Alabama by-Products Corp. v. Patterson

151 F. Supp. 641, 51 A.F.T.R. (P-H) 708, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3601
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. Alabama
DecidedMay 13, 1957
DocketCiv. A. No. 8310
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 151 F. Supp. 641 (Alabama by-Products Corp. v. Patterson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Alabama by-Products Corp. v. Patterson, 151 F. Supp. 641, 51 A.F.T.R. (P-H) 708, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3601 (N.D. Ala. 1957).

Opinion

LYNNE, Chief Judge.

This cause, coming on to be heard, by agreement of the parties was tried to the court without the intervention of a jury. After careful consideration of the pleadings, the stipulations of the parties and the evidence adduced upon the trial of the case, the court proceeds to make and enter the following findings of fact, conclusions of law and judgment.

Findings of Fact

1. The plaintiff is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in Birmingham, Alabama.

2. For the calendar year 1952, the plaintiff filed with defendant income and excess profits tax returns within the time provided by law and on account thereof timely paid income and excess profits taxes in the amount of $2,708,371.59. Thereafter, defendant assessed the plaintiff and the plaintiff paid to defendant as additional income taxes $1,766.19 with respect to the calendar year 1952, and interest thereon in the amount of $301.-99, also within the time provided by law.

3. Thereafter and within the time permitted by law, plaintiff filed with the defendant a claim for refund in the amount of $588,586.97. It later filed an amended claim for refund in the amount of $590,353.16, all as provided by law in such cases. The claims for refund were based upon the plaintiff’s corrected computation for 1952 of its percentage depletion on its mining of coal under Section 23(m) of the 1939 Code, 26 U.S.C.A. § 23 (m) by use of the proportionate profits method. Said claims for refund were thereafter, in the manner provided by law, disallowed by the defendant and this suit was brought by the plaintiff.

4. In its returns for income and excess profits taxes for the calendar year 1952, plaintiff showed a gross income of $6,223,080.10 and a net income of $4,-555,457.81, and in the computation of said net income plaintiff deducted for depletion of mineral resources the sum of $21,962.04. Of this amount plaintiff’s deduction for depletion of coal was $20,-729.50.

5. All necessary conditions precedent to the bringing of this action have been done or taken by the plaintiff and the court has jurisdiction of the proceeding.

6. On its return for 1952 plaintiff, in computing percentage depletion on coking coals, used a representative market or field price. Plaintiff took no percentage deduction on such return but only took unit or cost basis depletion on its coal.

7. The figure used by plaintiff as the representative field price of the coking coal used in its ovens was determined on the basis of sales made.

8. For many years prior to 1952 and during the year 1952, the plaintiff’s principal business has been the mining of coal in the Warrior coal field in Alabama, the coking of coal at its by-product coke oven plant in Jefferson County, Alabama, [643]*643and the sale of coke and by-products and of coal mined by it.

9. There are four coal fields in the State of Alabama. They are Warrior, Cahaba, Coosa and Plateau. Only bituminous coal is found in these fields. The plaintiff mined coal in 1952 from the Mary Lee seam and the Black Creek seam, both of which are in the Warrior field.

10. Blast furnace coke is used in blast furnaces to reduce iron ore to iron. Foundry coke is used in iron foundries to melt iron or other metals in a cupola for making castings.

11. The standards of coke for use in a foundry are more exacting than of coke for use in a blast furnace.

12. It is the prevailing practice in the industry to blend several coking coals with different inherent qualities to make a commercial foundry coke. The characteristics of foundry coke are derived from the inherent characteristics of the coking coals which are blended to produce the coke.

13. The total coke production in 1952 in the United States was 58,182,747 tons, of which 3,102,446 tons, or approximately 6% of the total, was foundry coke. The plaintiff produced 20% of the national output of foundry coke in 1952, selling foundry coke to approximately 400 customers in 32 states.

14. A coking coal contains bitumens which under the influence of heat first soften; then at a higher temperature become fluid; at a still higher temperature break down and decompose with the evolution of gas, at which point the remaining material sets and the bitumens bind all the particles of coal left together acting as an agglutinating agent to form a cake or coke. A coking coal should have sufficient bitumens or agglutinating materials to bind it together. The agglutinating characteristics of Alabama coking coals vary widely with different coking coals. In addition to variation in agglutinating properties Alabama coking coals vary in their chemical analyses, i.e., the amounts of fixed carbon, volatile matter, sulphur and ash in the coking coal. Alabama coking coals also differ in the amount of carbon which the coke made therefrom imparts to the metal heated by the coke, which is referred to herein as the carbon pickup quality of the coking coal. Alabama coking coals also vary in the physical structure of the coke made from them, the strength of the coke varying with the size of the air cells in the coke.

15. In order to determine whether a particular coal has the inherent characteristics to produce the type of coke required by any particular user of coke, plaintiff finds it necessary to make the following progressive tests: (1) . by chemical analysis determine the amounts of fixed carbon, volatile matter, ash and sulphur in the coal, but a favorable chemical analysis alone will not assure that the particular coal will make a commercial coking coal; (2) by various tests, including the Geisler test for plasticity, determine the coking or bitumen properties of the coal; (3) determine the physical chacteristics of the coke produced from the coal when blended with other coking coals in an oven test with about 300 lbs. of coal; (4) determine the characteristics of the coke produced from a full oven test of the coal blended with other coking coals; (5) determine how the coke produced from the coal in question reacts in a foundry cupola test wherein the metal is actually heated with the coke and the heated metal is analyzed to see what characteristics it picked up from the coke.

16. In addition to the above generally accepted tests of a coking coal, the plaintiff tested coking coals to determine their carbon pickup by making a coke from the particular coal without blending with other coking coals and then testing such coke in a cupola by melting iron to determine how much carbon was imparted to the iron.

[644]*64417. The coal in that part of the Mary Lee seam which extends west of the Warrior River (including the Barney and Samoset mines of the plaintiff) is not suitable for making a coke which can be used commercially as either a blast furnace coke or a foundry coke. The Mary Lee coal produced from the following mines is not suitable for making blast furnace coke or foundry coke:

Company Mine County

Brilliant Coal Company Calumet Walker

Brookside-Pratt Mining Co. Warrior River “

Galloway Coal Mining Co. No. 21 Strip “

Mammoth Coal Mining Co. Mammoth “

National Fireproofing Corp. Nat’l No. 26 “

Stith Coal Company Aldridge “

Alabama By-Products Corp. Barney “

Alabama By-Products Corp. Samoset

18. The Black Creek seam extends in a southeast-northwest direction through Jefferson County, Alabama.

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Related

United States Pipe & Foundry Co. v. Patterson
203 F. Supp. 335 (N.D. Alabama, 1962)
Woodward Iron Company v. Patterson
173 F. Supp. 251 (N.D. Alabama, 1959)

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Bluebook (online)
151 F. Supp. 641, 51 A.F.T.R. (P-H) 708, 1957 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3601, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/alabama-by-products-corp-v-patterson-alnd-1957.