Railroad Co. v. Pennsylvania

82 U.S. 300, 15 Wall. 300

• Court: Supreme Court of the United States
• Decided: March 18, 1873
• Status: Published

Opinion

Mr. Justice FIELD,

after stating the facts of the case, delivered the opinion of the court as follows:

The question presented in this case for our determination is whether the eleventh section of the act of Pennsylvania of May, 1868, so far as it applies to the interest on bonds of the railroad company, made and payable out of the State, issued to and held by non-residents of the State, citizens of other States, is a valid and constitutional exercise of the taxing power of the State, or whether it is an interference, under the name of a tax-, with the obligation of the contracts between the non-resident bondholders and the corporation. If it be the former, this court cannot arrest the judgment of the State court; if it be the latter, the alleged tax is illegal, and its enforcement can be restrained.

The case before us is similar in its essential particulars to that of The Railroad Company v. Jackson, reported in 7th Wallace. There, as here, the company was incorporated by the legislatures of two States, Pennsylvania and Maryland, under the same name, and its road extended in a continuous line from Baltimore in one State to Sunbury in the other. And the company had issued bonds for a large amount, drawing interest, and executed a mortgage for their security upon its entire road, its franchises and fixtures, including the portion lying in both States. Coupons for the different instalments of interest were attached to each bond. There was no apportionment of the bonds to any part of the road lying in either State. The whole road was bound for each bond. The law of Pennsylvania, as it then existed, imposed a tax on money owing by solvent debtors of three mills on the dollar of the principal, payable out of the interest. An alien resident in Ireland was the holder of some of the bonds of the railroad company, and when he presented his coupons for the interest due thereon, the company claimed the right to deduct the tax imposed by the law of Pennsylvania, and also an alleged tax to the United States. The non-resident refused to accept the interest with these deductions, and brought suit for 'the whole amount in the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Maryland. That court, the chief justice presiding, instructed the jury that if the plaintiff, when he purchased the bonds, was a British subject, resident in Ireland, and still resided there, he was entitled to recover the amount of the coupons without deduction. The verdict and judgment were in accordance with this instruction, and the case was brought here for review.

This court held that the tax under the law of Pennsylvania could not be sustained, as to permit its deduction from the coupons held by the plaintiff would bp giving effect to the acts of her legislature upon property aud effects lying beyond her jurisdiction. The reasoning by which the learned justice, who delivered the opinion of the court, reached this conclusion, may be open, perhaps, to some criticism. It is not perceived how the fact that the mortgage given for the security of the bonds in that case covered that portion of the road which extended into Maryland could affect the liability of the bonds to taxation. If the entire road upon which the mortgage was given had been in another State, and the bonds had been held by a resident of Pennsylvania, they would have been taxable under her laws in that State. It was the fact that the bonds were held by a non-resident which justified the language used, that to permit a deduction of the tax from the interest would be giving effect to the laws of Pennsylvania upon property beyond her jurisdiction, and not the fact assigned by the learned justice. The decision is, nevertheless, authority for the doctrine that property lying beyond the jurisdiction of the State is not a subject upon which her taxing power can be legitimately exercised. Indeed, it would seem that no adjudication should be necessary to establish so obvious a proposition.

The power of taxation, however vast in its character and searching in its extent, is necessarily limited to subjects within the jurisdiction of the State. These subjects are persons, property, and business. Whatever form taxation may assume, w’hether as duties, imposts, excises, or licenses, it must relate to one of these subjects. It is not possible to conceive of any other, though as applied to them, the taxation may be exercised in a great variety of ways. It may touch property in every shape, in its natural condition, in its manufactured form, and in its various transmutations. And the amount of the taxation may be determined by the value of the property, or its use, or its capacity, or its productiveness. It may touch business in the almost infinite forms in which it is conducted, in professions, in commerce, in manufactures, and in transportation. Unless restrained by provisions of the Federal Constitution, the power of the State as to the mode, form, and extent of taxation is unlimited, where the subjects to which it applies are within her jurisdiction.

Corporations may be taxed, like natural persons, upon their property and business. But debts owing by corporations, like debts owing by individuals, are not property of the debtors in any sense; they are obligations of the debtors, and only possess value in the hands of the creditors. With them they are property, and in their hands they may be taxed. To call debts property of the debtors is simply to misuse terms. All the property there eau be in the nature of things in debts of corporations, belongs to the creditors, to whom they are payable, and follows their domicile, wherever that may be. Their debts can have no locality separate from the parties to whom they are due. This principle might be stated in many different ways, and supported by citations from numerous adjudications, but no number of authorities, and no forms of expression could add anything to its obvious truth, which is recognized upon its simple statement.

The bonds issued by the railroad company in this case are undoubtedly property, but property in the hands of the holders, not property of the obligors. So far as they are held by non-residents of the State, they are property beyond the jurisdiction of the State. The law which recpuires the treasurer of the company to retain five per cent, of the interest due to the non-resident bondholder is not, therefore, a legitimate exercise of the taxing power. It is a law which interferes between the company and the bondholder, and under the pretence of levying a tax commands the company to withhold a portion of the stipulated interest and p>ay it over to the State. It is a law which thus impairs the obligation of the contract between the parties. The obligation of a contract depends upon its terms and the means which the law in existence at the time affords for its enforcement. A law which alters the terms of a contract by imposing new7 conditions, or dispensing with those expressed, is a law which impairs its obligation, for, as stated on another occasion, such a law relieves the parties from the moral duty of performing the original stipulations of the contract, and it prevents their legal enforcement. The Act of Pennsylvania of May 1st, 1868, falls within this description. It directs the treasurer of every incorporated company to retain from the interest stipulated to its bondholders five per cent, upon every dollar and pay it into the treasury of the Commonwealth. It thus sanctions and commands a disregard of the express provisions of the contracts between the company and its creditors. It is only one of many cases where, under the name of taxation, an oppressive exaction is made without constitutional warrant, amounting to little less than an arbitrary seizure of private property. It is, in fact, a forced contribution levied upon property held in other States, where it is subjected, or may be subjected, to taxation upon an estimate of its full value.

The case of Maltby v. The Reading and Columbia Railroad Company, decided by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania in 1866, was referred to by the Common Pleas in support of its ruling, and is relied upon by counsel in support of the tax in question. The decision in that ease does go to the full extent claimed, and holds that bonds of corporations held by non-residents are taxable in that State. But it is-evident from a perusal of the opinion of the court that the decision proceeded upon the idea that the bond of the nonresident was itself property in the State because secured by a mortgage on property there. “ It is undoubtedly true,”' said the court, “ that the legislature of Pennsylvania cannot impose a personal tax upon the citizen of another State, but the constant practice is to tax property within- our jurisdiction -which belongs to non-residents.” And again : “ There must be jurisdiction over either the property or the person of the owner, else the power cannot be exercised; but when the property is within our jurisdiction, and enjoys the protection of our State government, it is justly taxable, and it is of no moment that the owner, who is required to pay the tax, resides elsewhere.” There is no doubt of the correctness of these views. But the court then proceeds to state that the principle of taxation as the correlative of protection is as applicable to a non-resident as to a resident; that the loan to the non-resident is made valuable by the -franchises which the company derived from the Commonwealth, and as an investment rests upon State authority, and, therefore, ought to contribute to the support of the State government. It also adds that, though the loan is for some purposes subject to the law of the domicile of the holder, “yet, in a very high sense,” it is also property in Pennsylvania, observing, in support of this position, that the holder of a bond of the company could not enforce it except in that State, and that the mortgage given for its security was upon property and franchises within her jurisdiction. The amount of all which is this: that the State which creates and protects a corporation ought to have the right to tax the loans negotiated by it, though taken and held by non-residents, a proposition which it is unnecessary to controvert. The legality of a tax of that kind would not be questioned if in the charter of the company the imposition of the tax were authorized, and in the bonds of the company, or its certificates of loan, the liability of the loan to taxation were stated. The tax in that case would be in the nature of a license tax for negotiating the loan, for in whatever manner made payable’ it would ultimatel}7 fall on the company as a condition of effecting the loan, and parties contracting with the company would provide for it by proper stipulations. But there is nothing in the observations of the court, nor is there anything in the opinion, which shows that the bond of the non-resident was property in the State, or that the non-resident had any property in the State which was subject to taxation within the principles laid down by the court itself, which we have cited.

The property mortgaged belonged entirely to the company, and so far as it was situated in Pennsylvania was taxable there. If taxation is the correlative of protection, the taxes -which it there paid were the correlative for the protection which it there received. And neither the taxation of the property, nor its protection, was augmented or diminished by the fact that the corporation ivas in debt or free from debt. The property in no sense belonged to the nonresident bondholder or to the mortgagee of the company. The mortgage transferred no title; it created only a lien upon the property. Though in form a conveyance, it was both at law and in equity a mere security for the debt. That such is the nature of a mortgage in Pennsylvania has been frequently ruled by her highest court. In Witmer’s Appeal * the court said: “ The mortgagee has no estate in the land, any more than the judgment creditor. Both have liens upon it, and no more than liens.” And in that State all possible interests in lands, whether vested or contingent, are subject to levy and sale on execution, yet it has been held, on the ground that a mortgagee has no estate in the lands, that the mortgaged premises cannot be taken in execution for his debt. In Rickert v. Madeira, † the court said: “ A mortgage must be considered either as a chose in action or as giving title to the land and vesting a real interest in the mortgagee. In the latter case it would be liable to execution ; in the former it would not, as it would fall within the same i’eason as a judgment bond or simple contract. If we should consider the interest of the mortgagee as a real interest, we must carry the principle out and subject it to a dower and to the lien of a judgment; and that it is but a chose in action, a mere evidence of debt, is apparent from the whole current of decisions.” ‡

Such being the character of a mortgage in Pennsylvania, it cannot be said, as was justly observed by counsel, that the non-resident holder and owner of a bond secured by a mortgage in that State owns any real estate there. A mortgage being there a mere chose in action, it only confers upon the holder,- or the party for whose benefit the mortgage is given, a right to proceed against the property mortgaged, upon a given contingency, to enforce, by its sale, the payment of his demand. This right has no locality independent of the party in whom it resides. It may undoubtedly be taxed by the State when held by a resident therein, but when held by a non-resident it is as much beyond the jurisdiction of the State as the person of the owner.

It is undoubtedly true that the actual situs of personal property which has a visible anti tangible existence, and not the domicile of its owner, will, in many cases, determine the State in which it may be taxed. The same thing is true of public securities consisting of State bonds and bonds of municipal bodies, and circulating notes of banking institutions; the former, by geueral usage, have acquired the character of, and are treated as, property in the place whore they are found, though removed from the domicile of the owner; the latter are treated and pass as money wherever they are. But other personal property, consisting of bonds, mortgages, and debts generally, has no situs independent of the domicile of the owner, and certainly can have none where the instru-' ments, as in the present case, constituting the evidences of debt, are not separated from the possession of the owners.

Cases were cited by counsel on the argument from the decisions of the highest courts of several States, which accord with the views we have expressed. In Davenport v. The Mississippi and Missouri Railroad Company, * the question arose before the Supreme Court of Iowa whether mortgages on property in that State held by non-residents could be taxed under a law which provided that all property, real and personal, within the State, with certain exceptions not material to the present-case, should be subject to taxation, and the court said:

“ Both in law and equity the mortgagee has only a chattel interest. It is true that the situs of the property mortgaged is within the jurisdiction of the State, but, the mortgage itself being personal property, a chose in action, attaches to the person of the owner. It is agreed by the parties that the owners and holders of the mortgages are non-residents of the State. If so, and the property of the mortgage attaches to the person of the. owner, it follows that these mortgages are not property within the State, and if not they are not the subject of taxation.”

In People v. Eastman, † the question arose before the Supreme Court of. California whether a judgment of record in Mariposa County upon the foreclosure of a mortgage upon property situated in that county could he taxed there, the owner of the judgment being a resident of San Francisco, and the law of California requiring all property to be taxed in the county where situated; and it was held that it was not taxable there. “ The mortgage,” said the court, “ has no existence independent of the thing secured by it; a payment of the debt discharges the mortgage. The thing secured is intangible, and has no situs distinct and apart from the residence of the holder. It pertains to and follows the person. The same debt may, at the same time, be secured by a mortgage upon land in every county in the State; and if the mere fact that the mortgage exists in a particular county gives the property in the mortgage a situs subjecting it to taxation in that county, á party, without further legislation, might be called upon to pay the tax several times, for the lien for taxes attaches at the same time in every county in the State, and the mortgage in one county may be a different one from that in another, although the debt secured is the same.”

Some adjudications in the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania were also cited on the argument, which appear to recognize doctrines inconsistent with that announced in Maltby v. Reading and Columbia Railroad Company, particularly the case of McKeen v. The County of Northampton, * and the case of Short’s Estate, † but we do not deem it necessary to pursue the matter further. We are clear that the tax cannot be sustained; that the bonds, being held by non-residents of the State, are only property in their hands, and that they are thus beyond the jurisdiction of the taxing power of the State. Even where the bonds are held by residents of the State the retention by the company of a portion of the stipulated interest can only be sustained as a mode of collecting a tax upon that species of property in the State. When the property is out of the State there can then be no tax upon it for which the interest can be retained. The tax laws of Penn sylvania can have no extra-territorial operation; nor can any law of that State inconsistent with the terras of a contract, made with or payable to parties out of the State, have any effect upon the contract whilst it is in the hands of such parties or other non-residents. The extra-territorial invalidity of State laws discharging a debtor from his contracts with citizens of other States, even though made and payable in the State after'the passage of such laws, has been judicially determined by this court. * A like invalidity must, on similar grounds, attend State legislation which seeks to change the obligation of such contracts in any particular, and on stronger grounds where the contracts are made and payable out of the State.

Judgment reversed, and the cause remanded for further proceedings,

In conformity with this opinion.

Mr. Justice DAVIS, with whom concurred Justices CLIFFORD, MILLER, and HUNT, dissenting. †

* 45 Pennsylvania State, 463.

† 1 Kawle, 329.

‡ Wilson v. Shoenberger’s Executors, 31 Pennsylvania State, 295.

* 12 Iowa, 539.

† 25 California, 603.

* 49 Pennsylvania State, 519.

† 16 Id. 63.

* Ogden v. Saunders, 12 Wheaton, 214; Baldwin v. Hale, 1 Wallace, 223.