Cnty. of Kauai v. McGonagle

• Decision Date: 07 August 1936
• Docket Number: No. 2282.,2282.
• Citation: 33 Haw. 915
• Parties: COUNTY OF KAUAI v. W. C. MCGONAGLE, TREASURER OF THE TERRITORY OF HAWAII.
• Court: Hawaii Supreme Court

33 Haw. 915

COUNTY OF KAUAI

v.W. C. MCGONAGLE, TREASURER OF THE TERRITORY OF HAWAII.

No. 2282.

Supreme Court of the Territory of Hawai‘i.

Argued June 25, 1936.

Decided August 7, 1936.

RESERVED QUESTIONS FROM CIRCUIT COURT FIFTH CIRCUIT. HON. C. H. BUCK, JUDGE.

Syllabus by the Court

The intention of the legislature is to be obtained primarily from the language used in the statute. Where the language of the statute is unambiguous there is no occasion for construction and the statute must be given effect according to its plain and obvious meaning. Where the language used is of doubtful meaning or adherence to the strict letter of the statute would lead to contradictory provisions the court may resort to extrinsic aids to construction.

The provisions of section 21, Act 40, 2d Sp. S. L. 1932, as amended, do not impliedly repeal the provisions of section 12 (3), Act 19, 1st Sp. S. L. 1932, in respect to the powers of the territorial treasurer to deduct surplus liquid fuel tax collections from the tax rate calculations for the succeeding calendar year of property taxes in the county concerned.

C. N. Tavares and A. G. Kaulukou ( A. G. Kaulukou and Hewitt & Tavares on the briefs) for petitioner.

G. P. Kimball, Second Deputy Attorney General ( W. B. Pittman, Attorney General, and J. V. Hodgson, First Deputy Attorney General, on the brief), for respondent.

COKE, C. J., BANKS AND PETERS, JJ.

OPINION OF THE COURT BY PETERS, J.

Under the provisions of Act 40, 2d Sp. S. L. 1932, as amended, hereinafter referred to as the “1932 Real Property Tax Act,” all real property in the Territory is subject to an annual ad valorem tax at a rate to be computed by the territorial treasurer. The method of determining the rate is prescribed by section 21 of the Act as amended (R. L. 1935, § 1921, Am. L. 1935, Act 191, § 1).

The Kauai county budget for the calendar year 1936, as submitted to the territorial treasurer on February 19 of that year, disclosed that in computing the amount to be included under column II opposite item (9) under column I, the county supervisors had included the sum of $56,188.79,representing the 1935 surplus fuel tax collections payable to Kauai county under the provisions of section 12, paragraph (3) of the Hawaiian Fuel Tax Act (Act 19, 1st Sp. S. L. 1932), as amended by Act 6, Sp. S. L. 1933, hereinafter referred to as the “Fuel Tax Act,” as revenues or funds “available” during the year 1936 and applicable in column II on account of item (9) under column I.

The Fuel Tax Act imposes a tax on liquid fuel used in internal combustion engines for the generation of power. Liquid fuel taxes are territorial realizations. The disposition of taxes collected under the Fuel Tax Act is prescribed in section 12 thereof as amended. To fully appreciate the language of section 12 as originally enacted and subsequently amended the session laws should be consulted. Section 2021, R. L. 1935, which purports to be section 12 of the Act as amended, is a modified form and there have been mistakenly omitted therefrom portions of the section as originally enacted.

The territorial treasurer declined to accept the budget in the form submitted by the supervisors of Kauai county, insisting that the amount of surplus 1935 fuel tax collections payable to the county was not one of the amounts which were required or authorized by law to be deducted from or offset by the county board of supervisors against the tax rate calculations for the calendar year 1936 for item (9) or represented revenues or other funds available during such year on account of item (9) and should be omitted by the board from its computations of the amount that should be included under column II opposite item (9) under column I; that the territorial treasurer, and not the county board of supervisors, was authorized by section 12, paragraph (3) of the Fuel Tax Act to make the deduction of the 1935 surplus fuel tax collections and that before accepting the budget as submitted it would be necessary that the same be amended by the board of supervisors accordingly.

At first blush it would seem that the territorial treasurer was insisting upon a distinction without a difference; that it is as broad as it is long if the county supervisors, in preparing the 1936 budget, deducted the amount of 1935 surplus fuel tax collections as a part of the amount included in column II opposite item (9) under column I, or the territorial treasurer deducted such surplus. But the difference results from the limitation of $450,000 placed by section 21 of the 1932 Real Property Tax Act on the amount that may be shown in item (11) column III of the Kauai county budget. To be exact. In the 1936 budget of Kauai county the amount shown in item (11) column III of the budget is the sum of $423,115.71. If the amount of the 1935 surplus fuel tax collections is not deductible from or otherwise available for item (9) under column II, the amount that should be shown in said item (11) column III of its budget is the sum of $479,265.50, an excess of $29,265.50 over the legally permitted maximum amount.

The county supervisors refused to amend the budget and no other budget has been transmitted by them to the territorial treasurer within the time required by law.

In the meantime Kauai county brought proceedings for a declaratory judgment. The parties thereto filed a stipulation of facts and the questions involved under the record were, pursuant to the statute, reserved by the presiding judge for the consideration of this court. In the stipulation referred to it is therein mutually agreed between the parties that the facts do not require the application of paragraph (3) of section 71 of the 1932 Real Property Tax Act. It is a fair inference from the admitted facts that none of the 1935 surplus fuel tax collections were included in the 1934 estimates of fuel taxes available for that year for the purposes of paragraphs (2) or (3) of section 12 of the Fuel Tax Act.

No objection was made by the attorney general to the jurisdiction of the circuit court to consider the controversy under the declaratory judgment statute. And we, for reasons of expediency, make none. But in proceeding to the merits it should be understood that this case is not to be considered as a precedent.

The many questions reserved will not be repeated here. They are involved and repetitious. Some are beyond the scope of the briefs. Our categorical answers at the conclusion of the opinion will indicate what questions have been considered. Those not answered are returned unanswered. Such of the questions as have been considered logically resolve themselves into the two following questions: 1. Are the two Acts, namely, the Hawaiian Fuel Tax Act (1st Sp. S. L. 1932, Act 19), as amended, and the 1932 Real Property Tax Act (2d Sp. S. L. 1932, Act 40), as amended, in respect to the application of surplus fuel tax collections, repugnant to or in conflict with each other, so that it may be said that the 1932 Real Property Tax Act, being the latest expression of the legislative will, will although it contains no repealing clause in respect thereto, govern, control or prevail so as to supersede and impliedly repeal the provisions of the earlier Act which imposes the duty upon the territorial treasurer, where surplus collections for any year in any fuel tax fund to the credit of a county remain after the payment of the charges enumerated in paragraphs (1), (2) (a), (2) (b) and (2) (c) of section 12 of the Fuel Tax Act, to deduct such surplus fuel tax collections from the tax rate calculations for the succeeding calendar year for property taxes in the county concerned, and to transfer such duty to the county board of supervisors of the county affected and to authorize them to include under column II of the budget, opposite the appropriate item under column I, the amount of such surplus fuel tax collections; and, if not, 2. Does the provision of section 21 of the Real Property Tax Act providing for the contingency of a failure by a county board of supervisors to transmit a budget, as in said section 21 required, apply?

Petitioner takes the position that the county board of supervisors, and not the territorial treasurer, is the proper governmental authority to make the deduction of surplus liquid fuel tax collections and such deductions must be made in item (9) under column II of the 1936 county budget and any provision to the contrary in the Liquid Fuel Tax Act was repealed by implication by the provisions of the 1932 Real Property Tax Act.

The petitioner does not deny that the Liquid Fuel Tax Act expressly provides that the territorial treasurer shall deduct surplus fuel tax collections from the property tax rate calculations but claims in support of its position that the Liquid Fuel Tax Act was enacted by the legislature during the existence of the former Real and Personal Property Tax Act (R. L. 1925, §§ 1315–1323, both inclusive, as amended), which the 1932 Real Property Tax Act superseded and expressly repealed and that when the legislature passed the real property tax law it effected such a radical change or departure from the policy and practice of real property taxation contemplated by, and enacted provisions so inconsistent with, section 12 of the Fuel Tax Act, especially in section 21 of the 1932 Real Property Tax Act, as to supersede or repeal those portions of section 12 of the Fuel Tax Act which required the treasurer to make deductions of surplus fuel tax collections and to require the board of supervisors of each county to make the required deductions in their budgets before submitting the same to the territorial treasurer.

Petitioner points to the history of tax legislation introduced in the first and second special sessions of the 1932 legislature and especially to that of the Fuel Tax Act and the 1932 Real Property Tax Act, as commonly known and as disclosed by the senate and house journals of that session; to the respective...