Morewood Realty Corp. v. Commonwealth

294 A.2d 219, 6 Pa. Commw. 244, 1972 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 305
CourtCommonwealth Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedAugust 18, 1972
DocketAppeal, No. 698 Tr. Dkt, 1970
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 294 A.2d 219 (Morewood Realty Corp. 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
Morewood Realty Corp. v. Commonwealth, 294 A.2d 219, 6 Pa. Commw. 244, 1972 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 305 (Pa. Ct. App. 1972).

Opinion

Opinion by

Judge Rogers,

This appeal from a decision of the Board of Finance and Revenue requires us to determine the validity of the action of State taxing authorities in including out-of-state assets in settling the franchise tax of a foreign corporation against the taxpayer’s claim that the assets and results of its business conducted elsewhere may not be included in computing its tax. The field has been well worked by the Common Pleas Court of Dauphin County and the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania1 but remains difficult because each case requires the application of very general principles to a factual situation differing in detail from those previously considered.

Morewood Realty Corporation (Morewood) is a Delaware corporation whose principal place of operations is New York City. There, during and before 1966, the tax year in question, its board met, its business was transacted and its books and records were kept. Its corporate charter authorized it to own, lease and deal in real estate, to invest in securities, to manufacture and “to carry on other businesses.”2 Morewood was [246]*246registered to do business in Pennsylvania under a certificate authorizing it only to own, operate and deal in real estate and to hold and deal in securities.

During 1966, Morewood owned and leased to unrelated tenants through a rental agent two retail store buildings in Pittsburgh. The rental agent managed the properties, collected rents, deducted his fees' and deposited the balance in a Pittsburgh bank from which it was withdrawn by Morewood and credited to an account in a New York City bank. Morewood owned separate insurance policies for the Pittsburgh properties. It maintained separate income, expense, asset and liability accounts for the Pennsylvania properties and segregated this activity on its balance sheets and profit and loss statements.

The Pittsburgh buildings were purchased, one in 1965 and the other in 1966, for the total sum of $455,-000. The purchase prices were paid wholly in cash derived from the sale of another Pennsylvania retail store building and from general assets. The buildings produced during 1966 gross rents of $69,688 and a net profit of $1,654, after depreciation and expenses, including local real estate taxes of $42,964.

The taxpayer was engaged wholly in the State of New York in two other enterprises.

It owned and managed a portfolio of marketable securities worth in 1966 about $43,000,000 from which it derived about $1,190,000 in dividends and interest. The securities were held in New York, bought and sold there and the income and other proceeds received and deposited in banks in New York City.

The taxpayer’s remaining activity was as the owner of a sand and gravel property on Long Island. Prior to 1956, Morewood itself mined, processed and sold the [247]*247sand and gravel on the site; after that time and during 1966, it licensed another corporation to remove the minerals in consideration of royalty payments. In addition it owned sand and gravel machinery, equipment and facilities which it rented to its licensee. The actual value of these properties, real and personal, on December 31, 1966 was $5,095,969. In 1966, Morewood received $105,010 in gross rentals for its machinery, equipment and facilities and $228,700 in gross royalties for sand and gravel removed. All of these receipts were had and held in New York. Morewood was compelled to exercise continuous and extensive oversight of the sand and gravel operation to ensure compliance by the licensee with the agreement with respect to amount of minerals removed and the amount of royalties due, the observance by the lessee of mining regulations, the prevention of pollution from the use of its property, and the surveillance of prices for minerals in the market upon which the royalties are partially based. Because the mining operations were noisy, dirty and unsightly they evoked public antagonism requiring constant atten tion by Morewood in the prevention of annoyance to the public of Long Island, the satisfaction of complaints and the creation of good will where possible. The taxpayer has engaged in protracted litigation resulting from one condemnation of its property and much activity to prevent another. As the result of an investigation of prices for sand and gravel conducted by More-wood’s officers and accountants engaged by it, the taxpayer’s royalty income was increased during one two-year period by $166,000.

All sales or purchases of sand and gravel or mining assets were made in New York and all receipts from that activity were received there. None of these activities took place in Pennsylvania. No equipment has ever been transferred from the New York operations to the [248]*248Pennsylvania operation or from the Pennsylvania operation to the New York operations.

Morewood had no employees working in Pennsylvania. A vice-president who was also a director resided in Pittsburgh where he had other substantial business interests. His value to the company was with respect to the marketable securities and the New York sand and gravel operations. He visited New York on company business at least once a month. For these services he received a salary of $25,100 a year on which he paid income tax to the State of New York. He did not supervise the Pennsylvania properties.

Morewood’s tax for the privilege of earning $1654 on its Pittsburgh rental properties was settled by the Commonwealth Department of Revenue at $6612.55, by including in the computation New York assets and gross receipts from New York activities.3 Morewood contends that its tax should have been based solely upon the value of its Pittsburgh store buildings as of December 31, 1966.

. Under the United States Constitution, when a state imposes a property tax on a corporation doing business within its borders, the Due Process Clause requires “. . . that the property shall be within the territorial jurisdiction of the taxing state for the tax to be [249]*249valid.” Wheeling Steel Corp. v. Fox, 298 U.S. 193, 208, 56 S. Ct. 773, 776 (1936). In the Wheeling Steel Gorp. case, Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes stated the following rationale for the rule: “[Application to the states of the rule of due process arises from the fact 'that their spheres of activity are enforced and protected by the Constitution, and therefore it is impossible for one state to reach out and tax property in another without violating the Constitution.’ ” 298 U. S. at 209, 56 S. Ct. at 776. This rule, originally applied to land, was extended to tangible personal property as well as intangible personalty which may be taxed solely at the domicile of the owner unless it has acquired a business situs elsewhere. In addition, the taxation of property not located within the taxing state may be unconstitutional because it imposes an illegitimate restraint on interstate commerce, thereby violating the Commerce Clause of the Federal Constitution. These principles were recently reaffirmed by the United States Supreme Court in Norfolk and Western Ry. Co. v. Missouri State Tax Commission, 390 U.S. 317, 88 S. Ct. 995 (1968).

In the case of a franchise tax, i.e., a tax for the privilege of doing business within a state, the constitutional considerations are much the same.

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Related

Commonwealth v. Morewood Realty Corp.
327 A.2d 328 (Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 1974)
Logan Clay Products Co. v. Commonwealth
315 A.2d 346 (Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, 1974)
International Telephone & Telegraph Corp. v. Michigan
213 N.W.2d 226 (Michigan Court of Appeals, 1973)
Advance-Wilson Industries, Inc. v. Commonwealth
297 A.2d 835 (Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, 1972)

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Bluebook (online)
294 A.2d 219, 6 Pa. Commw. 244, 1972 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 305, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/morewood-realty-corp-v-commonwealth-pacommwct-1972.