O'Kane v. State

172 Misc. 829, 16 N.Y.S.2d 520, 1939 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 2569
CourtNew York Court of Claims
DecidedDecember 22, 1939
DocketClaim No. 24798
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 172 Misc. 829 (O'Kane v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Court of Claims primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
O'Kane v. State, 172 Misc. 829, 16 N.Y.S.2d 520, 1939 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 2569 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1939).

Opinion

Barrett, P. J.

This is a claim for the recovery of moneys alleged to have been erroneously paid in the form of stock transfer taxes. An application pursuant to section 280 of the Tax Law for the refund of said moneys was rejected by the Tax Commission, and following that rejection the claim was filed against the State. The claimants are copartners engaged in the stock brokerage business in the city of New York with offices at 42 Broadway. On October 17, 1936, a written confirmation of sale to Kennedy & Company of Philadelphia, Pa., of 200 shares of stock of dividend shares at one dollar and ninety cents was mailed by Kennedy & Company to claimants and received at their New York office. On October 20, 1936, claimants mailed their confirmation of the sale to Kennedy & Company at Philadelphia, Pa. On the same day the Pennsylvania Company at Philadelphia mailed to claimants at their offices in New York city its receipt to the effect that it had received a draft for the purchase price of the stock with shares of stock attached and with the receipt was sent a check in payment of the stock. This procedure followed the usual course where stock was purchased over the telephone or otherwise and where the seller sent a sight draft for collection with the stock attached, which sight draft is honored by the purchaser and then the stock is delivered.

The same procedure was followed in the sale of fifty-six and one-quarter shares of stock of the Republic Natural Gas to Butcher & Sherred of Philadelphia and in the sale of sixty-six shares of stock of Delaware Valley Utilities at two dollars and fifty cents a share to John B. Babbage & Company of Washington, D. C. Stock transfer tax stamps were affixed to these transactions under sections 270 and 270-a of the Tax Law of this State. Under section 270 it is provided in substance that there shall be collected a tax on all sales or agreements to sell or memorandum of sales and all deliveries or transfers of shares or certificates of stock. Under section 270-a there is imposed upon the same transactions an additional emergency tax.

It is claimed that the imposition of such taxes upon the transactions in question was in violation of the commerce provisions of the Constitution of the United States (Art. 1, § 8, cl. 3, and art. 1, § 10, cl. 2) and also in violation of section 1 of the Fourteenth [831]*831Amendment, which provides, in substance, so far as applicable that a State shall not make or enforce any law depriving any person of property without due process of law. So far as the Kennedy & Company transaction is concerned, a telephone call or other message was received by claimants at their offices in New York city for the purchase of the stock. Claimants sent their memoranda of sale to Kennedy & Company; then the certificates of stock were sent to a banking company in Philadelphia from New York to be held by the banking company until a sight draft sent by claimants was honored, and when the draft was honored the banking company sent a check in payment of the stock to claimants at New York city. Clearly the agreement to sell and memoranda of sale were made in this State.

Taxing statutes are presumptively constitutional. (King v. Mullins, 171 U. S. 404, 436.) The sections of the Tax Law of this State in question here are constitutional legislative enactments. (Vaughan v. State, 272 N. Y. 102.) It is only direct not incidental interference with the freedom of commerce that brings the case within the exclusive domain of Federal legislation. (Field v. Barber Asphalt Paving Co., 194 U. S. 618, 623.)

The taxes were imposed, not on the property represented by the shares of stock nor on the shares, but on the privilege of sale or the agreement to sell the shares. (People ex rel. Hatch v. Reardon, 184 N. Y. 431; affd., 204 U. S. 152.)

That the interference with commerce must be direct and not incidental is well established. In South Carolina State Highway Dept. v. Barnwell Bros., Inc. (303 U. S. 177), it was held that it was within the power of a State to regulate the use of its highways, which regulations applied alike to vehicles moving within and without the State.

In Cargill Co. v. Minnesota (180 U. S. 452) it was held that in the exercise of its police power and its power to license occupations and businesses within its boundaries, a State may impose a license tax for transacting such business or occupation although the property may involve deliveries outside the State. In this case it was held that the fact that grain stored in an elevator is to be shipped out of the State does not make a statute requiring a license for conducting the business of such elevator in the State amount to a regulation of interstate commerce. In other words, when the property involved is subject to a property tax, the privilege of engaging in business concerning such property may be taxed. (Wiggins Ferry Co. v. East St. Louis, 107 U. S. 365.) In this case, where an annual license fee was imposed on a ferry company by the city of East St. Louis, the company having been chartered by [832]*832the State of Illinois and being domiciled in East St. Louis, its boats plying between that place and St. Louis, Mo., the court said (at p. 374): The exaction of a license fee is an ordinary exercise of the police power by municipal corporations. When, therefore, a State expressly grants to an incorporated city, as in this case, the power to license, tax and regulate ferries,’ the latter may impose a license tax on the keepers of ferries, although their boats ply between landings lying in two different States, and the act by which this exaction is authorized will not be held to be a regulation of commerce.”

In the instant case the situs of the shares of stock was the city and State of New York and the shares were subject to a property tax. The State may require a license and the payment of a tax therefor from hawkers, peddlers, agents and other persons selling goods which are within the State at the time of sale, although such licensees bring their goods in from another State or buy from or act for non-resident manufacturers. (Singer Sewing Machine Co. v. Brickell, 233 U. S. 304.)

In Western Live Stock v. Bureau of Revenue (303 U. S. 250) it was said (at p. 253): “ Nor is taxation of a local business or occupation which is separate and distinct from the transportation and intercourse which is interstate commerce forbidden merely because in the ordinary course such transportation or intercourse is induced or occasioned by the business.”

In Townsend v. Yeomans (301 U. S. 441

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Related

Ludlum Steel Co. v. State
179 Misc. 363 (New York State Court of Claims, 1943)

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Bluebook (online)
172 Misc. 829, 16 N.Y.S.2d 520, 1939 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 2569, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/okane-v-state-nyclaimsct-1939.