Annenberg v. Commonwealth

686 A.2d 1380, 1996 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 542
CourtCommonwealth Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedDecember 23, 1996
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 686 A.2d 1380 (Annenberg v. Commonwealth) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Annenberg v. Commonwealth, 686 A.2d 1380, 1996 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 542 (Pa. Ct. App. 1996).

Opinions

SMITH, Judge.

Walter H. and Leonore Annenberg (Taxpayers) have filed a petition for review in the nature of a complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief in this Court’s original jurisdiction against the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and Thomas W. Corbett, Jr., Attorney General (together, Commonwealth) and also against the Board of Commissioners of the County of Montgomery and each Commissioner in his official capacity, the Board of Assessment Appeals of the County and the County itself (collectively, County).

Taxpayers seek a declaration that the Act of June 17, 1913, P.L. 507, as amended, 72 P.S. §§ 4821 — 4902, commonly known as the County Personal Property Tax Law, violates the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution, U.S. Const, art. I, § 8, cl. 3, and is therefore null and void insofar as it imposes a tax on any corporate stock held by them. They also request a permanent injunction against the Commissioners and the Board of Assessment Appeals prohibiting them from imposing and collecting the tax on any shares of corporate stock that Taxpayers own.

I

Both the Commonwealth and the County have filed preliminary objections. They assert that this Court lacks original jurisdiction over this matter because the Commonwealth is not an indispensable party, as is required for this Court’s original jurisdiction under' Section 761(a)(1) of the Judicial Code, as amended, 42 Pa.C.S. § 761(a)(1), and because original jurisdiction lies in the Board of Assessment Appeals or the Court of Common Pleas of Montgomery County.

Section 1 of the County Personal Property Tax Law, 72 P.S. § 4821, provides in part:

All personal property of the classes hereinafter enumerated, owned, held or possessed by any resident ... is hereby made taxable annually for county purposes ... at a rate not to exceed four mills of each dollar of the value thereof ... that is to say ... all shares of stock in any ... corporation ... created or formed under the laws of this Commonwealth or of the United States, or of any other state or government, except shares of stock in any ... corporation ... liable to or relieved from the capital stock or franchise tax for State purposes under the laws of this Commonwealth ....

Section 1.1, added by Section 1 of the Act of April 18, 1978, P.L. 56, 72 P.S. § 4821.1, provides that “the county commissioners of each county ... shall have the power to determine whether or not to impose and collect the taxes permitted under the provisions of this law.”

Taxpayers commenced them action following the issuance of the decision of the United States Supreme Court in Fulton Corp. v. Faulkner, — U.S. -, 116 S.Ct. 848, 133 L.Ed.2d 796 (1996). The Supreme Court held that a North Carolina statewide “intangibles tax” imposed on corporate stock holdings, with an exemption tied to the proportion of the overall business of the corporation that was performed within the state, facially discriminated against interstate commerce by taxing a transaction or incident more heavily when it crossed state lines than when it occurred entirely within a state.

Noting that facially discriminatory taxes have been upheld where they were shown to be truly “compensatory,” that is, designed simply to make interstate commerce bear a burden already borne by intrastate commerce, the Court restated the three-pronged test for compensatory taxes. The state must identify the intrastate tax burden for which it is attempting to compensate; the tax must be shown to roughly approximate but not to exceed the intrastate tax; and the events [1382]*1382that are taxed must be shown to be sufficiently similar in substance to serve as exclusive proxies for each other. As to the third prong, the Court noted that the determination of whether a tax burden is shifted out of state rather than borne by in-state producers and consumers requires complex factual inquiries. The Court referred to the difficulty of comparing the economic incidence of state taxes paid by different taxpayers upon different transactions as an explanation of why it had so seldom recognized a valid compensatory tax outside the context of sales taxes and use taxes, which require no economic incidence analysis because they are functional equivalents of one another.

Taxpayers own stock of corporations that do no business in the Commonwealth. They contend that the county personal property tax discriminates against interstate commerce by discriminating against corporations not doing business or having a taxable situs within the Commonwealth. The tax assert-edly impairs such corporations’ ability to raise capital in any county that imposes the tax because potential investors in such counties know that any earnings from investment in such stocks will be reduced by the amount of the tax, whereas similar investment in Pennsylvania corporations will not. Taxpayers argue that this is the same effect held to violate the Commerce Clause in Fulton Corp..

II

This Court turns first to the objection of the County that this Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction because exclusive original jurisdiction lies in the Board of Assessment Appeals and the Court of Common Pleas of Montgomery County.1 The County notes that cases have frequently held that original jurisdiction in this Court is improper where exclusive jurisdiction has been granted to another tribunal.2 The County refers to Section 6.1 of the County Personal Property Tax Act, added by Section 3 of the Act of July 3, 1947, P.L. 1249, 72 P.S. § 4844.1, which provides that any resident against whom an assessment is made may petition the board of revision of taxes or the county commissioners for a reassessment, setting forth the ground upon which it is claimed that the assessment is erroneous or unlawful; if the petitioner is not satisfied with the resulting action, he or she has the right to appeal to the court of common pleas.

In addition, the County refers to Section 1(a) of the Act of May 21, 1943, P.L. 349, as amended, 72 P.S. § 5566b(a), which provides that when any person or corporation who has paid taxes or made certain other payments to a political subdivision to which it is not legally entitled, then, upon proper filing, the authorities are directed to make refunds. The County notes that Walter H. Annenberg, in his capacity as trustee of the trust under the will of Moses L. Annenberg, has filed an application with the Board of Assessment Appeals pursuant to Section 1(a) in regard to a county personal property tax assessment on the trust, based upon the same allegations as in the present petition for review.3 The County notes also that numerous other applications for refunds have been filed with the [1383]*1383Board of Assessment Appeals and that, in addition, nine separate suits have been brought in the Court of Common Pleas of Montgomery County based on allegations virtually identical to those of the present case.

In response, Taxpayers assert that the controlling principles are found in Borough of Green Tree v. Board of Property Assessments, Appeals and Review of Allegheny County, 459 Pa. 268, 328 A.2d 819 (1974) (plurality opinion).

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Bluebook (online)
686 A.2d 1380, 1996 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 542, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/annenberg-v-commonwealth-pacommwct-1996.