the State with promptness and great fidelity, at times being the channels through which millions of dollars have passed belonging to the State. The accompanying tables show the amounts of deposits. monthly in the Bank of Commerce of St. Louis, how secured, and the interest paid monthly to the State on deposits:

The interest received by the State upon its deposits since this ad

ministration came into power is $52,633.37. This result shows the wisdom of the present law upon this subject.

I refer with pride, as a Missourian, and especially as the Executive, to the financial management of the State for the last four years, fully believing that it will compare favorably with any previous administration, and will firmly anchor the State in the confidence of the business world. No step has been taken by the Treasurer or the Fund Commissioners which has not elevated the credit of the State, and given it a firmer hold upon the stock markets of the world. I call your attention to the accompanying letter from the cashier of the Bank of Com-merce of New York.

This bank has been the fiscal agent of Missouri for a quarter of a century.

NATIONAL BANK OF COMMERCE,
NEW YORK, December 8, 1884.

Honorables, the Governor, State Aulitor and Attorney General, Fund' Commissioners, State of Missouri:

GENTLEMEN-We have received with pleasure the letter of StateAuditor Walker expressing the approval of the Fund Commissionersof the manner in which this bank has performed its duty, in the large transactions with the financial department of your State; and, while assuring you of our gratification at the thorough business methods. which have characterized all the operations of the Fund Commi-sioners, we would take the opportunity to congratulate you upon the result of your administration as shown in the solid and satisfactory condition. of the State's finances.

Yours very respectfully,
W. W. SHERMAN,
Cashier.

Wise constitutional and legislative enactments and rigid honesty upon the part of the officers of the counties and State, have placed the credit of the State in the advanced rank of the foremost States.. United States 4 per cent. bonds are now selling in the stock exchanges at 1 20 100, which price yields the investor 2 75-100 per cent. interest per annum.

Missouri 6 per cent. eleven year bonds, the longest bonds now outstanding, sell readily at 1 30, yielding the investor 3 per cent. per annum, showing a difference in the value of the two securities of only one-fourth of one per cent. per annum. These figures show the credit of the government to be on a 2 per cent. basis and Missouri on a 3. per cent. basis. The former bonds are non-taxable, those of this State are, which may account for the fractional difference. This high stand

ing of the State is not the result of any one administration, of any one spasmodic effort, but is the outgrowth of that regular and natural progress of growth, which will alone, in governmental, as well as individual affairs, "secure solidity and stability in structure."

REVENUE.

Having touched upon the Treasury Department, I now call your attention to those facts which can only be supplied from the Auditor's office. The following tables show the increase in valuation in real and personal property. Since the 10th of January, 1881, to January 1, 1884,-no assessment having been made in 1884. Under the law, assessments upon all taxable property, except merchandise, shall be made between the first days of June and January, and the valuation is placed upon it the first day of June. The taxes upon this assessment are collected the following fall-over a year after the assessment is made.

Aggregate statement of the assessed valuation of property for the

taxes of 1883 and 1884:

Aggregate assesments for taxes of 1883 and 1884.... $656, 250,414 68 $725,775,259 45

In 1883 and 1884, State bonds were redeemed and purchased aggregating $2,144,000.

During these two years the State interest-bearing debt was increased by reason of certificates having been isued to the School and Seminary Funds as follows:

For the State School Fund....

For the benefit of the State University.....

$22,000

387,000

$409,000

Deducting certificates issued from bonds redeemed and purchased, the actual reduction of the interest bearing debt in 1883 and 1884 was $1,735,000, leaving the debt January 1, 1885, as follows:

The above statement includes bonds issued to the Hannibal & St." Joseph Railroad Company.

The annual interest on the public debt, as it existed January 1, 1883, amounted to $1,018,680.

As it now exists, the annual interest amounts to $910,490.

The annual interest on the bonded debt, as it now exists, is $708,180. On the certificates in the School and Seminary Funds the annual interest amounts to $202,310.

These tables show an increase in valuation in 1882 over 1881 of $47,544,369.11. In my former message to the legislature this language was used: "If the rate of increase in values is as great for 1883 as 1882, I think the valuation will exceed $700,000.000." It exceeded my anticipation. It is $725,775,259.45, an actual increase of 1883 over that of 1882 of $76,508,016.59, an increase of $122,052,385.70 in values for the years 1881, 1882, 1883. This rapid increase in values must soon secure a reduction of taxation, the desideratum of all good government. Under the constitution, the rate of State tax cannot exceed forty cents on the $100 valuation. Section 8 of Article 10 of the Constitution reads as follows: "The State tax on property, exclusive of the tax necessary to pay the bonded debt of the State, shall not exceed twenty cents on the hundred dollars valuation; and whenever the taxable property of the State shall amount to $900,000,000, the rate shall not exceed fifteen cents." If the large number of bonds, notes and other evidences of debt, now held in concealment within and without this State by its citizens, were honestly given in to the assessors, that amount would be largely exceeded at the present time. If, in the wisdom of this legislature, the expenditures of the public money should be carefully guarded, and made only in the reduction of the existing State debt, in the preservation and enlargement of its various institutions of learning, and to carry on the necessary expenses of the State, then in my opinion we may begin to look to an early day, when the reduction of taxation may be had-I hope before the next general assessment of property is made, which will be in two years from this date.

PUBLIC Debt.

The public debt has been reduced during this administration as follows: