Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 2.djvu/848

 WOODMAN V. BLT. 841 �tax, and there îs an entire failure to prove fraud on the part of the assesSor. The only evidence tending to establish ine- quality of valuation is that in 1876 these lands were assessed not above five dollars an acre ; that in 1877 they were (most of them) assessed $10 an acre. A witness testifies that the lands of the Mackinaw Lumber Company, in the same township, were assessed not above five dollars an acre. Both tracts are pine land, and the same witness testifies that complainants' lands are not worth over five dollars an acre. There is other evidence as to their value not exceeding that sum, but there is no testi- mony to show the comparative value of the two tracts, or why one tract or description should not be valued higher than an- other. There is, therefore, no ground for saying that com- plainants are entitled to be relieved as tax payers on the ground of inequality or injustice in the assessment of their property, if the ground was sufificient. �The amount of the tax which they dispute as illegal and fraudulent does not exceed $500, and it is not believed, there- fore, that the court has jurisdiction, The entire tax against the three-fourths interest of these complaints was $920.76. They tendered to the auditor general $650 as a just amount of tax for them to pay, leaving only $270.76 in dispute. Com- plainants claim that it is the value of their interest in the land that controls as to jurisdiction. But we regard the amount of tax in dispute as the criterion of jurisdiction, so far as de- pends upon the sum or value in dispute. Adams v. Board of County Commissioners, McCahon's R. 241. The bill is dis- missed upon al! the grounds stated. ����