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REDISTRIBUTION OF GENERAL TAXES IN DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

general tax for that year, or so much thereof as well as all special assessments of any kind, as shall then be due and payable by the property involved, shall then be paid. The purpose of the third section is to enable the purchaser of a part of an unsubdivided tract of land upon the whole of which a general tax or a special assessment, or both are due, to pay the portion of such tax or assessment upon such part of said tract as in the judgment of the assessor is equitably chargeable thereto instead of requiring the payment of the general tax or special assessment against the entire tract.

The effect of the first section, with respect to arrears of general taxes due on the land, would be twofold. The subdividing owner of the property would be required to pay the general tax due up to the end of the half of the fiscal year in which the subdivision would be made; which would be equitable, because the grantees of such owner ought not to be required to pay taxes for the portion of the tax year previous to their acquisition of title to their lots; nor for any general taxes of prior years. This would also be fair to the subdividing owner who, when a subdivision is made during the first six months of a fiscal year, might, if he were required to pay the tax for the entire fiscal year, be paying for several months in advance during which the ownership and use of the land might be in one or more of his grantees. On the other hand the District would be benefited by the requirement to pay the general tax for the first six months, in that it would have the immediate use of the money, and as the reassessment of the land as subdivided would as a rule exceed the assessment of the original parcel of which the subdivision would be made, the District would collect a correspondingly increased tax thereby.

When a subdivision is made during the second six months of a fiscal year, the subdividing owner should be required, as proposed in the second section of the bill, to pay the entire unpaid general tax for that fiscal year, for the same general reason that he should pay for the first six months, when the subdivision is made during that period; and in order to avoid bookkeeping complications which the apportionment of the tax by smaller fractions of the year to the several subdivisions would involve.

With respect to the third section, there is at present no law which authorizes the redistribution of an assessment. In many cases the owner of the tract as it exists prior to the sale of a part of it, is not able or is unwilling to pay the assessment on the whole of it before it is due, while it would be unreasonable to expect the purchaser to pay more than is lawfully and equitably chargeable against the portion of the tract to which he acquires title.

There are cases in which the purchaser of a part of an unsubdivided parcel of land on which general taxes and special assessments are due finds it impossible to pay the share equitably chargeable against his holding without paying the assessment on the entire parcel. There is no law in the District of Columbia under which such purchaser could recover from the owner or owners of the remainder of the parcel the amount equitably chargeable to such remainder if he should pay the entire assessment. The result is that property is annually being sold at tax sale because the owner of a part of a parcel can not secure a division of the assessment so as to enable him to pay the amount justly chargeable against the portion which he owns.

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CONVEYANCE OF LOTS ON LOW GROUNDS IN WASHINGTON, D. C.

JANUARY 31 (calendar day, FEBRUARY 1), 1921.—Ordered to be printed.

Mr. JONES of Washington, from the Committee on the District of Columbia, submitted the following

REPORT.

[To accompany H. R. 12045.]

The Committee on the District of Columbia, to whom was referred the bill (H. R. 12045) to provide for the conveyance of lots on the low grounds of Washington, D. C., having considered the same, reports favorably thereon with the recommendation that the following amendment be adopted and the bill as amended be passed.

On page 2, after the word "evidence," add the words "and that buildings are now upon such lands that comply with or exceed the original building requirements."

The provisions of this bill and the reasons for its passage are explained by reference to the following letter addressed to the chairman of the House Committee on the Public Lands by the Secretary of the Interior, regarding H. R. 5332, introduced some time ago: DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, Washington, December 19, 1919.

Hon. N. J. SINNOTT,

Chairman Committee on the Public Lands,

House of Representatives.

DEAR MR. SINNOTT: Your letter of August 25 has been received, inclosing, with request for report thereon, H. R. 5332, entitled "A bill authorizing and directing the Secretary of the Interior to make, execute, and deliver to the Safe Deposit & Trust Co., of Baltimore, trustee under the will of Florence B. Gelston, deceased, a deed in fee of lot thirteen, in reservation eleven, in the city of Washington, D. C." The bill in question is substantially as follows:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That to quiet the title to lot thirteen, in reservation eleven, the Secretary of the Interior be, and he hereby is, authorized and directed to make, execute, and deliver to Safe Deposit and Trust Company of Baltimore, trustee under the will of Florence B. Gelston, deceased, a deed in fee of said lot thirteen, in reservation eleven, conveying said land and premises to said Safe Deposit and Trust Company of Baltimore, trustee, without proof of compliance of the building conditions contained in a certain bond signed by the mayor of the corporation of Washington and the commissioners appointed under an act passed by said corporation of Washington

May 22, 1822, entitled "An act to carry into effect an act of Congress entitled 'An act to authorize and empower the corporation of the city of Washington, in the District of Columbia, to drain the low grounds on and near the public reservations and to improve and ornament certain parts of such reservation," said bond being recorded on the 26th day of October, 1835, in liber W B 56, at folio 497, of the land records of the District of Columbia.

In the report of the Secretary of the Interior for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1906, the following historical statement is made in relation to lands in the District of Columbia, the title to a portion of which is proposed to be conveyed in the bill under consideration:

LOTS IN THE LOW GROUNDS IN THE CITY OF WASHINGTON, D. C.

By act of Congress approved May 7, 1822 (3 Stat. L., 691), the corporation of the city of Washington, in the District of Columbia, was authorized and empowered to drain the low grounds on or near the public reservations in the city of Washington, and to improve and ornament certain parts of such reservation.

By section 2 of said act the corporation, among other things, was empowered to make an agreement with the Washington Canal Co. by which the location of the parts of the canal passing through that section of the city lying between Second and Seventh Streets west should be changed into such course as would most effectually drain the low ground lying on the borders of the Tiber Creek. To effect this the corporation was (sec. 2) authorized to lay off in building lots certain parts of the public reservations Nos. 10, 11, and 12 (commencing at the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue and Second Street NW., thence northwardly to the corner of C Street NW., thence westwardly along C Street to the corner of Four-and-a-half Street NW., thence along Fourand-a-half Street to the corner of Pennsylvania Avenue, thence eastwardly along the north side of Pennsylvania Avenue to the place of beginning), to sell and dispose of the right and title of the United States of, in, or to said lots, or any part thereof, at public sale.

The corporation was further authorized (sec. 2) to lay off two squares south of Pennsylvania Avenue (squares A and B, lying and being between Third Street NW. on the east, Missouri Avenue on the south, Sixth Street on the west, and Pennsylvania Avenue on the north), and also lay off north of Maryland Avenue two uniform and corresponding squares (C and D, lying and being between Third Street NW. on the east, Maryland Avenue on the south, Sixth Street on the west, and Maine Avenue on the north), the said four squares when so laid off to be divided into building lots and the right and title of the United States in such lots be disposed of at public sale. The proceeds of these sales were in the first place to be applied to the purposes first mentioned; in the second place to inclose, plant, and otherwise improve certain reservations, to build bridges, etc., and the surplus, if any, to be covered into the Treasury.

Section 3 of said act provides that upon payment of the purchase money and upon the compliance with the conditions of improvement by the purchaser or purchasers, or his or their heirs or assigns, the mayor of said city for the time being shall be, and he is hereby, empowered to execute a deed or deeds in fee to such purchaser or purchasers, his or their heirs or assigns, under his hand and seal of the said corporation, which deed or deeds shall be recorded among the land records of Washington, etc.

To carry into execution the act of May 7, 1822, the corporation of Washington, by ordinance approved May 22, 1822 (ch. 134, Rothwell's Laws of the District of Columbia), created a board of five commissioners, who would at once proceed to lay off the parcels of ground into squares and building lots, prescribe terms of sales and conditions of improvement.

On the 25th of May, 1822, the Low Grounds Commission, having organized on the 31st of the same month, adopted the following conditions of sale of the lots in reservations 10, 11, 12, etc., viz:

First, one-fifth of the purchase money down, the balance to be divided into five annual payments, bearing interest from the day of sale; second, each of the lots on Pennsylvania Avenue to be built on and the houses to be in a habitable and taxable condition on or before the 1st day of November, 1825, and on other lots on or before the 1st day of November, 1827; third, the outer walls of all the houses to be of brick and stone, the houses not less than 18 feet wide, 20 feet high, and 30 feet deep. Penalty for failure to comply with the conditions or any of them, forfeiture of all moneys previously paid, and the land to revert to the corporation-i. e., the United States. On the 13th of June, 1828, the commission adopted the following, to wit:

That the building conditions adopted by the commission prior to the first sales of lots on Pennsylvania Avenue be, and the same are hereby, suspended for three years from this time.

All the lots in said reservations were sold from time to time at public auction, and on December 15, 1833, the books and records of the commissioners were formally turned over to the authorities of the city of Washington, and the board virtually dissolved. Said books are now in the custody of the Board of Commissioners of the District of Columbia.

In the case of Van Ness and wife v. The Mayor of Washington and The United States (4 Peters, 232) it was held that the proceedings of the corporation of Washington in relation to the sale of lots in conformity to the conditions of the act of May 7, 1822, were valid and effectual, etc.

On July 1, 1879, there was approved by the President an act entitled "An act to provide for the conveyance of the low grounds in the city of Washington, under the provisions of the act of Congress approved May 7, 1822" (21 Stat., 47), which provides "that the powers and duties heretofore and by the third section of the act of Congress approved May 7, 1822, to wit, chapter 96 of the first session of the Seventeenth Congress, devolved upon and vested in 'the mayor of the city of Washington for the time being,' be, and the same hereby are, vested in and devolved upon the Secretary of the Interior, who shall execute the deeds thereby required under his hand and official seal when it shall appear to him the persons applying for such deeds are duly entitled to the same: Provided, nevertheless, This act shall not be construed as to create or revive any right lost by lapse of time."

Since the passage of the foregoing act deeds have been executed by the Secretary of the Interior in favor of various parties who had the equitable title thereto to 18 lots in the low grounds of the District of Columbia. Four applications, involving 10 lots, are still pending, the parties not having furnished the necessary evidence. One application has been favorably considered during the year, and a deed covering the property to which it refers will be executed at an early date.

Since 1906 a number of applications for relief under the provisions of the act above mentioned have been presented, and applicants have been uniformly required to furnish an abstract of title showing equitable title to lands for which deed was desired, payment of all taxes of any kind or character due the District of Columbia, and satisfactory evidence of compliance with requirements of the building conditions above mentioned. No deeds, however, have been granted owing to the inability of the applicants to show compliance by the original purchasers or their successors with the conditions of sale as to building. In two instances, to wit: The case of Ida Seymour Tulloch et al., for a deed to sublot 38 of original lot 17 in reservation D, applicants, after denial of their application by the department, petitioned Congress for relief, and H. R. bill 16755 (63d Cong., 2d sess.) passed the House August 1, 1914, in which the Secretary of the Interior was authorized in his discretion to execute and deliver the desired deed, and in the case of Otto L. Wolfsteiner and Lillie M. Thomson for a deed to a part of lot 39 in reservation 10, applicants, after denial of their application by the department, petitioned Congress for relief, and a bill, S. 3509 (64th Cong., 2d sess.), passed the Senate February 16, 1916, and was reported favorably in the House of Representatives by the House Committee on the District of Columbia, on February 27, 1917, in which the Secretary of the Interior was likewise authorized in his discretion to execute and deliver the desired deed. Neither of these bills. however, became laws.

In the case under consideration, the records show that House bill 8853 (65th Cong., 2d sess.), entitled "A bill authorizing and directing the Secretary of the Interior to make, execute, and deliver with the Safe Deposit and Trust Co., of Baltimore, trustee under the will of Florence B. Gelston, deceased, a deed in fee of lot 13 in reservation 11, in the city of Washington, District of Columbia," was referred by the House Committee on the Public Lands to this department for consideration, and under date of March 12, 1918, a report was made stating that it was not prac ticable to express an opinion on the merits of the bill, as the beneficiary therein had presented no claim for relief under the provisions of the act of July 1, 1879 (21 Stats., 47). Subsequently, however, Hon. Charles P. Coady, of the House of Representatives, made personal inquiry as to what evidence would be required by the department had an application for deed been presented by the beneficiary mentioned in the bill, and he was advised by department letter of April 29, 1918 (copy herewith), as to the requirements; the evidence suggested, however, has not been filed.

I do not approve House bill 5332, for the reason that it is mandatory in character, and should it become a law no inquiry could be made as to whether or no the beneficiary was entitled to the relief sought, or requirement be made as to payment of taxes due. If it is the desire of Congress to grant relief in this particular case, I have to suggest that the bill be amended as follows:

On page 1 of House bill 5332, line 5, strike out the words "and directed to make" and insert in lieu thereof “at his discretion to," so that it will read in part as follows:

"That to quiet the title to lot 13 in reservation 11, the Secretary of the Interior be, and he hereby is, authorized in his discretion to execute and deliver to the Safe Deposit and Trust Co., of Baltimore, trustee under the will of Florence B. Gelston, deceased, a deed in fee of said lot 13," etc.

In view of the number of applications for relief under the act of July 1, 1879, supra, which the department has been compelled to deny, and the likelihood that there are a large number of cases which may arise hereafter, in which the right to equitable relief is just as great as that of the beneficiary in House bill 5332, it is suggested that Congress will be relieved of the consideration of these cases as they arise if general legislation covering the subject is enacted, and the accompanying bill is therefore submitted as one that would meet the conditions of the case.

Very respectfully,