United States v. Clintwood Elkhorn Mining Co.

Citation128 S.Ct. 1511,2008 USTC P 50281,2008 USTC P 70275,170 L.Ed.2d 392,2008 Daily Journal D.A.R. 5309,553 U.S. 1,2008 I.R.B. 845,76 USLW 4189,101 A.F.T.R.2d 2008,08 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 4326
Decision Date15 April 2008
Docket NumberNo. 07–308.,07–308.
PartiesUNITED STATES, Petitioner, v. CLINTWOOD ELKHORN MINING COMPANY, et al.
CourtUnited States Supreme Court

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

Recognized as Unconstitutional

26 U.S.C.A. § 4121(a)(1).

Syllabus *

The Internal Revenue Code requires a taxpayer seeking a refund of taxes unlawfully assessed to file an administrative claim with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) before filing suit against the Government, see 26 U.S.C. § 7422(a). Such claim must be filed within three years of the filing of a tax return or two years of the tax's payment, whichever is later, see § 6511(a). In contrast, the Tucker Act allows claims to be brought against the Government within six years of the challenged conduct. Respondent coal companies paid taxes on coal exports under a portion of the Code later invalidated under the Export Clause of the Constitution. They filed timely administrative claims and recovered refunds of their 19971999 taxes, but sought a refund of their 19941996 taxes in the Court of Federal Claims without complying with the Code's refund procedures. Nevertheless, the court allowed them to proceed directly under the Export Clause and the Tucker Act. Affirming in relevant part, the Federal Circuit ruled that the companies could pursue their Export Clause claim despite their failure to file timely administrative refund claims.

Held: The plain language of 26 U.S.C. §§ 7422(a) and 6511 requires a taxpayer seeking a refund for a tax assessed in violation of the Export Clause, just as for any other unlawfully assessed tax, to file a timely administrative refund claim before bringing suit against the Government. Pp. 1516 – 1520.

(a) Because the companies did not file a refund claim with the IRS for the 19941996 taxes, they may, under § 7422(a), bring [n]o suit” in “any court to recover “any internal revenue tax” or “any sum” alleged to have been wrongfully collected “in any manner.” Moreover, § 6511's time limits for filing administrative refund claims—set forth in an “unusually emphatic form,” United States v. Brockamp, 519 U.S. 347, 350, 117 S.Ct. 849, 136 L.Ed.2d 818—apply to any tax imposed by [Title 26],” § 6511(a) (emphasis added). Contrary to the companies' claim that these statutes are ambiguous, the provisions clearly state that taxpayers must comply with the Code's refund scheme before bringing suit, including the filing of a timely administrative claim. Indeed, this question was all but decided in United States v. A.S. Kreider Co., 313 U.S. 443, 61 S.Ct. 1007, 85 L.Ed. 1447, where the Court held that the limitations period in the Revenue Act then in effect, not the Tucker Act's longer period, applied to tax refund actions. As was the case there, the current Code's refund scheme would have “no meaning whatever,” id., at 448, 61 S.Ct. 1007, if taxpayers failing to comply with it were nonetheless allowed to bring suit subject only to the Tucker Act's longer time bar. Pp. 1516 – 1517.

(b) The companies nonetheless assert that their claims are exempt from the Code provisions' broad sweep because the claims derive from the Export Clause. The principles that a “constitutional claim can become time-barred just as any other claim can,” Block v. North Dakota ex rel. Board of Univ. and School Lands, 461 U.S. 273, 292, 103 S.Ct. 1811, 75 L.Ed.2d 840, and that Congress has the authority to require administrative exhaustion before allowing a suit against the Government, even for a constitutional violation, see, e.g., Ruckelshaus v. Monsanto Co., 467 U.S. 986, 1018, 104 S.Ct. 2862, 81 L.Ed.2d 815, are fully applicable to unconstitutional taxation claims. The companies' attempt to distinguish Export Clause claims on the ground that the Clause is not simply a limitation on taxing authority but a prohibition carving particular economic activity out of Congress's power is without substance and totally manipulable. There is no basis for treating taxes collected in violation of that Clause differently from taxes challenged on other grounds. Because the companies acknowledge that their claims are subject to the Tucker Act's time bar, the question is not whether their refund claim can be limited, but rather which limitation applies. Their argument that, despite explicit and expansive statutory language, the Code's refund scheme does not apply to their case as a matter of statutory interpretation is unavailing. They claim that Congress could not have intended it to apply a “constitutionally dubious” refund scheme to taxes assessed in violation of the Export Clause, but the statutory language emphatically covers the facts of this case. In any event, there is no constitutional problem. Congress's detailed scheme is designed “to advise the appropriate officials of the demands or claims intended to be asserted, so as to insure an orderly administration of the revenue,” United States v. Felt & Tarrant Mfg. Co., 283 U.S. 269, 272, 51 S.Ct. 376, 75 L.Ed. 1025, to provide that refund claims are made promptly, and to allow the IRS to avoid unnecessary litigation by correcting conceded errors. Even when a tax's constitutionality is challenged, taxing authorities have an “exceedingly strong interest in financial stability,” McKesson Corp. v. Division of Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco, Fla. Dept. of Business Regulation, 496 U.S. 18, 37, 110 S.Ct. 2238, 110 L.Ed.2d 17, that they may pursue through provisions of the sort at issue. There is no reason why invoking the Export Clause would deprive Congress of the power to protect this interest. The companies' claim that the Code procedures are excessively burdensome is belied by their own invocation of those procedures for taxes paid within the Code's limitations period, which resulted in full refunds with interest. Pp. 1517 – 1519.

(c) The companies' fallback argument—that even if the refund scheme applies to Export Clause cases generally, it does not apply when taxes are unconstitutional on their face—is rejected. Enochs v. Williams Packing & Nav. Co., 370 U.S. 1, 82 S.Ct. 1125, 8 L.Ed.2d 292, distinguished. Pp. 1519 – 1520.

473 F.3d 1373, reversed.

ROBERTS, C. J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.

William M. Jay, for Petitioner.

Patricia A. Millett, for Respondents.

Paul D. Clement, Solicitor General, Washington, D.C., for United States.Steven H. Becker, Paul A. Horowitz, Suzanne I. Offerman, Baker & McKenzie LLP, New York, NY, Patricia A. Millett, Thomas C. Goldstein, Steven C. Wu, Monica P. Sekhon, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, LLP, Washington, DC, for Respondents.Paul D. Clement, Solicitor General, Richard T. Morrison, Acting Assistant Attorney, Thomas G. Hungar, Deputy Solicitor General, Gilbert S. Rothenberg, Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General, William M. Jay, Assistant to the Solicitor General, Kenneth L. Greene, Steven W. Parks, Washington, D.C., for United States.Chief Justice ROBERTS delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Internal Revenue Code provides that taxpayers seeking a refund of taxes unlawfully assessed must comply with tax refund procedures set forth in the Code. Under those procedures, a taxpayer must file an administrative claim with the Internal Revenue Service before filing suit against the Government. Such a claim must be filed within three years of the filing of a return or two years of payment of the tax, whichever is later. The Tucker Act, in contrast, is more forgiving, allowing claims to be brought against the United States within six years of the challenged conduct. The question in this case is whether a taxpayer suing for a refund of taxes collected in violation of the Export Clause of the Constitution may proceed under the Tucker Act, when his suit does not meet the time limits for refund actions in the Internal Revenue Code. The answer is no.

I

A taxpayer seeking a refund of taxes erroneously or unlawfully assessed or collected may bring an action against the Government either in United States district court or in the United States Court of Federal Claims. 28 U.S.C. § 1346(a)(1); EC Term of Years Trust v. United States, 550 U.S. 429, 431, and n. 2, 127 S.Ct. 1763, 1766 n. 2, 167 L.Ed.2d 729 (2007). The Internal Revenue Code specifies that before doing so, the taxpayer must comply with the tax refund scheme established in the Code. United States v. Dalm, 494 U.S. 596, 609–610, 110 S.Ct. 1361, 108 L.Ed.2d 548 (1990). That scheme provides that a claim for a refund must be filed with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) before suit can be brought, and establishes strict timeframes for filing such a claim.

In particular, 26 U.S.C. § 7422(a) specifies:

“No suit or proceeding shall be maintained in any court for the recovery of any internal revenue tax alleged to have been erroneously or illegally assessed or collected, or of any penalty claimed to have been collected without authority, or of any sum alleged to have been excessive or in any manner wrongfully collected, until a claim for refund or credit has been duly filed with the [IRS].”

The Code further establishes a time limit for filing such a refund claim with the IRS: To receive a “refund of an overpayment of any tax imposed by this title in respect of which tax the taxpayer is required to file a return,” a refund claim must be filed no later than “3 years from the time the return was filed or 2 years from the time the tax was paid, whichever of such periods expires the later.” § 6511(a). And § 6511(b)(1) mandates that [n]o credit or refund shall be allowed or made” if a claim is not filed within the time limits set forth in § 6511(a). “Read together, the import of these sections is clear: unless a claim for refund of a tax has been filed within the time limits imposed by § 6511(a), a suit for refund ... may not be maintained in any court.” Dalm, su...

To continue reading

Request your trial
375 cases
  • Polsky v. Werfel, CIVIL ACTION No. 14-655
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania
    • February 23, 2015
    ...filed or two years from the time the tax was paid, whichever period is later. 26 U.S.C. § 6511(a); U.S. v. Clintwood Elkhorn Mining Co., 553 U.S. 1, 4, 5 (2008)Page 12(citing § 6511(a)). As stated above, the Polskys had two options to contest the Math Error Notice. One was to request an aba......
  • Claybrook v. United States, No. 10-734T
    • United States
    • United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (District of Columbia)
    • April 18, 2012
    ...but only if a taxpayer has met all the procedural requirements to seek a refund directly from the IRS. See United States v. Clintwood Elkhorn Mining Co., 553 U.S. 1, 11 (2008) ("Congress has . . . established a detailed refund scheme that subjects complaining taxpayers to various requiremen......
  • JACOBS V. The UNITED States
    • United States
    • Court of Federal Claims
    • June 23, 2010
    ...authority to create "a different and shorter period of limitation to an individual class of actions." Id.; see United States v. Clintwood Elkhorn Mining Co., 553 U.S. 1, 4 (2008) ("The question in this case is whether a taxpayer suing for a refund... may proceed under the Tucker Act, when h......
  • Shell Oil Co. v. United States
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of International Trade
    • June 20, 2011
    ......Clintwood Elkhorn Mining Co., 553 U.S. 1, 5, 13–14, 128 S.Ct. 1511, 170 L.Ed.2d 392 (2008) (holding that ......
  • Request a trial to view additional results
1 firm's commentaries
1 books & journal articles
  • THE LAW WANTS TO BE FORMAL.
    • United States
    • January 1, 2021
    ...Corp. v. Div. of Alcoholic Beverages & Tobacco, 496 U.S. 18, 22 (1990). (258) See United States v. Clintwood Elkhorn Mining Co., 553 U.S. 1, 11-12 (2008) ("Even when the constitutionality of a tax is challenged, taxing authorities do in fact have an 'exceedingly strong interest in finan......

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT