First Nat. Bank v. Stone

88 F. 409, 1898 U.S. App. LEXIS 2799
CourtU.S. Circuit Court for the District of Kentucky
DecidedJune 4, 1898
DocketNos. 6,569, 6,575, 6,576
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 88 F. 409 (First Nat. Bank v. Stone) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Kentucky primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
First Nat. Bank v. Stone, 88 F. 409, 1898 U.S. App. LEXIS 2799 (circtdky 1898).

Opinion

TAFT, Circuit Judge.

The First National Bank was organized in October, 1863, under the national banking laws, and its charter rights were extended September 6, 1882. It did not formally accept the Hewitt act, in accordance with the terms of that act. The averment of the bill upon tills point is:

“Your orator shows that from the 1st day of July, 1887, although it was not by the United States banking acts bound to submit to taxation under the ‘Hewitt BUI,’ it nevertheless did so, and from said date regularly reported to the auditor of public accounts of the state of Kentucky, under, and in accordance with the provisions of said Hewitt bill; and the said state, through its proper officers, received and appropriated said taxes paid by your orator as aforesaid. Your orator has no real estate, and never had. In the way above stated, your orator accepted the provisions of the Hewitt bill.”

The American National Bank was organized after the passage of the Hewitt act, so that it could not accept that act in accordance with its provisions. The averment of its bill upon this point is:

“Your orator shows that from the 1st day of July, 1890, although it was not by the United Slates banking acts bound to submit to taxation under the [410]*410Hewitt bill, it nevertheless did so, and from said date regularly reported to the auditor of public accounts of the state of Kentucky, under, and in accordance with the provisions of said Hewitt bill; and the said state, through its proper officers, received and appropriated said taxes paid by your orator as aforesaid. Your orator has since its organization paid, to the city, taxes on the building in which it docs business. In the way above stated, your orator accepted the provisions of the Hewitt bill.”

Each of the bills in the above-entitled causes contained these aver-ments :

“Your orator respectfully shows to the court that the existing laws of the state of Kentucky do not provide for taxing the shares of your orator as permitted by the act of congress, but attempt to subject to taxation its franchise granted by the congress of the United States and its other intangible property, such as its surplus, undivided profits, and investments, without lawful right to do so, and contrary to the act of congress in such eases made and provided. Your orator has never consented to this method of taxation, but has always protested against the same as illegal and contrary to the act of congress. And your orator respectfully submits that said statute of the state of Kentucky is repugnant to the act of congress in such cases made and provided, and, because of said repugnancy, is void and of no binding force as against your orator. Your orator further shows and submits to the court that by reason of the formal contract entered into by all the other banks and trust companies in the city of Louisville, and by reason of the former adjudication in favor of said banks and trust companies establishing the validity of said contract, they will escape local taxation, except on the houses owned by them respectively, in which they respectively do business; and your orator, coming, as it does, into direct competition with said institutions, will be driven out of business if subjected to. local taxation; wherefore it respectfully insists it is protected by the acts of congress against such unjust discrimination.”

The first question is whether the revenue act of November, 1892, taxes the national banks in a way inconsistent with the permission given by congress.

Section 5219 of the Revised Statutes of the United States is as follows:

“Nothing herein shall prevent all the shares in any association from being included in the valuation of the personal property of the owner or holder of such shares in assessing taxes imposed by authority of the state within which the association is located; but the legislature of each state may determine and direct the manner and place of taxing all the shares of national banking associations located within the state, subject only to the two restrictions, that the taxation shall not be at a greater' rate than is assessed upon other moneyed capital in the hands of individual citizens of such state, and that the shares of any national banking association owned by nonresidents of any state shall be taxed in the city or town where the bank is located and not elsewhere. Nothing herein shall be construed to exempt the real property of associations from either state, county or municipal taxes, to the same extent according to its value, as other real property is taxed.”

Tke state derives its power to tax national banks from this section. The question is whether the provision for taxation of banks under the revenue act of November, 1892, is a violation of this section. The provisions of that act are that all banks shall be taxed upon their real property and personal property, and also taxed upon their franchises to be assessed by subtracting the value of the tangible property from the value of the capital stock of the company. It is argued that the state has no right to tax the franchises conferred by the government of the United States. But it has been [411]*411decided in the cases of Henderson Bridge Co. v. Kentucky, 166 U. S. 150, 17 Sup. Ct. 532, and Adams Exp. Co. v. Kentucky, 166 C. S. 171, 17 Sup. Ct. 527, that the word “franchise,” in the revenue act of 1892 was not employed in a technical sense, and that the legislative intention was plain that the entire property, tangible and intangible, of all foreign and domestic corporations, and all foreign and domestic companies, possessing no franchise, should be valued as an eutirety, that the value of the tangible property should be deducted, and that the value of the intangible, property thus ascertained should be taxed under these provisions. It will be seen, therefore, that the taxation upon ail banks is nothing but a tax upon the value of its capital stock. There is no discrimination whatever against national banks in favor of state banks, because they are all subject to the same rule of taxation.

The supreme court of the United States has given section 5219 a very liberal construction in sustaining state taxation of national banks if not inconsistent with the purpose of congress to prevent a discrimination in favor of state banks as against national banks. Mr. Justice Miller, in delivering the opinion of the court in the case of Davenport Nat. Bank v. Davenport Board of Equalization, 123 U. S. 83, 8 Sup. Ct. 73, said:

“It has never been held by this court that the states should abandon systems of taxation of their own banks, or of money in the hands of their other corporations, which they may think the most wise and efficient modes of taxing their own corporate organizations, in order to make that taxation conform to the system of taxing the national banks upon the shares of their stock in the hands of their owners. All that has ever been held to be necessary is that the system of state taxation of its own citizens, of its own banks, and of its own corporations shall not work a discrimination unfavorable to the holders pf the’ shares of the national banks. Nor does the act of con gress require anything more than this. Neither its language nor its purpose can be construed to go any further.

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Related

American Nat. Bank v. Stone
109 F. 1056 (Sixth Circuit, 1901)
Farmers' Loan & Trust Co. v. Chicago & N. P. R.
73 F. 314 (Seventh Circuit, 1896)

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Bluebook (online)
88 F. 409, 1898 U.S. App. LEXIS 2799, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/first-nat-bank-v-stone-circtdky-1898.