Protests against apportionments under the estimate were few. From October, 1774, to March, 1777, no tax was levied. When it was found necessary to resume taxation a committee was appointed to consider the changes which had occurred in each town since 1769, and agree upon a new basis of apportionment. The committee completed its work in one day, and made a report containing an estimate which was accepted as a temporary standard. The total valuation of the new estimate was only a few pounds greater than that of eight years before. The island towns, then in possession of the enemy, were relieved at the expense of the main land, the most important change being the removal of £100,000 from the valuation of Newport and the placing of it on Providence, increasing the valuation of the latter town by nearly eighty per cent. Providence, in its desire to further the resumption of taxation, accepted this large addition, but only on condition that it should not become a precedent. The General Assembly however showed no desire to take a new estimate and continued to apportion taxes in accordance with the estimate of March, 1777.
Providence, beginning to feel the burdens of the war in the stoppage of its commerce and the demands of military service, protested and refused to pay its tax as it had done ten years before. The assembly reduced the valuation of Providence first by £25,000, then by £50,000, and in October, 1778, passed an act for taking a new estimate. As in 1769, a committee of five was appointed and was directed to proceed into each town and take account of ratable estates and all male polls of twenty-one years and upwards, except ministers of the gospel and officers and soldiers in the army and naval service. The principles on which the estimate was to be taken varied but little from those laid down for the estimate of 1769. All the property enumerated was to be appraised at its full value, "whether the said rateable Property be removed without the limits of the state of not." The committee as before were empowered, if they thought best, to deduct debts from personal estate. No report was made until July, 1780. The committee had visited each town "and with great care, and as much precision as possible, have endeavored to obtain an exact account of the real value of this state." The report was accepted and the estimate declared to be the legal basis of apportionment. The total valuation was £2,778,145-10-0. In September several towns complained that the estimate was erroneous, and a committee was appointed to revise it. This committee reported in November having increased the total valuation about £10,000, and made considerable alterations in the relative portions of the towns. This report was submitted to still another revision, the final report however being presented at the same session. The total remained unchanged and the changes made in proportions assigned to the towns were, for the most part, not important. This last report gives merely the total valuations of the towns, but the earlier report of the November session comprises the following headings:
| Number of acres | 518,112-3/4 |
| Price per acre | £2-5s. to £70-10s-6d. |
| Value of real estate | 2,788,145-10s. |
In none of these estimates were the island towns included. A valuation of these towns, in accordance with the act of 1778, was ordered in June, 1783, and completed in October of the same year. It showed a total of £502,227-5-0 which, added to the valuation of the mainland towns in 1780, gave a total valuation for the state of £3,290,372-15-0. This was the last general estimate made before the adoption of the constitution of the United States.
The first point which we notice in these valuations is the prominent part played by the poll tax. On the basis of the estimate of 1762, and a poll tax of six pence per one thousand pounds, the poll tax supplied 20.7 per cent of all receipts from taxes. In 1769, the proportion was 22.2 per cent. This proportion increased of course with the growth of population, and by 1774, must have amounted to 24 per cent, but the diminution of the taxable population during the war brought it down again to 22 per cent in 1780. As to the proportions in which personal and real estate entered into the valuation, personal estate formed about one third of the total in 1762, and about one fourth in 1769, while, owing to the destruction of personal property during the war, it had sunk to about one-eighth in 1780. In all these estimates there is a tendency to favor personalty, as represented in the growing commercial interests, at the expense of the proprietors of land. In 1762, money and trading stock was valued at only one half of its true value, and in 1769, land was valued at twenty years rental which must certainly have been a high valuation.
A comparison of the proportions in which the various towns contributed to the various taxes is instructive. The figures following refer to the estimate of 1769. The whole number of towns was twenty-eight. Eleven towns paid a larger proportion of the total property tax than of the total poll tax, showing they contained more than their proportionate share of wealth. As a whole they comprised the territory which borders on Narragansett Bay, and which had been long settled. Together they contained 40.32 per cent of the rateable polls, and 56.10 per cent of the property in the colony. The most important towns among them were Newport, which contained 12.44 per cent of the polls, and 15.6 per cent of the property; Providence which contained 5.06 per cent of the polls and 5.94 per cent of the property, and South Kingstown which contained 4.78 per cent of the polls and 9.3 per cent of the property. As a rule these were also the towns which contained the largest proportions of personal property.
Of the property valued in Newport 47.4 per cent was personal, in Providence 51 per cent. Newport contained 30 per cent of all the personal property in the colony, Providence 12.4 per cent (i.e. the two commercial towns with 17.5 per cent of the polls contained 42.4 per cent of the personal property) and South Kingstown 6.2 per cent. Eleven towns out of the twenty-eight contained 77 per cent of the personalty. These same towns contained 49.5 per cent of the polls.
The gain in valuation from £2,111,295-10-7 to £3,290,372-15, between 1769 and 1780-1783, was entirely on real estate, the personal property valuation remaining practically stationary, owing to the destruction caused by the war.
There is a falling off in the share of taxes paid by the commercial towns in proportion to their population. In 1782, Providence contained 8.23 per cent of the population, but it paid only 6.98 per cent of the taxes. Newport's per centage of population had fallen to 10.56 per cent and the per centage of taxes to 7.81. On the other hand, the country towns had gained proportionately. Taking Providence county, exclusive of the town of Providence, we find that in 1769, it contained 26.64 per cent of the polls and 19.2 per cent of the property, in 1782 it contained 25.27 per cent of the population and 27 per cent of the property. There was but little change in the relative positions of the other counties, Kings County made a slight gain, and the other counties suffered a slight loss, with the exception of Newport County. Here the loss of the Island towns was great. In 1769, they contained 19.09 per cent of the polls and 26.7 per cent of the property while in 1783 they had but about 16 per cent of the population and 15.2 per cent of the property.