Ville de Saint-Etienne 1912 (City of Saint-Etienne)
2me Crie (2nd category) - 325989
Bronze round, 30 mm
Below, the article concerning the tax on dogs, borrowed from the Grand dictionnaire universel of the XIXth century of Pierre Larousse :
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The law of May 2nd, 1855, to open to the municipalities a source of receipts to help them in the execution of municipal works, established on dogs, a tax the product of which enters entirely in the municipal coffer. This tax cannot exceed 10 francs nor be lower than 1 franc. Every Town Council draws up a rate which; having been subjected to the approval of the "General Council" (Council of the department), is settled by virtue of a decree pronounced in Council of State, on April 4th, 1855. In case the Town Council of a municipality would not present a rate, it would be ordered automatically on the proposition of the prefect. The ex officio taxation would still take place if, the rate being drawn up by the municipality, the General Council would be broken up without expressing its opinion. The rates include only two taxes : the highest is aimed on the dogs of enjoyment or being of use to the hunting; the least high is aimed on watch-dogs and, generally, on all those who are not included in the first category.
Of October 1st of every year on January 15th of the next year, all those who possess dogs are obliged to make to the city hall a registration indicating the number of their dogs and the use for which they are intended. These declarations are registered on a special register held with the aid of the mayor, and is given to déclarants a receipt removed from the counterfoil. Those who made a declaration before on January 1st are obliged to make it a second, if, before January 15th, the last time-limit of the declarations, it has taken place some change in the number and the use of their dogs. From 15 till 31 February, the tax inspector sends to the director of direct taxes the list which have to be of use as base to the preparation of the register of the taxpayers. This preparation, their execution and their publication, the distribution of demand note and the recovering of taxes take place as in direct taxes. The Taxpayers have to pay off the tax by equal portions, in so many terms that it remains of months from the publication of the register of the Taxpayers. The expenses of printing relative to the basis of the tax, those of the preparation of the register of the taxpayers, the preparation and the distribution of demand notes are chargeable to the municipalities.
The tax is due for all the dogs possessed on January 1st, except for those who, in this time, are still fed by the mother. Likened to the direct taxes, the municipal tax is established for whole year, that is it continues to be due, even when basis on which it bases stop existing during the course of the year. When the taxpayer dies during the course of the year, his heirs are accountable of the portion of the tax remaining to pay off. In case of move outside the competence of the perception, the tax is at once due for the totality of the current year.
Are liable to the increase of tax: 1 ° the one who, possessing one or several dogs, did not make declaration for the periods prescribes; 2° the one who made an incomplete or incorrect declaration. In the first case, the tax is tripled, and, in the second, it is doubled for the not declared dogs or which were the object of a false declaration. When a taxpayer was subjected to an increase of tax, and when, for the next year, he does not make the declaration or makes an incomplete or incorrect declaration, the tax is quadrupled in the first case, and tripled in the second.
Different rulings of the Council of State, established the distinction existing between the dogs of enjoyment and the watch-dogs. According to its jurisprudence, it is not necessary that a dog, to be considered as being a watch-dog, is constantly attached; its use just has to appear in a evident way, and it just has to explain or by the profession of the individual which possesses it, or by the housing conditions where the taxpayer is placed.
The complaints in municipal tax are presented, prepared and considered in them even form that the complaints in direct taxes. They can be made on pure paper, unless the tax about which it is a question exceeds the 30-franc amount; in that case, they must be drafted on a stamped paper by 0 F 50. Dogs serving for driving the blind persons are tax-exempt.
The law of May 2nd, 1855 was conceived and voted in an excellent purpose. It is evident that the legislator suggested realizing a measure of order just as much as a fiscal measure, and if the municipal administrations brought to the execution of this law a serious attention, we would see disappearing a big number of stray dogs which are for the law and order a permanent danger, a danger which police regulations cannot always prevent.