National Liberty Life Insurance v. State

215 N.W.2d 26, 62 Wis. 2d 347, 1974 Wisc. LEXIS 1544
CourtWisconsin Supreme Court
DecidedFebruary 25, 1974
Docket246
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 215 N.W.2d 26 (National Liberty Life Insurance v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Wisconsin Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
National Liberty Life Insurance v. State, 215 N.W.2d 26, 62 Wis. 2d 347, 1974 Wisc. LEXIS 1544 (Wis. 1974).

Opinion

Wilkie, J.

Two controlling issues are presented on this appeal:

1. Does the application of sec. 201.42 (11) (a), Stats. 1969, to National constitute the taking of property without due process of law contrary to the guarantees of the fourteenth amendment to the United States Constitution?

2. If the state of Wisconsin can constitutionally apply a general revenue tax to the applicant, is sec. 201.42 (11) (a), Stats. 1969, nonetheless unconstitutional for failure to apportion the tax on the basis of that activity conducted in the state of Wisconsin as opposed to that activity conducted outside the state of Wisconsin which combine to produce the gross receipts upon which the tax is levied?

*353 Due process objections.

National is not contesting the constitutionality of sec. 201.42, Stats. 1969, but it is contesting the constitutionality of the application of sub. (11) (a) to itself. National recognizes that this court upheld the constitutionality of the regulatory and taxation aspects of sec. 201.42 in Ministers Life & Casualty Union v. Haase, 3 but points out that the court recognized that the constitutionality of the application of the statute will vary with the fact situation:

“. . . We do not hold, however, that any one single act defined as doing business in the state in sec. 201.42, Stats., is alone sufficient for the application of the section to a given business. Each set of facts must be considered on its own merits when applying the statute.” 4

National asserts that there must be some “physical presence” of a corporation within the taxing state, such as an office, retail outlet, agents, representatives or quasi agents, to give a state constitutional jurisdiction to impose a tax. National finds that the presence of “group leaders” in Ministers satisfied the requirement of “physical presence” within the taxing state, but that in this case there is absolutely no physical presence sufficient to support the imposition of a general revenue tax.

National asserts that the “minimum contacts” necessary to support due process jurisdiction for service of process, police power regulation, and general revenue taxation differ and that a more stringent test is necessary to validate a power to tax a foreign corporation. National feels that a series of cases culminating in National Bellas Hess v. Department of Revenue 5 indicate that in order for the constitutional imposition of a tax *354 on a “mail-order” business there must be some physical presence of the corporation within the taxing state. National also contends that this test or standard applies, without exception, to all mail-order businesses including the sale of insurance.

The position of National is well-phrased in a recent legal periodical: 6

“Accordingly, presence through an agent or a place of business is a prerequisite to the imposition of a general revenue measure. And it makes no difference, in this connection, what the nature of the business is. In this respect taxation differs from regulation. Contacts that would justify regulatory provisions as to one type of business might not as to another because of the greater interest of the state in the former than in the latter. Thus, a state can properly regulate an insurance business based upon contacts which would not support regulation of a greeting card business, for example. But when it comes to general revenue taxation the question is whether the taxpayer is present so that the state is called upon to provide anything for which it may constitutionally require a tax contribution. Here the nature of the business becomes unimportant.”

In support of its contention that taxation requires greater state contacts to justify it, National cites Freeman v. Hewit. 7 In that case the United States Supreme Court said:

“. . . A police regulation of local aspects of interstate commerce is a power often essential to a State in safeguarding vital local interests. . . . State taxation falling on interstate commerce, on the other hand, can only be justified as designed to make such commerce bear a fair share of the cost of the local government whose protection it enjoys. But revenue serves as well no matter what its source. To deny to a State a particular source of income because it taxes the very process of in *355 terstate commerce does not impose a crippling limitation on a State’s ability to carry on its local function. Moreover, the burden on interstate commerce involved in a direct tax upon it is inherently greater, certainly less uncertain in its consequences, than results from the usual police regulations. The power to tax is a dominant power over commerce. Because the greater or more threatening burden of a direct tax on commerce is coupled with the lesser need to a State of a particular source of revenue, attempts at such taxation have always been more carefully scrutinized and more consistently resisted than police power regulations of aspects of such commerce. The task of scrutinizing is a task of drawing lines. This is the historic duty of the Court so long as Congress does not undertake to make specific arrangements between the National Government and the States in regard to revenues from interstate commerce.”

The analysis in this quotation is clearly based on the restrictions of the commerce clause. One recurring problem in analyzing supreme court decisions on the permissibility of taxation and regulation of foreign corporations is the failure of the supreme court to clearly distinguish between restrictions on state power based on the commerce clause and those based on the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment. In the case of the insurance business, Prudential Ins. Co. v. Benjamin 8 establishes that the McCarran Act has removed any objections to state regulation or taxation of insurance based on the commerce clause. Therefore, any restrictions on the power of the states over the insurance business must rest on the vague requirements of the due process clause. The McCarran Act appears to be the type of specific congressional act referred to by the supreme court in the Freeman Case and makes the language of that case inapplicable to the present situation.

Another case relied on heavily by National is Norton Co. v. Department of Revenue, 9 In Norton the United States Supreme Court held that a gross receipts tax on *356 all sales to persons in Illinois made by a Massachusetts corporation with its factory and head office in Massachusetts, but with a branch office in Illinois, was partially unconstitutional.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
215 N.W.2d 26, 62 Wis. 2d 347, 1974 Wisc. LEXIS 1544, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/national-liberty-life-insurance-v-state-wis-1974.