American Tel. & Tel. v. REVENUE DEPT.

422 N.W.2d 629, 143 Wis. 2d 533
CourtCourt of Appeals of Wisconsin
DecidedFebruary 18, 1988
Docket86-2222
StatusPublished

This text of 422 N.W.2d 629 (American Tel. & Tel. v. REVENUE DEPT.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Wisconsin primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
American Tel. & Tel. v. REVENUE DEPT., 422 N.W.2d 629, 143 Wis. 2d 533 (Wis. Ct. App. 1988).

Opinion

143 Wis.2d 533 (1988)
422 N.W.2d 629

AMERICAN TELEPHONE & TELEGRAPH CO., Petitioner-Appellant,
v.
Wisconsin DEPARTMENT OF REVENUE, Respondent.[†]

No. 86-2222.

Court of Appeals of Wisconsin

Argued November 12, 1987.
Decided February 18, 1988.

*534 For the petitioner-appellant there were briefs by Marvin E. Klitsner and Richard S. Gallagher and Foley & Lardner of Milwaukee, and James H. Peters, of counsel, and oral argument by James H. Peters.

*535 For the respondent there was a brief by Donald J. Hanaway, attorney general, and John C. Murphy, assistant attorney general, and oral argument by John C. Murphy, assistant attorney general.

Before Dykman, Eich and Sundby, JJ.

SUNDBY, J.

American Telephone and Telegraph Company appeals an order of the circuit court affirming the Wisconsin Tax Appeals Commission's decision and order, as modified by its order on rehearing. The commission affirmed the department's denial of A.T.&T.'s petition for redetermination of additional taxes for tax years ending December 31, 1972 through December 31, 1976.[1]

A.T.&T. claims that the failure of the department to tax A.T.&T. as part of a unitary business violates secs. 71.07(2)[2] and 71.07(2)(e), Stats. (1975),[3] and the due process, commerce and equal protection clauses of the United States Constitution. Because the apportionment formula by which the department determined A.T.&T.'s Wisconsin taxable income for tax years 1975 and 1976, taxed income earned outside the borders of the state, we conclude that the additional *536 assessment for tax years 1975 and 1976 violates secs. 71.07(2), 71.07(2)(e) and the due process and commerce clauses. We therefore reverse and remand to the trial court with directions to remand the cause to the commission for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. It is not necessary that we decide A.T.&T.'s equal protection claim.

I.

BACKGROUND OF THE CASE

Section 71.07(2)(e), Stats., provides:

The net business income of ... public utilities requiring apportionment shall be apportioned pursuant to rules of the department of revenue, but the income taxed is limited to the income derived from business transacted and property located within the state.

It is undisputed that A.T.&T. is a public utility whose business income requires apportionment. Wisconsin Adm. Code, sec. Tax 2.50(1) provides that the business income of an interstate public utility, operating within and without Wisconsin, shall be apportioned to Wisconsin according to a ratio obtained by taking the arithmetical average of the property, payroll and sales fractions provided in sec. 71.07(2)(a), (b), (c), Stats., and Wis. Adm. Code, sec. Tax 2.39.[4] The formula is expressed as follows:

*537 Property in state + Payroll in state + Sales in state = Ratio of Property everywhere Payroll everywhere Sales everywhere Wisconsin's share of -------------------------------------------------------------- taxable (÷) 3 income

A.T.&T. does not quarrel with the use of the three-factor formula to allocate to Wisconsin its share of A.T.&T.'s taxable income. The three-factor apportionment formula has not only met the approval of the United States Supreme Court, "it has become ... something of a benchmark against which other apportionment formulas are judged." Container Corp. v. Franchise Tax Bd., 463 U.S. 159, 170 (1983). A.T.&T.'s quarrel is with the factors which the department used after the department included as income subject to apportionment, the intangible income received by A.T.&T. in 1975 and 1976 from its subsidiaries.

Prior to this litigation, the department apportioned A.T.&T.'s business income by using in the apportionment formula the sales, property and payroll of A.T.&T.'s Long Lines Department.[5] Beginning *538 in tax year 1975, pursuant to newly-created sec. 71.07(1m), Stats.,[6] the department included in the apportionable business income of A.T.&T., income to its General Department from dividends and interest paid to it by its subsidiaries.[7] However, the department made no change to the property, sales and payroll factors of the apportionment formula. The commission concluded that this was error and ordered that for tax years 1975 and 1976 intangible income received by A.T.&T. from its subsidiaries was to be included in the denominator of the sales factor.

A.T.&T. claims that in order to comply with the commands of secs. 71.07(2) and 71.07(2)(e), Stats., and the United States Constitution, the department was required to treat A.T.&T. and its subsidiaries as one entity and determine its tax liability by a combined report, or alternatively, was required to include in the property factor of the formula, its book cost investment *539 in and advances to its subsidiaries which generated the dividend and interest income paid to it.[8]

II.

DEPARTMENT'S POSITION

We first consider the department's contention that the statutes and case law do not permit it to include in the apportionment formula, by combined reporting or otherwise, the value of A.T.&T.'s investment[9] in the real and tangible personal property of its subsidiaries.[10] The department argues: A. The property from which A.T.&T.'s General Department derives its income is intangible property—stock and evidences of indebtedness—and that sec. 71.07(2)(a)1, Stats., expressly excludes intangible property from the property factor. B. Section 71.07(2)(a)1 includes only the "taxpayer's" real and tangible personal property and the subsidiaries are not the "taxpayer." C. According to Interstate Finance Corp. v. Dept. of Taxation, 28 Wis. 2d 262, 137 N.W.2d 38 (1965), and other cases, there is no statutory authority to include the sales, property and payroll factors of subsidiaries in the apportionment formula.

*540 A.

Property Included in Property Factor

Section 71.07(2)(a)1, Stats., includes in the property factor "real and tangible personal property." Cash, shares of stock, notes, bonds, accounts receivable, or other evidence of indebtedness, shall not be considered tangible property nor included in the apportionment. Id.

The effect of the department's argument is to exclude from the apportionment formula the real and tangible personal property of the subsidiaries which pay intangible income to A.T.&T. This argument ignores the nature of a unitary business. The real and tangible personal property owned and used by A.T.&T. as operating property is a small fraction of the Bell System's[11] operating property. The bulk of the real and tangible personal property owned and operated by the Bell System is owned and operated by A.T.&T.'s subsidiaries.

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American Telephone & Telegraph Co. v. Wisconsin Department of Revenue
422 N.W.2d 629 (Court of Appeals of Wisconsin, 1988)

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422 N.W.2d 629, 143 Wis. 2d 533, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/american-tel-tel-v-revenue-dept-wisctapp-1988.