Consolidated Gas Co. v. City of Baltimore

• Court: Maryland Supreme Court
• Writing for the Court: ROBINSON, J., delivered the opinion of the Court.
• Citation: Consolidated Gas Co. v. City of Baltimore, 62 Md. 588 (Md. 1884)
• Decision Date: 19 December 1884
• Parties: THE CONSOLIDATED GAS COMPANY OF BALTIMORE v. THE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL OF BALTIMORE.

62 Md. 588

THE CONSOLIDATED GAS COMPANY OF BALTIMORE v. THE MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL OF BALTIMORE.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

December 19, 1884

APPEAL from the Circuit Court of Baltimore City.

The bill of complaint in this case was filed by the appellant against the appellee, asking for an injunction to restrain the appellee from enforcing the payment af a tax assessed upon the gasometers and gas mains or pipes of the appellant and from assessing and taxing said property as though the same were in fact assessable and taxable as real estate. After answer filed and testimony taken, the Court (FISHER J.) passed a decree refusing the injunction and dismissing the bill. From this decree the present appeal was taken. The case is further stated in the opinion of this Court.

The cause was argued before ALVEY, C.J., MILLER, ROBINSON, and BRYAN, J.

N Penniman Bond, and Robert D. Morrison, for the appellant.

James L. McLane, for the appellee.

ROBINSON J., delivered the opinion of the Court.

Ordinance No. 7, 1881, passed by the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, in pursuance of the Acts of 1880, chapters 187 and 235, provides, "that any mechanical tools or implements, whether worked by hand or by steam or other motive power, machinery, manufacturing apparatus, or engines, owned by any individual, firm or corporation in said city, and properly subject to valuation and taxation therein, which said tools, implements, machinery, apparatus or engines, shall be actually employed and used in the business of manufacturing in said city," shall be exempt from taxation.

The appellant was incorporated under the laws of this State, for the purpose of manufacturing illuminating gas in Baltimore City.

The question in this appeal, is whether the gasometers and gas mains or pipes belonging to the Company are, under the above ordinance, exempt from taxation? And this depends upon whether they constituted part of the machinery actually used by it in the manufacture of gas?--the language of the ordinance, being "any machinery, etc., actually employed and used in the business of manufacturing."

The process of manufacturing gas is, according to the testimony as follows: The coal is put in air-tight retorts and heated to a temperature sufficient to drive off the volatile matter, which, in fact, contains everything to be found in illuminating gas, the residuum in the retort being coke. This volatile matter or gas then passes into a condenser of a lower temperature, to free it from the tar which is present with the gas;--it then goes into what is called a scrubber, by which the ammonia is washed out in the form of ammoniacal liquor; thence it is drawn by an exhauster, driven by a steam engine, through purifiers over slacked lime, and thus freed of all impurities. It then passes through the station metres for the purpose of ascertaining...