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repeal and the failure to reënact in the present law either the whole estate or succession duty.

What it was considered the act of 1864 levied the tax on is also in addition demonstrated by the amendments made to the act of 1864 in 1866. One of these amendments was: "That any legacy or share of personal property passing as aforesaid to a minor child of the person who died possessed as aforesaid shall be exempt from taxation under this section, unless such legacy or share shall exceed the sum of one thousand dollars, in which case the excess only above that sum shall be liable to said taxation." Another was that any tax paid under the provisions of sections 124 and 125 of the act of 1864 should "be deducted from the particular legacy or distributive share, on account of which the same is charged." In other words, the act expressly commanded that to be done, which it was impossible should be done compatibly with any hypothesis that the tax was on the whole personal estate, for, as we have seen, under that assumption the deduction of the tax from the whole estate was essential.

That the provisions of the act of 1864 were in mind when the present act was drafted is apparent, since it is not disputed that the act under review, so far as the tax on legacies and distributive shares is concerned, is an exact reproduction of the original act of 1864, except to the extent that the present act contains. provisions relating to a progressive increase of rates. We say of the original act, because the present act does not contain in it the amendments to which we have referred, made in 1866; the fair inference being that the writer of the present act had before him the original text of the act of 1864, and not that text as amended by the act of 1866.

As the only provisions added to the present law relate to the progressive rate upon the legacies, it follows that, unless these added clauses provide for a tax on the whole estate instead of the legacies, it is a demonstration that the whole estate is not taxed by the present act. That the progressive rate features inserted in the act now under review have even no tendency to bring about such a result, we proceed now to demonstrate. We reproduce such portions of section 29 as are essential, putting in

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brackets the words found in the act of 1898 under review, which were not contained in the corresponding provisions existing in the act of 1864:

"That any person or persons having in charge or trust, as administrators, executors or trustees, any legacies or distributive shares arising from personal property where the whole amount of such personal property as aforesaid shall exceed the sum of [ten] thousand dollars in actual value, passing, after the passage of this act, from any person possessed of such property, either by will or by the intestate laws of any State or Territory, or any personal property or interest therein, transferred by deed, grant, bargain, sale or gift, made or intended to take effect in possession or enjoyment after the death of the grantor or bargainor, to any person or persons, or to any body or bodies, politic or corporate, in trust or otherwise, shall be, and hereby are, made subject to a duty or tax to be paid to the United States, as follows, that is to say: [Where the whole amount of said personal property shall exceed in value ten thousand and shall not exceed in value the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars, the tax shall be:]"

Immediately following this are five classifications of beneficiaries, each varying in rate. These are followed by the progressive rate clause, which is as follows:

["Where the amount or value of said property shall exceed the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars, but shall not exceed the sum or value of one hundred thousand dollars, the rates of duty or tax above set forth shall be multiplied by one and onehalf, and where the amount or value of said property shall exceed the sum of one hundred thousand dollars, but shall not exceed the sum of five hundred thousand dollars, such rates of duty shall be multiplied by two; and where the amount or value of such property shall exceed the sum of five hundred thousand dollars, but shall not exceed the sum of one million dollars, such rates of duty shall be multiplied by two and onehalf; and where the amount or value of such property shall exceed the sum of one million dollars, such rates of duty shall be multiplied by three."]

Observing closely the text, it is apparent that the clause

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therein which points out what is taxed is an exact copy of the act of 1864, except the substitution of the " ten" for the word "one." The subject taxed, therefore, under the present act is the same which was taxed under the act of 1864. This is the equivalent of a mathematical certainty. Coming, then, to the added provision at the end of the first paragraph, it says: "Where the whole amount of said personal property shall exceed in value," etc. This, however, creates no new object of taxation, but simply provides that where said personal property, that is, the property previously specified, exceeds a certain amount, a given rate shall be imposed. So, in the further addition, pointing out the progressive feature, the law says, "Where the amount or value of said property shall exceed the sum of," etc., thus clearly again referring to the objects of taxation, the property described in the first part of the act, which was identically the same thing described in the act of 1864. The demonstration, therefore, is conclusive that the progressive feature clause added in the present act creates no new subject of taxation; it simply provides for the progressive rates on the said property mentioned in the opening sentences, which is described exactly as it was in the act of 1864. Now, as the act of 1864 taxed, not the whole estate, but each particular legacy or distributive share, the conclusion cannot be escaped that the present law does the same thing, except that there is added thereto a progressive rate.

The tax being then on the legacies and distributive shares, the rate primarily being determined by the relation of the legatees or distributees to the estate, does the law command that the progressive rate of tax which it imposes on the legacies or distributive shares shall be measured, not separately by the amount of each particular legacy or distributive share, but by the sum of the whole personal estate? This, as we have said, is the interpretation of the act which was adopted by the assessor in levying the taxes under review, and which was sustained by the court below.

The unsoundness of the construction, that the act measures the rate of tax by the whole estate, is fully shown by what we have already said, for, as under the act of 1864 the legacies and

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distributive shares alone were taxed, and as in reënacting it the exact language was retained, (omitting the separate provisions in the act of 1864, taxing the whole estate by a probate duty and taxing successions,) and as the progressive rates only refer to the object taxed, as provided in the act of 1864, it results that under no reasonable construction can the present act be held to provide for a rate of tax computed on the whole estate. Even, however, if all the previous history be shut out of view, and even if the omission from this act of the whole estate duty which obtained under the act of 1864 be for the moment forgotten, the text of the law, considered alone, would not support the construction that it provides for a tax upon each legacy and distributive share by a rate of tax measured by the whole estate. In order to make this clear we will briefly analyze the text. In doing so, however, we eliminate the attempt made by counsel in argument to show the significance thereof by expressions used in the course of the debate by certain members of the Senate. Maxwell v. Dow, 176 U. S. 581, and cases there cited.

The meaning of the act largely turns upon the following words, contained in the opening paragraph of section 29: "Where the whole amount of such personal property as aforesaid shall exceed the sum of ten thousand dollars in actual value, passing," etc. If these words refer to the whole amount of the estate left by a deceased person, then the words added in the act of 1898, to the end of the paragraph, viz., "where the whole amount of said personal property shall exceed in value ten thousand, and shall not exceed in value the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars, the tax shall be," as stated in five classifications next enumerated, must refer to the same thing. It follows likewise that the progressive rate clause, which says, "where the amount or value of said property shall exceed the sum of," etc., must relate to the same thing; that is, the whole amount of the estate, as stated in the opening sentences of section 29. If this view be correct, then all legacies in an estate of ten thousand dollars are exempt, and all legacies, whatever be their amount, in an estate above ten thousand dollars, have the original rate adjusted according to the classifications, and that rate is in

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creased progressively by the whole amount of the estate, and not by the amount of the legacy. If, on the other hand, the words "where the whole amount of such personal property as aforesaid shall exceed the sum of ten thousand dollars," found in the first sentence of section 29, relate to the whole amount of each legacy, then legacies under ten thousand dollars are not taxable, and those above ten thousand pay the original rate provided in the classifications, and become subject to the progressive increase clause, according to the amount of the legacy, and not by the whole amount of the estate.

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But the pivotal words in the first sentence are not simply "the whole amount of such personal property," but the "whole amount of such personal property as aforesaid." This can only refer to the preceding part of the sentence, where what is contemplated by the words "as aforesaid" is and can alone be any legacies or distributive shares arising from personal property passing after the passage of this act." In other words, the statute itself by the reference clause establishes that the whole amount referred to is the sum or value of each particular legacy, etc., separately considered, passing from the deceased to the taker thereof. And this construction of the vital words referred to, derived from what immediately precedes them, is sustained by what immediately follows them, that is, the clause imposing the tax on "any personal property or interest therein, transferred by deed," etc., "made or intended to take effect in possession or enjoyment after the death of the grantor or bargainor, to any person or persons," etc. This latter clause treats each item of property given in contemplation of death otherwise than by last will and testament, as a distinct entity to be considered for the purpose of levying the tax. Each of such items, therefore, separately considered, becomes for the purpose of the tax, the whole amount of such personal property, the statute clearly recognizing that there may be partial and distinct interests in each item of personal property, such as an interest for life in one person with a remainder in another. Thus by the two clauses, which are linked together by the words "the whole amount of such personal property," it develops that the amount referred to is the separate and distinct