Chap. 103.—An ACT to amend and re-enact section 47 of an act entitled
an act to raise revenue for the support of the government and public
free schools, and to pay the interest on the public debt, and to provide
a special tax for pensions, as authorized by section 189 of the Consti-
tution, approved April 16, 1903. (S. B. 100)

‘Approved March 15, 1915.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That section
forty-seven of an act entitled an act to raise revenue for the support of
the government and public free schools and to pay the interest on the
public debt, and to provide a special tax for pensions, as authorized by
section one hundred and eighty nine of the Constitution, approved April
sixteenth, nineteen hundred and three, be amended and re-enacted so
as to read as follows:

Section 47. Every railroad company or other incorporated company
in this Commonwealth, whether such privilege be granted in its charter
or not, which shall sell any mineral or forest product, or any other article,
shall be taxed as other merchants dealing in like commodities. This act
shall apply to companies keeping commissaries, or having agents for the
sale of any other article than their own product; provided, that nothing
herein contained shall prevent a railroad company from buying and dis-
tributing to its employees, as part of their compensation, meat, meal,
and flour, at the cost price thereof; but nothing in the foregoing shall be
construed as requiring a company selling the products of their own mines,
or lands, or manufacturers, to pay a merchant’s license fot so doing,
except as otherwise provided by law with reference to the licensing of
merchants by the State.

Any railroad company or other incorporated company selling any
article or products on account of the owner, and receiving a compensation
therefor other than for transportation, storage or handling, as provided
in its charter, shall pay a license the same as commission merchants. It
shall be the duty of the commissioner of the revenue to ascertain the
liability of such individuals or companies in this State to the payment
of such license taxes, and shall assess the same in the same manner as
other merchants.

2. ‘The revenue for the current year being affected, an emergency is
declared to exist, and this act shall be in force from its passage.