough to show that the assessment is so made and evidenced as to be understood, then regulations designed for the information of the assessor, or other officer, intended to promote dispatch, method, system and uniformity in modes of proceeding, are merely directory. So, clerical and ministerial duties, the observance or non-observance of which do not affect the tax-payer injuriously, must be classed as directory. In cases of taxes imposed by municipal corporations, the intendments are less liberal. Lott v. Ross, 38 Ala. 156.

Sections 24 to 26, inclusive, of the act approved December 31st, 1868 (Pamph. Acts, 307-8-9), provide for the assessment of railroads in this State for taxation. Section 24 requires an annual report to be made to the auditor of State by the railroad officials, showing "total length of such railroad, the total length and value of such road, including right of way, road-bed, side track and main track in this State, and the total length and value thereof in each county, city and incorporated town in this State; they shall also make return of the number and value of all their locomotive engines, passenger, freight, platform, construction and other cars; and the value thereof shall be apportioned by the auditor, pro rata, to each mile of the main track; and the auditor of State shall notify the assessors of each county, through which such railroad runs, of the numbers of miles of track and value thereof, and the proportionate value of personal property, taxable in their respective counties." Section 25 provides how these returns are to be made of roads in the hands of receivers; and then directs, if the returns provided for above are not made "on or before the last day of April annually, the auditor shall proceed to ascertain the values herein required, from the best information he can conveniently obtain," etc. Section 26: "That the auditor of State, treasurer of State, and secretary of State, shall constitute a board of equalization, a majority of whom shall constitute a quorum for the transaction of business, who shall meet at the office of the auditor of State in Montgomery, on the 3d Wednesday of May annually, and equalize the property of railroad companies whose roads are wholly or partially in this State, as returned to the auditor of State under the provisions of this act, by increasing the value of the roads and property of such companies as shall have been, in their judgment, returned at too low a valuation, and diminishing the value of such as may have been returned at too high a valuation. They shall keep a record of their proceedings, which shall be signed by all the members present, and deposited with and kept by the auditor of State.... The apportionment herein provided for shall not be made until such equalization shall have been made."

The act approved February 9th, 1870 (Pamph. Acts, 87), we have heretofore declared to be unconstitutional. Perry Co. v. R. R. Co., 58 Ala. 546. We might have given another reason for our opinion, equally as satisfactory. It is not within the constitutional power of the legislature to relieve private corporations from the payment of a tax, the burden of which rests on private indi viduals. Const. of 1868, Art. 13, sec. 4; Const. of 1875, Art. 11, sec. 6; Mayor, etc. v. Stonewall Ins. Co., 53 Ala. 570. In that case we said: "When the legislature provides for taxing the property of individuals, this clause of the constitution requires it to tax the property of corporations for pecuniary profit to the same extent, and for the same purposes." See, also, City of Davenport v. R. R.

Co., 38 Iowa, 633; City Council of Montgomery v. Gas-Light Co., at the present term. In the revenue law approved March 19, 1875, sections 21, 22 and 23 (Pamph. Acts, 14, 15), reënacted, verbatim, sections 24-5-6 of the act approved December 31, 1868. So that the sections of the revenue law of 1868, so far as they relate to the assessment of railroads for taxation, were of force during all the time material to be inquired of in the present case.

We do not hesitate to declare that many of the provisions of the revenue law copied above were intended merely as guides to the officers charged with the duty of assessment-intended to secure system, uniformity and dispatch in the discharge of this trust. The tax-payer cannot be injuriously affected by compliance or noncompliance with these directions. Hence, they are classed as directory, in contradistinction to other clauses styled mandatory, or conditions precedent, as Ch. J. Shaw phrases it; mandatory, because they are designed to protect the tax-payer against unjust assessment and spoliation. Each class, it is the duty of the assessor to observe and obey; but a failure to conform to those falling within the first class does not invalidate the assessment, while a non-observance of the mandatory duties renders it wholly void. It is our duty, as we have shown above, to indulge every reasonable intendment in favor of regularity, in assessment for State taxation, rather than paralyze this motive power of the State's machinery. Hilliard on Taxation, 36, § 78; Cooley on Taxation, 329.

Among the many directions in sections 24-5-6 of the revenue law of 1868, given for the guidance of railroad officials, the auditor, and State board of equalization, we are satisfied that none of them are made conditions precedent, unless they are the following. In section 26 it is said, the auditor shall not apportion the values among the several counties, until the equalization shall have been made. This is mandatory, and, if disobeyed, will avoid the tax. The same section declares who shall constitute the State board of equalization, and directs that they shall "meet at the office of the anditor of State in Montgomery, on the 3d Wednesday of May annually." Has the tax-paying railroad an interest in having this meeting take place on the very day named in the statute? and will such corporation be liable to be injuriously affected, if the meeting take place on a different day? This must depend on the powers of the board when assembled, the purpose of the meeting, and, mainly, their duty vel non to furnish to the officers of the railroad company the right and privilege of appearing before them. If it is intended that the proceedings shall be ex parte, then, whether the meeting be held on the day mentioned in the statute, or on any other day, cannot injuriously affect the tax-payer. The tax-paying railroad has first had the privilege and opportunity through its highest and most trusted officers, of describing its property, and fixing upon it its own estimated values, under solemn oath. The