| State Railroad Tax Cases | 92 U. S., 608 |
| Delaware Railroad Tax Case | 18 Wall., 206 |
| Erie Railway vs. Pennsylvania | 21 Wall., 492 |
| Western Union Telegraph Company vs. Mass | 125 U. S., 530 |
| Pullman Palace Car Company vs. Pennsylvania | 141 U. S., 18 |
| Maine vs. Grand Trunk Railway | 142 U. S., 217 |
| Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Chicago, and St. Louis Railway vs. Backus | 154 U. S., 430 |
Therefore this basis of division of values between territorial units appears to be well established by precedent. This is in a measure unfortunate, as certain classes of property cannot be apportioned equitably in this way, unless the value of a railroad be determined, and then that value allocated between different territorial units in proportion to mileage, without any regard to the location of any structure or series of structures in any State or county, the track-mileage basis must be looked upon as a method of apportionment which is subject to modification or which will lead to error.
In an Indiana tax case, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago, and St. Louis Railway vs. Backus (154 U. S., 444), the late Justice Brewer, of the Supreme Court, in handing down the judgment, said:
"The true value of a line of railroad is something more than an aggregation of the values of the separate parts of it, operated separately. It is the aggregate of those values plus that arising from a connected operation of the whole, and each part of the road contributes not merely the value arising from its independent operation, but its mileage proportion of that flowing from a continuous and connected operation of the whole.... The value of property results from the use to which it is put, and varies with the profitableness of that use, past, present and prospective, actual and anticipated. There is no pecuniary value outside that which results from such use....
"In the nature of things it is practically impossible, at least in respect to railroad property, to divide its value and determine how much is caused by one use to which it is put and how much by another. Take the case before us, it is impossible to disintegrate the value of that portion of the road within the State of Indiana and determine how much of that value springs from its use in doing interstate business and how much from its use in doing business wholly within the State. An attempt to do so would be entering upon a mere field of uncertainty and speculation."
In the Michigan cases, the principal one being Michigan Central Railroad vs. Powers (201 U. S., 245), the question of method of valuation was not passed on by the Courts for the reason that, after the evidence was in, and during the argument, counsel for the railroad admitted that the Cooley valuation was as correct a figure as it was possible to secure under then existing conditions, methods and rates of taxation being the issue.
It is thus seen that the Supreme Court of the United States was not, in any of the earlier cases, required to pass squarely on the propriety of any method of arriving at a "fair value," and consequently had not, prior to 1909, defined any hard-and-fast rules of procedure in determining such value. The Circuit Courts have passed on kindred questions in a few cases, among which San Diego Land and Town Company vs. National City (74 Fed., 83), and San Diego Land and Town Company vs. Jasper (110 Fed., 714) hold as above, and cite most of the cases referred to. In the latter case the Court says:
"The actual value of such property obviously depends upon a variety of considerations—among them the actual and prospective number of consumers—and is no more unchangeable than the value of any other kind of property."
As an illustration, there is cited the effect of a year's drouth on an irrigation plant as temporarily affecting the value of property.
In the case of Cotting vs. Kansas City Stock Yards (82 Fed., 839) the Circuit Court touches on one very interesting argument, in the light of some of the methods of valuation advocated by railway managers and some of the criticisms of recent valuation work.