Chap. 156.—An ACT to amend and re-enact sections 17, 19, 20, 37, 60,
71, 72, 78, 98, 95, 107, and 114 of the act for the assessment of taxes
on persons, property, income, licenses, &c., and imposing taxes there-
on for the support of the government and free schools, and to pay the
interest on the public debt, approved March 27, 1876.

Approved March 13, 1877.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That
sections seventeen, nineteen, twenty, thirty-seven, sixty,
seventy-one, seventy-two, seventy-eight, ninety-three, ninety-
five, one hundred and seven, and one hundred and fourteen,
of the act entitled an act for the assessment of taxes on per-
sons, property, income, licenses, and so forth, and imposing
taxes thereon for the support of the government and free
schools, and to pay the interest on the public debt, approved
March twenty-seventb, eighteen hundred and seventy-six, be
amended and re-enacted so as to read as follows:

Tax on Seals.

§ 17. When the seal of the state, of a court, or notary
public, is affixed to any paper, except in tbe cases exempted
by law, the tax shall be as follows: For the seal of the
state, two dollars; and for the seal of a court, or notary, one
dollar; and herein shall be included a tax on a scroll, or any
Impression on paper in the place of a seal.

Tax on Insurance Companies.

§ 19. The real and personal property of every insurance
company, and every mutual aid society company, shall be
listed and assessed on the land and property books of the
commissioners of the revenue, in the same manner as other
real and personal property is assessed, and there shall be a
tax of fifty cents on every hundred dollars of the estimated
value thereof, the proceeds of one-fifth of which shall be ap-
plied to the support of the public free schools of the state.
The specific license tax upon each insurance company, and
mutual aid society company, for the privilege of doing busi-
ness in this stato, shall be two hundred dollars, and in addi-
tion thereto, one per centum upon the gross amount of all
assessments of premiums collected or received, or obligations
taken therefor, derived from its business in this state. Any
company failing promptly to pay the tax hereby imposed,
shall forfeit five per centum upon the amount of the tax due
for each month, or fraction of a month, during which it shall
be in defauJt. Any company which sball pay the specific
license tax into the treasury between the first and fifteenth
days of January in each year, or as soon thereafter as such
company shall begin business in this state, and the additional
tax of one per centum upon the amount derived from its
business as provided, shall be entitled, without the payment
of any additional state tax, to do business in any and every
part of the commonwealth. Every company shall certify
to the auditor of public accounts, between the first and
thirty-first day of January in each year, on the oath of its
chief accounting officer or principal agent in this state, the
gross amount of all assessments or premiums collected or re-
ceived, or obligations taken therefor, by such company, from
its business in this state; and shall immediately pay into the
treasury the tax imposed by law on such assessments, pre-
miums, and forfeitures. Any company failing to report the
amount of its receipts as herein provided, shall forfeit the
right to do business in this state until such report shall have
been made; of which forfeiture the auditor of public accounts
shall give notice, by publication, and thereupon the power
of such agent shall cease and determine. A company which
does not in any year solicit any new business, but which re-
ceives the premiums from business done in any previous year
or years, shall be construed as doing business in this state
tor that year, and be subject to the taxes imposed by this act.

Railroad and Canal Companies.

§ 20. Every railroad and canal company not exempted from
taxation by virtue of its charter, shall report annually, on
the first day of June, to the auditor of public accounts, the
estimated value of its real and personal property of every
description, as of the first day of February of each year,
classifying the same under the following heads:

First. Roadway and track, or canal bed.

Second. Depots, depot grounds and lots, station buildings
and fixtures, and machine shops.

Third. Real estate not included in other classes.

Fourth. Rolling stock, including passenger, freight, cattle,
or stock, baggage, mail, express, sleeping, palace, and all
other cars owned by or belonging to the company; boats,
machinery, and equipments, houses and appurtenances occu-
pied by lock-gate keepers and other emp.oyees.

Fifth. Stores.

Sixth. Telegraph lines.

Seventh. Miscellaneous property.

Every such company shall also report, on or before the
first day June of each year, tho gross and net receipts of
the road or canal for the twelve months preceding the first
day of February of each year, and in all cases the report
shall be so made as to give the data on which the same is
made. If such road or canal is only in part within the com-
monwealth, the report shall show what part is within the
commonwealth, and what proportion the same bears to the
entire length of the road or canal, and sball apportion the
receipts accordingly. The reports herein required, shall be
verified by the oath of the president or other propor officer.
Upon the receipt of every such report, it shall be the duty
of the auditor of public accounts to lay the same before the
board of public works, who shall, after thirty days’ notice
previously given to the president, treasurer, or other proper
officer, proceed to ascertain and assess the value of tbe pro-
perty, 80 reported, upon the best and most reliable informa-
tion that can be procured, and to this end, shall be authorized
and empowered to send for persons and papers should it be
deemed necessary. A certified copy of the assessment, when
made, shall be immediately forwarded by the secretary of
the board to the president or other proper officer of every
railroad or canal company so assessed, whose duty it shall
be to pay into the treasury of the state, within sixty days
atter the receipt thereof, the tax which may be imposed
thereon by law. A company failing to make such reports
orto pay the tax assessed upon its property, shall be imme.
diately assessed, under the direction of the auditor of public
accounts, by any person appointed by him for the purpose,
rating their real estate and rolling stock at twenty thousand
dollars per mile; and a tax shall at once be levied on such
value, at the annual rate levied upon the value of the othe
property for the year. Such tax so levied, as well as the
eam required to be paid upon the report hereinbefore men-
tioned, it the same be not paid at the time provided herein,
shall be collected by any sheriff or collector to whom the
auditor may deliver the assessment or a copy thereof. The
sheriff or collector may distrain and sell any personal pro-
perty of such company, and shall pay the taxes into the
treasury within three months from the time of the assess-
ment, or a copy as aforeyaid may be delivered to him.

Tax on £edlars.

§ 37. The specific license tax on every person for the privi-
lege of pedling and bartering, shall be fifty dollars; but no
resident mechanic or manufacturer, except a manufacturer
of ardent spirits or malt liquors, sball be taxed for the privi-
lege of pedling or bartering articles manufactured by him-
self in this state. Any person other than a resident me-
chanic or manufacturer, who desires to obtain a license un-
der this section, to sell throughout the state, may be allowed
to do so upon the payment of a specific tax of two hundred
and fifty dollars. If the licenso shall be used out of the
county or corporation wherein it is issued, it sball in all
cases be authenticated by the certificate of the clerk of the
county or corporation aforesaid, with the seal of the court
affixed, as provided in the case of sample merchants.

Common Criers.

§ 60. Any person licensed as a common crier, may cry for
sale, at any place in the county or corporation in which his
license issued, any property, real or personal, for any auc-
tioneer, fiduciary, or for the owner of the property, where
such owner is authorized to sell the same by auction; but he
shall not conduct a sale otherwise than under the present
and immediate direction of the property owner, or other
person authorized to sell the same. He shall not, as such
crier, receive money on account of the sale, grant aequit-
tances, or give any evidence of a sale or title to the purcba-
ser. He may receive for his services a stated compensation,
but he shall not receive any commission or per centage on
the amount of the sale, nor any specific or contingent interest
in the sale as a compensation for his services, directly or in-
directly. For any violation of this section, the person offend-
ing shall pay a fine of not less than fifty dollars nor more
than five hundred dollars for each offence.
Commercial Brokers and Insurance Brokers.

§ 71. No person shall, without a license authorized by law,
‘act as commercial broker. Every person who negotiates
the purchase and sale of promissory notes, or who negotiates
‘loans upon any class of securities, unless he be a stockbroker
or private banker, or who negotiates the sale of merchan-
dise, without baving possession or control of it as commis-
sion merchants have, shall, for the purposes of this section,
be deemed a commercial broker. No person shall, without
a license authorized by law, act as insurance broker. HKvery
person, not being a licensed insurance agent, or the employee
of such agent, who shall solicit for compensation, directly or
indirectly to be derived therefrom, any fire, marine, or life
insurance, either on account of any person desiring to effect
any such insurance, or of any insurance company, shall, for
the purposes of this section, be deemed an insurance broker.
Any person acting as commercial broker or insurance bro-
ker, without a license, shall pay a fine of not less than fifty
dollars, nor more than five hundred dollars for each offence.

Tax on Commercial Brokers and Insurance Brokers.

§ 72. The specific license tax on a commercial broker and
onan insurance broker shall be two hundred and fifty dollars.

What constitutes a Boarding-house.

§ 78. Any person who shall furnish for compensation, board
or lodging, or both, to any number of persons exceeding five,
for a period as long as one week, shall, if he be not the
keeper of an ordinary or house of private entertainment,
according to the provisions of this act, be deemed to keep a
boarding-house. The tax thereon shall be a specific tax for
the privilege of keeping such house; and if any tax is im-
posed upon the annual rent or value of the house, such rent
or value shall be ascertained in the same manner as the rent
or annual value of an ordinary is required to be ascertained.
Any person who shall keep a boarding-house without a
license, shall pay a fine of not less than five dollars, nor more
than twenty dollars for each day he may keep the same.

Tax on Shows, Circuses, and Menageries.

§ 93. The specific license tax on every show, circus, or
menagerie, shall be, for each day, twenty dollars, in a town of
less than one thousand inbabitants, or in a county, and not
within five miles of 4 city or town having one thousand in-
habitants and upwards. The specific license tax on every
show, on each performance of every circus, and on the exhi-
bition of a menagerie, shall be fifty dollars, if in a city or
town having more than one thousand and less than ten thou-
sand inhabitants, or within five miles thereof; if in a city, or
witbin five miles of a ‘city of more than ten thousand inhab-
itants, one hundred dollars. And in addition to the specific
tax aforesaid, there shall be a tax of five per centum of the
gross receipts derived from such show, circus, or menagerie.

Tax on Hobby-horse Machines, Merry-go-rounds, and other like
Machines.

§ 95. The specific license tax on every such hobby-borse
machine, merry-go-round, or other like machines on which
persons are charged for riding, shall be, for each county in
which such machine is operated, the sum of ten dollars: pro-
vided however, that if the machine is connected with a
circus or menagerie, the ,license tax sball be two dollars for
each day. Any person operating any such machine, without
first having paid the specific license tax therefor, sball pay
a fine of not less than twenty nor more than fifty dollars for
cach offence.

Agents for Renting Houses.

§ 107. Any person engaged in renting houses, farms, or
other real estate, for compensation or profit, shall be deemed
to be an agent for renting houses, and when licensed as such,
may engage not only in renting houses, but any real estate:
provided that administrators, guardians, executors, and other
fiduciaries, shall be exempt fram the payment of the tax.
Any person engaged as an agent for renting houses as afore-
said, without a license, sball pay a fine of not less than fifty
dollars, nor more than one hundred dollars for each offence.

Tax on Livery Stables.

§ 114. The specific license tax to keep a livery stable in
the country, and in towns of less than two thousand inhabi-
tants, shall be fifteen dollars; and in towns of two thousand
inhabitants and over, shall be twenty-five dollars; and an
additional tax of fifty cents for cach stall therein. And
herein shall be included as stalls, such space as may be
neceseary for a horse to staud, and in which a horse is or
may be kept. If the license be to keep a livery stable by
proprietors of public watering-places, and other places of
summer resort, or any other person at such places, and is
for six months or less, the tax thereon shall be one-half the
rates above specified. The specific license tax to a person
for the privilege of running a single hack shall be ten dollars.

2. This act shall be in force from its passage.