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With the filing of these objections it became more & more necessary to determine Colonel Green's domicile. It might be Texas, Massachusetts, New York or Florida. If it is Texas, Surrogate Owen has already ruled, Widow Green will be judged an interested party in the proceedings.
Texan to Texans. In Dallas fortnight ago at a hearing to ascertain facts about the Colonel's domicile many a loyal old Texan went before Surrogate Owen's Commissioner, Raymond C. Prime, to vouch for Hetty Green's London-born son as a Texan. Among them was a tall, lanky Negro named William Madison ("Gooseneck Bill") McDonald, 70 and rich. He was Colonel Green's political lieutenant between 1897 and 1909 at a salary of $575 per month. Recalled he:
"Back in 1896 Colonel Green walked into a Republican State Committee meeting at Terrell and announced he wanted to be a delegate to the national convention. Hetty Green had told him to get some publicity. The convention told him nothin' stirrin' . . . but the people of the town put on the pressure. ... I told Colonel Green it would 'take 75' to cover expenses for the delegate he replaced. He handed me a check for $7,500. I had to explain I only needed $75."
After Hetty Green threatened to disinherit him if he accepted the gubernatorial nomination in 1906, the Negro related, Colonel Green dropped out of politics except to return to Terrell to vote in each Presidential election. Said "Gooseneck Bill" McDonald of himself: "I quit being a Republican in 1928." When hearings moved to Miami last week, testimony showed that Floridians had tried without success to make the Colonel a Floridian. Said Colonel Green's onetime Star Island neighbor, Webb Jay: "He said he wouldn't consider transferring his domicile."
Death & Taxes, No matter what State gets Colonel Green as a resident by Surrogate Owen's ruling, the U. S. Supreme Court will be the court to settle once & for all the question of domicile for tax billing purposes. The tax schedule which Texas' Attorney General William McCraw filed with the Supreme Court placed the gross value of Colonel Green's estate at $44,384,500. This may be as much as $50,000,000 short of the final figure, for as yet nobody knows exactly how much Hetty Green's big cub did leave. According to Texas arithmetic, the Federal Government will collect $20,812,905 in inheritance taxes. Other tax bills: $7,132,000 (New York); $5,809,000 (Massachusetts); $5,335,000 (Florida); $5,326,000 (Texas). Total asked by Federal and State Governments: $44,414,905. If administration of the estate costs $2,000,000, Mr. McCraw figured that the estate will fall short of meeting taxes, but certainly some of the tax bills will be pared when the Supreme Court finally determines the domicile of the late Edward Rowland Robinson Green, son of onion-eating Hetty, who hated lawyers.
*A Republican, Ned Green was made a Colonel on the staff of a Democratic Governor of Texas in 1910 after turning down the post of director of Texas A. & M. College.