Carter Carburetor Corp. v. City of St. Louis

203 S.W.2d 438, 356 Mo. 646, 1947 Mo. LEXIS 610
CourtSupreme Court of Missouri
DecidedJune 9, 1947
DocketNo. 40353.
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 203 S.W.2d 438 (Carter Carburetor Corp. v. City of St. Louis) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Missouri primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Carter Carburetor Corp. v. City of St. Louis, 203 S.W.2d 438, 356 Mo. 646, 1947 Mo. LEXIS 610 (Mo. 1947).

Opinion

*651 ELLISON, J.

This is an appeal by the defendants, City of St. Louis and its Collector of Revenue, from an adverse judgment of the circuit court of that city in a suit for a declaratory judgment and injunction brought under See. 1127, R. S. 1939-Mo. R. S. A., by-.the plaintiff-respondent, a Missouri corporation located. in St.-; Louis. Respondent challenges on constitutional grounds the validity, of a recently passed Ordinance 43783 of the - City, which imposes ,an “Earnings Tax” on the residents thereof, and in part- on certain non-residents.

The constitutional provisions invoked by respondent are See’s 1 and 2, Art. X, Const. Mo. 1945, the first of which is a single sentence broadly confides “the taxing power” to the General Assembly, and-authorizes it to grant that power to political subdivisions for municipal purposes, among others. See. 2 provides ‘1 The power to tax shall not be surrendered, suspended or contracted away except 1 as authorized by this Constitution.” Respondent maintains these are mere-enabling provisions; 2 that the General Assembly has never enacted a statute authorizing the City to impose the tax, which is undisputed that the Constitution has not otherwise sanctioned it; and that the *652 ordinance is so vague and capricious as to be unenforceable and denies due process of law.

On the other hand the appellants maintain that statutory authority for the imposition of the earnings tax is unnecessary because it is purely a matter of local or municipal, as distinguished from State, concern; and that for those purposes the City had the “unfettered” power to impose the tax under its special charter adopted by vote of its people in 1914 pursuant to Sec’s 20-25, Art. IX, Const. Mo. 1875. That preexisting charter was expressly recognized and continued in force by Sec. 3Í, Art. VI,' Const. Mo. 1945. Hence, appellants insist the sanction for the tax found in'Art. 1,'Sec. 1, Par. 1 of that charter is a direct constitutional grant, and has the force and effect of a statute. Kansas City v. J. I. Case Threshing Machine Co., 337 Mo. 913, 925 (2), 87 S. W. (2d) 195, 201(5); Wiget v. St. Louis, 337 Mo. 799, 805-6(4), 85 S. W. (2d) 1038, 1042(6).

To that respondent answers that the earnings tax is not purely a matter of local concern; and that the cited section of the charter is fully as vague as the constitutional provision first referred to above, and equally needs the support of a statute or a specific provision in the charter. Said Art. 1, Sec. 1, Par 1 of the charter, on which appellants rely, merely authorizes the City: “To assess, levy and collect 'taxes for all general and special purposes on all subjects or objects of taxation.” And the next paragraph empowers the City “to adopt such classifications of the subjects and objects of taxation as may not be contrary to law.” There are no other charter provisions authorizing the imposition of taxes, except license taxes; Art. 1, Sec. 1, Pars. 23, 24,' and Art. XX. Even the power to impose ad valorem taxes is merely assumed by collateral references thereto in the charter. 3 However, Art. 1, Sec. 2 provides:

“The enumeration of particular powers in this charter is not exclusive of others, nor restrictive of general words or phrases granting powers, nor shall a grant or failure to grant power in this article impair a power granted in any other part of this charter; and whether powers, objects, or purposes are expressed conjunctively or disjunctively they shall be construed so as to permit the city to exer *653 cise freely any one or more such powers as to any one or more, such objects for any one or more such purposes.”

The ordinance contains nine sections, of which Sec. 8 declares that if any sentence, clause or section or any part of the ordinance is for. any reason held to be unconstitutional, illegal or invalid, that fact shall not affect or impair the remaining provisions of the ordinance, since it would have been adopted by the Board of Aldermen even if the condemned part, had been omitted. Sec. 9 is an emergency clause. Sec. 1 contains only definitions, among which the word “Associations” includes “any . . . form of unincorporated enterprise owned by two or more persons.” “Business” means any “enterprise, activity, profession or other undertaking of nny nature conducted for-profit, or ordinarily conducted for profit . . .” “Corporations” covers domestic, foreign, Federal and alien corporations. An “employer ’ ’ is any entity that employs anyone on the earning basis taxed. “Person” includes “-Every natural person, association, business, corporation or fiduciary.” And “residents” are such “persons” as reside or are located within the City..

Sec’s 3- to 8 cover the making of “returns” of earnings to the Collector, much like income tax returns, and generally implement the ordinance, providing for the collection of the tax at the source from employers in the City, along with the imposition of interest and penalties for delinquency, and making specified violations thereof misdemeanors. Sec. 2 of the ordinance is the section directly assailed here. The City’s brief correctly summarizes it as imposing a tax of %c/o for general revenue purposes,-from and after-July 31,. 1946, on (italics ours) :

(a) The gross salaries, wages, commissions and other compensation earned by residents of the City of St. Louis;

(b) The gross salaries, wages, commissions and other compensation earned by non-residents of the City of St. Louis, for. work done or services performed or rendered in- the City of St. Louis;

(c) The net profits earned (by) associations, businesses, or other activities conducted by residents;

(d) The net profits of associations, business, or other activities conducted in the City of St. Louis by non-residents;

(e) .That portion of the net profits earned by all corporations as a ' result of work done or services performed or rendered, and business or other activities conducted, in the City of St. Louis.

The tax obviously is not a license tax under the police power, for the ordinance is not in any sense regulatory, and the tax is imposed expressly “for general1 revenue purposes.” Appellants also say it is not a use tax or an excise tax, but just a “tax”. We do not agree. In our opinion it is a species of income or excise tax. ' However, it is limited to earnings from work and services, and does not include other kinds- of income such as interest on investments, rents, dividends, capi *654 tál gains and' the like. Clauses (a) and (b) cover any worker for compensation, including the professions. An actor, architect, artist, dentist, engineer, journalist, lawyer, physician or surgeon, for instance though residing outside the City, State or Nation, would be taxed on any work or services he had performed in the City, without deduction for expenses.

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Bluebook (online)
203 S.W.2d 438, 356 Mo. 646, 1947 Mo. LEXIS 610, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/carter-carburetor-corp-v-city-of-st-louis-mo-1947.