Day v. Buffinton

7 F. Cas. 222, 3 Cliff. 376

This text of 7 F. Cas. 222 (Day v. Buffinton) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Massachusetts primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Day v. Buffinton, 7 F. Cas. 222, 3 Cliff. 376 (circtdma 1871).

Opinion

CDIFFORD, Circuit Justice.

Taxes were assessed against the plaintiff under the internal revenue laws of the United States upon his salary as judge of probate and insolvency for the county of Barnstable in this state for the years 1866 and 1867, and, having paid the same under protest, he brought an action of assumpsit against the defendant as the collector of such taxes for the first collection district, to recover back the amount so paid, both assessments amounting to the sum of $61.50. The agreed statement shows that the salary of the plaintiff as such judge is fixed by law, and that it is payable out of the treasury of the state, and that he made due protest before the taxes were assessed and at the time he made the payments.

Five per centum on the excess over $600, and not exceeding $5,000, was required to be levied, collected, and paid annually by the act of the 30th of June, 1864, as amended by the act of the 3d of March, 1865, upon the annual gains, profits, and income of every person residing in the United States .... whether derived from any kind of property, rents, interests, dividends, or salaries, or from any profession, trade, employment, or vocation .... or from any other source whatever. 13 Stat. p. 2S1, § 116; as amended, Id. p. 479, § 1. The first assessment was made under that provision, and the second was made under a provision in all respects similar, except that the exemption was $1,000 instead of $600, as in the former act. 14 Stat. p. 477, § 13.' Power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises to pay the debts and provide for the common de-fence and general welfare of the United States, is conferred by the constitution, and the only limitation annexed in terms to that clause of the instrument is that all duties, imposts, and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States. But the powers granted to congress are not in all cases exclusive of similar powers existing in the states, unless where the constitution has so provided, or the exercise of a like power is prohibited to the states, or there would be a direct or necessarily implied repugnancy in the exercise of it by the states. Exclusive authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state, in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, dockyards, and other needful buildings, is delegated to congress, and it follows as a necessary consequence that the state legislatures cannot exercise any power or jurisdiction over such places, as the exclusive authority over them is vested in the national government. State authorities cannot coin money, emit bills of credit, or make anything but gold and silver a tender in payment of debts, as they are prohibited from so doing by the constitution, nor shall any state without the consent of the congress lay any imposts or duties on imports or exports except what may be absolutely necessary for executing its inspection laws. Const, art. 1, § 10. Laws establishing rules of naturalization are required to be uniform, and it is held that the power to pass such laws is [226]*226.vested exclusively in congress, as the exercise of such a power by the states would be incompatible with that condition as annexed to the exercise of that power. Houston v. Moore, 5 Wheat. [18 U. S.] 23; Chirac v. Chirac, 2 Wheat. [15 U. S.] 259.

Cases arise where it is held that the mere grant of power to congress, unaccompanied by any legislation under the grant, does not imply a prohibition on the states to exercise the same power. Such cases, however, are not numerous, and whenever the nature of the power granted or the terms in which the grant is made are of a character to show that the framers of the constitution intended that it should be exclusively exercised by congress, the subject is as' completely taken from the state legislatures as if the constitution contained an express prohibition to that effect. Sturges v. Crowninshield, 4 Wheat. [17 U. S.] 122; Ogden v. Saunders, 12 Wheat. [25 U. S.] 213. Undoubtedly the power of congress to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises is coextensive with the territory of the United States, but when properly construed it does not interfere with the power of the states to levy taxes for the support of their own governments, nor is the exercise of that power by the states an exercise of any portion of the power that is granted to the federal government Loughborough v. Blake, 5 Wheat. [18 U. S.] 317; Gibbons v. Ogden, 9 Wheat. [22 U. S.] 1; Waring v. The Mayor, 8 Wall. [75 U. S.] 121. State power to lay and collect taxes, for the support of their government, may reach every subject over which the sovereign power of the state extends. They cannot tax imports nor exports without the consent of congress, as they are prohibited from so doing by the constitution. Want of authority in the states to tax the securities of the United States issued in the exercise of the admitted power of congress to borrow money on the credit of the United States is equally certain, although there is no prohibition in the constitution establishing any such rule. Hamilton Co. v. Massachusetts, 6 Wall. [73 U. S.] 639; Society for Savings v. Coite, 6 Wall. [73 U. S.] 594.

All subjects over which the sovereign power of a state extends are as a general rule proper objects of taxation, but the power of a state of the Union to lay taxes does not extend to the instruments of the national government, nor to the constitutional means employed by congress to carry into execution' the powers conferred in the federal constitution. Tax laws of the states cannot restrain the action of the national government, nor can they abridge the operation of any law which congress may constitutionally pass. They may extend to every object of value within the sovereignty of the state belonging to the citizens, but they cannot reach the instruments and means of the federal government, nor the administration of justice in the federal courts, nor the collection of the public revenues, nor interfere with any.constitutional regulation enacted by congress. McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat [17 U. S.] 429; Brown v. Maryland, 12 Wheat. [25 U. S.] 448.

Power to tax its citizens or subjects in some form is an attribute of every government, residing in it as part of itself, and hence it follows that the power to tax may be exercised at the same time upon the same objects of private property' by the state and by the United States without inconsistency or repugnancy. Society for Savings v. Coite, 6 Wall. [73 U. S.] 606; Providence Bank v. Billings, 4 Pet. [29 U. S.] 563. Such power exists in the state as one conferred or not prohibited by the state constitution, and in the federal government under an express grant. Such powers are therefore perfectly consistent, though the two governments, in exercising the same, act entirely independent of each other, as applied to the property of the citizens.

Congress in its discretion fixes by law the compensation to be allowed to federal officers; and having exercised that discretion, and fixed the amount of compensation, the law of congress confers upon the officer the right to receive that amount when he has performed the duties devolved upon the office; and the settled rule of decision in the supreme court is that any law of a state imposing a tax upon such an office diminishing the recompense allowed to such officer is in conflict with the law of congress which defines and secures to the officer the prescribed compensation. Dobbins v. Commissioners, 16 Pet. [41 U. S.] 447.

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Bluebook (online)
7 F. Cas. 222, 3 Cliff. 376, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/day-v-buffinton-circtdma-1871.