Coffin v. Artesian Water Co.
| Decision Date | 27 November 1906 |
| Citation | 193 Mass. 274,79 N.E. 262 |
| Parties | COFFIN v. ARTESIAN WATER CO. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Jacob T. Choate, for appellant.
Horace I. Bartlett, for appellee.
This is an action to recover a tax on property of a foreign corporation. The tax was assessed on the defendant's water mains and pipes which supply the public with water at Salisbury Beach The case was submitted on an agreed statement of facts which contains the following sentence: 'Unless the defendant is taxable in Salisbury for said pipes and mains as personal property, the defendant is entitled to judgment.' This sentence presents the only question before us.
The defendant's pumping station is situated about one-half a mile from Salisbury Beach, 'and the pipes and mains except as hereinafter stated, are entirely upon private land the defendant having a lease to maintain said pipes, from the owners of the fee, made and the pipes laid in 1902.' The exception referred to arises from the fact that about 200 feet of the pipes are within a way 75 feet wide on Salisbury Beach. This beach is owned by a corporation which succeeded the commoners of Salisbury, a quasi corporation, in August 1903. 'Said commoners had title and claimed exclusive title in fee to all said beach for many years. In a certain release given by said town to said commoners in July, 1903, there was the following language: 'Excepting, however, from this conveyance, any right of the public and the marsh owners in and to the old way to the marsh, as the same now exists and is used, and in and to the way seventy-five feet wide, running across said beach in continuation of the town road leading to the same. * * * And reserving to itself and its successors the right to use and to permit any person residing in said town to use for purposes of travel only, * * * the way seventy-five feet wide as now laid out, extending from the present highway to the sea. * * * The location of said ways may be changed from time to time, as agreed in writing by the selectmen of said town, and by said commoners, their successors and assigns.”
In a case presented on an agreed statement of facts which contains no clause authorizing the court to draw inferences of fact, the plaintiff cannot recover, unless the matters stated entitled him to a judgment against the defendant as a matter of law. Old Colony Railroad Co. v. Wilder, 137 Mass. 538.
The defendant, being a foreign corporation, is not taxable upon personal property in this state under the general provisions of the statute, unless the property is within some of the exceptions referred to in Rev. Laws, c. 12, § 23. Flanders v. Cross, 10 Cush. (Mass.) 516; Harrington v. Glidden, 179 Mass. 486-491, 61 N.E 54, 94 Am. St. Rep. 613. The only exception in the statute, relied on...
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