Florida Central Peninsular Railroad Company v. William Reynolds

• Decision Date: 06 January 1902
• Docket Number: No. 183,183
• Citation: 22 S.Ct. 176,183 U.S. 471,46 L.Ed. 283
• Parties: FLORIDA CENTRAL & PENINSULAR RAILROAD COMPANY, Plff. in Err. , v. WILLIAM H. REYNOLDS, as Comptroller of the State of Florida, and John A. Pierce, as Sheriff of Leon County
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

183 U.S. 471

22 S.Ct. 176

46 L.Ed. 283

FLORIDA CENTRAL & PENINSULAR RAILROAD COMPANY, Plff. in Err.,

v WILLIAM H. REYNOLDS, as Comptroller of the State of Florida, and John A. Pierce, as Sheriff of Leon County.

No. 183.

Argued November 5, 6, 1901.

Decided January 6, 1902.

The constitution of Florida of 1868, art. 16, § 24, as amended by art. 11 of the amendments of 1875, is as follows:

'The property of all corporations, whether heretofore or hereafter incorporated, shall be subject to taxation, unless such property be held and used exclusively for religious, educational, or charitable purposes.'

Sec. 26, chap. 3413, of the Laws of Florida, 1883, reads:

'If any assessor, when making his assessments, shall discover that any land in his county was omitted in the assessment roll of either or all of the three previous years, and was then liable to taxation, he shall, in addition to the assessment of such land for that year, assess the same separately for such year or years that may have been so omitted, at the just value thereof in such year, noting distinctly the year when such omission occurred; and such assessment shall have the same force and effect as it would have had if made in the year the same was omitted, and taxes shall be levied and collected thereon in like manner and together with the taxes of the year in which the assessment is made; but no lands shall be assessed for more than three years' arrears of taxes, and all lands shall be subject to such taxes omitted to be assessed, into whosesoever hands they may come.'

In 1885 this statute was passed:

'Sec. 1. That in all cases in which any railroad or the properties thereto belonging or appertaining in this state, in the tax years commencing March 1, 1879, 1880, and 1881, or any of such years, were not assessed for taxes for such years, it shall be the duty of the comptroller to cause the same, or so much thereof, as were not assessed, to be assessed for state and county taxes, and 20 per centum of the taxes so assessed for said years and now unpaid shall be collected at the same time the taxes for the year 1885 shall be assessed and collected, and each year thereafter an additional 20 per centum of said taxes shall be collected at the same time and in the same manner as the taxes for such year are collected, until the whole amount of said unpaid taxes for the years 1879, 1880, and 1881 are paid.

'The taxes to be assessed under this act shall be the same in amount as they would have been had they been assessed in such years or any of them as to which there was a failure to assess.' Laws of Florida 1885, chap. 3558.

This statute was followed in 1891 by one in these words:

'Sec. 1. That the state and county taxes assessed by the comptroller of the state of Florida, upon any railroads and the properties thereof in said state, for the years 1879, 1880, and 1881, under and in pursuance of 'An Act to Provide for the Assessment and Collection of Taxes on Railroads and the Properties Thereof for the Years 1879, 1880, and 1881, as to Which There Was no Assessment,' but which have not been collected, shall be collected, and the payment thereof enforced at the same times and in the same manner as is now or may hereafter be provided by law for the collection and the enforcement of the payment of taxes assessed upon the railroads and the properties thereof in the state of Florida.' Laws of Florida, 1891, chap. 4073.

The assessment of railroad property in Florida was not made by the county assessors, but by the comptroller of the state. Acts State of Florida, 1879, chap. 3099, §§ 45, 46.

The plaintiff is a corporation organized under the laws of Florida on November 17, 1888, and was the owner of several lines of railway which, on May 1, 1889, it acquired from the Florida Railway & Navigation Company, under foreclosure proceedings. The Florida Railway & Navigation Company was organized on February 29, 1884, by the consolidation of several companies, and on July 1 of that year it placed upon its properties a trust deed to secure the payment of $10,000,000 bonds.

This bill was filed November 2, 1892, in the circuit court of the second judicial circuit of Florida, in and for the county of Leon. Its purpose was to restrain the collection of certain taxes, and to recover other taxes paid under protest. After three appeals to the supreme court of the state (35 Fla. 625, 17 So. 902, 39 Fla. 243, 22 So. 697, 28 So. 861), the final outcome of the litigation was a decree dismissing the plaintiff's bill in toto.

Messrs. William B. Lamar and George H. Lamar for defendants in error.

Mr. Justice Brewer delivered the opinion of the court:

No question is presented concerning the claim for the taxes paid under protest, counsel for plaintiff stating in their brief that 'the sole relief sought in this court is to obtain a reversal of the decree of the state supreme court, in so far as it reversed the decree of the circuit court enjoining the sale of complainant's lines of railroad for the taxes assessed for the years 1879, 1880, and 1881, such taxes amounting to $96,181.69;' and in respect to this matter they sum up their contention in these words:

'By the law of 1885 the state attempted to authorize the assessment of taxes for 1879-1881, but only upon property belonging to railroad companies, though it appears from the record that other properties of like class, i. e., real estate belonging to individuals and owners, not railroad companies, had not been assessed for taxes for such years.

'It surely cannot be 'due process of law' for the state of Florida in 1885 to arbitrarily impose a burden theretofore unheard of upon security holders who in 1884 had invested their money upon the faith of a title then clear of such burden.

'It surely cannot be less than a denial of the equal protection of the laws for the state of Florida in 1885 to impose burdens theretofore unheard of upon the property of railroad companies which under the laws of Florida is real estate, while permitting other real estate, otherwise owned, to escape such burdens.'

The decision of the supreme court of the state establishes that these proceedings are not in confiict with the Constitution of Florida. The single question, therefore, to consider, is whether there is anything in the Federal Constitution which forbids a state to reach backward and collect taxes from certain kinds of property which were not at the time collected through lack of statutory provisions therefor, or in consequence of a misunderstanding as to the law, or from neglect of administrative officials, without also making provision for collecting the taxes for the same years on other property. It will be perceived that there was no new levy of taxes. No act of the legislature was passed imposing an additional burden upon the property of the state in general, or upon any particular property, but the case is one in which, general levies having been made for the years named, certain property which ought to have paid taxes under them—and thus contributed its share of the expenses of the state—failed to do so, and the effort is to compel that property to discharge its obligation. The objection is not that the property ought not during those years to have paid its proportion of the taxes, but that it ought not now to be compelled to pay such proportion, because certain other property was similarly situated, and no effort is made to compel payment from it.

The fault, if fault there be, is one of omission rather than commission. The act of the legislature is not a mandate to a single officer, charged with the duty of assessing all property, to assess certain property, and to omit to assess the rest; but the general legislation having provided that railroad property should be assessed by the comptroller and real estate by county assessors, the act simply directed the comptroller to discharge the duties of assessment as to the property committed to his care, and omitted any direction to the county assessors. This omission, it is contended, makes the act unconstitutional. In other words, the legislature may not pass an act directing one officer to discharge his duty unless it couples therewith a direction to other officers charged with kindred duty to perform theirs. It would seem to follow that if the legislature had on the same day passed another act with like command to the county assessors, the two acts together would be constitutional, though each standing alone would not be; and as the time of its passage is not generally of the essence of a statute, it would also seem to follow that if the legislature should to-day pass an act directing the county assessors to assess delinquent real estate for those years, this late enactment would give constitutional vitality to that passed years ago. How far can this theory of constitutionality be sustained?

It must be remembered that 'taxes are not debts in the ordinary sense of that term;' that they are 'the enforced proportional contribution of persons and property, levied by the authority of the state for the support of the government and for all public needs.' Cooley, Taxn. 1st ed. pp. 13 and 1. They are obligations of the highest character, for only as they are discharged is the continued existence of government possible. They are not canceled and discharged by the failure of duty on the part of any tribunal or officer, legislative or administrative. Payment alone discharges the obligation, and until payment the state may proceed by all proper means to compel the performance of the obligation. No statutes of limitation run against the state, and it is a matter of discretion with it to determine how far into the past it will reach to compel performance of this obligation.

No question of bona fide purchase arises, for it was held by the supreme court that, inasmuch as no assessment of this railroad property had been made during the years named, and no lien thereon for taxes established, a...