Crystal Car Line v. State Tax Commission

174 P.2d 984, 110 Utah 426, 1946 Utah LEXIS 166
CourtUtah Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 29, 1946
DocketNo. 6916.
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 174 P.2d 984 (Crystal Car Line v. State Tax Commission) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Utah Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Crystal Car Line v. State Tax Commission, 174 P.2d 984, 110 Utah 426, 1946 Utah LEXIS 166 (Utah 1946).

Opinions

This is an appeal from an adverse judgment in a case brought by the car companies under our Declaratory Judgment *Page 430 Act, Utah Code 1943, 104-64-1 et seq., to determine the right of the defendants and respondents herein to tax their cars. Although all the plaintiffs had separate causes of action, they joined in one action to avoid a multiplicity of suits, since the questions involved and the relief asked were the same in each instance.

All of the plaintiffs are non-residents and none of their cars were ever permanently within the state of Utah.

The tax commission had sought to collect taxes assessed since 1930 on cars belonging to the various plaintiffs. These cars consisted of tank, refrigerator, wine, poultry and beer cars which were leased by them to different railroad companies throughout the United States. The plaintiffs did not operate these cars and retained no control over them while they were being used by the railroads to transport commodities. The railroad company using the cars would route them through whatever states it desired. The cars were not leased in units but left on tracks convenient for the users and when a railroad needed a particular type of car it would take one or more as needed and pay the plaintiffs for the use on a mileage basis.

The plaintiffs had failed to pay the taxes assessed against their cars since 1930 and after numerous conferences between their representatives and the tax commission in which a compromise settlement of the taxes sought to be collected was discussed, this suit for a declaratory judgment was brought. After this action was brought naming the individual tax commissioners as well as the tax commission as defendants, the defendants sought to collect the taxes by attaching a car belonging to one of the plaintiffs which was found in the state of Utah, whereupon a temporary injunction was issued against the tax commission to restrain it from attaching plaintiffs' cars pending the outcome of this suit.

In their suit for a declaratory judgment plaintiffs alleged that the tax commission had no authority under Title 80 U.C.A. 1943, to tax their cars and if it was found that it did have this power, nevertheless that the manner in which *Page 431 these cars were valued and assessed was in contravention of the United States Constitution and the Constitution of the State of Utah. They also pleaded that the tax commission was barred from enforcing the payment of any taxes due more than three years prior to the commencement of this action under the provisions of the Laws of 1937, Chap. 138, Sec. 1, now Sec. 104-2-24.10, U.C.A. 1943.

After trial the court found against plaintiffs on all points and dissolved the temporary injunction.

Plaintiffs assign as error the court's holding that there was statutory authority for the levying and assessment by the tax commission of taxes belonging to the American Car Corp. for the year 1932, the Northwestern Refrigerator Line Co. for the year 1933 and the Western Refrigerator Line Co. for the years 1931, 1932, and 1933. They contend that from March 24, 1931 until June 22, 1933, there was no statute authorizing the levying of taxes against car companies. They argue that whereas Sec. 5873, Laws of Utah 1917, expressly included car companies in property which was to be assessed by the state taxing board, the amendment of that section in the Laws of 1931, Chap. 53, did not include car companies. The amendment to Sec. 5873, Laws of Utah, 1917, as it appears in Laws of Utah 1931, Chap. 53, reads:

"All property owned by public utilities operated in this State and by pipe line, power, canal and irrigating companies operated in more than one county in the State, * * * must be assessed by the tax commission as hereinafter provided."

Sec. 5923 in Chap. 53, Laws of Utah 1931, provides that:

"By the first Monday in May the tax commission shall assess, * * * all property required by law to be assessed by it * * * the tax commission must apportion the total assessment of all property of such persons or companies to the several counties through or into which the property of such person or companies extends or operates, * * *, as follows: * * *

"4. The property of car companies * * *."

The power to tax is purely a legislative function and unless the legislature has provided for the taxation of the property any attempt to levy and assess a tax on property is *Page 432 void. See Tamble v. Pullman Co., 6 Cir., 207 F. 30;City of New Orleans v. Stemple, 175 U.S. 309, 20 S.Ct. 1, 2 110, 44 L.Ed. 174; Western Leather Finding Co. v.State Tax Commission, 87 Utah 227, 48 P.2d 526. A mere reading of the amendment to Sec. 5873 in the Laws of 1931 discloses that the property of car companies is not included in the list of property to be taxed, unless, as the tax commission argues, it is included in the term property owned by "public utilities." The statute itself does not define "public utilities," but as is stated in 43 Am. Jur., page 571:

"* * * the term `public utility' implies a public use and service to the public; and indeed, the principal determinative characteristic of a public utility, is that of service to, or readiness to serve, an indefinite public (or portion of the public as such) which has a legal right to demand and receive its services or commodities. The term precludes the idea of service which is private in its nature and is not to be obtained by the public * * *."

This property was clearly not owned by a public utility. The car companies involved in this suit do not purport to serve the public. They supply cars under contract to railroad companies and have no dealings with the public as such and the public has no right to demand any service from them. It is 3 apparent therefore that they are not public utilities. In Sinclair Refining Co. v. State Tax Commission et al.,102 Utah 340, 130 P.2d 663, in interpreting Sec. 80-5-3, R.S.U. 1933, which amended Sec. 5873, Laws of Utah 1931, this court said that car companies are not public utilities. It follows therefore that the court erred in holding that the taxes for the years 1931 to 1933 assessed against the car companies we have named above were valid.

Plaintiff further contends that there is no statutory authority for any of the taxes levied and assessed against any of the car companies after 1933, although Sec. 80-5-3, R.S.U. 1933, authorized the property of car companies to be assessed by the tax commission, because that section provides 4 only for such an assessment of "the property of car transportation companies, when they are operated as a unit in more than one county." They contend that this provision requires that the same company *Page 433 which owns the property must also operate it as a unit in more than one county. Sec. 80-5-3, provides that:

"Pipelines, power lines and plants, canals and irrigation works, bridges and ferries, and the property of car and transporation companies, when they are operated as a unit in more than one county."

must be assessed by the tax commission.

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Bluebook (online)
174 P.2d 984, 110 Utah 426, 1946 Utah LEXIS 166, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/crystal-car-line-v-state-tax-commission-utah-1946.