Corry v. City of Baltimore

• Decision Date: 16 January 1903
• Parties: CORRY v. MAYOR, ETC., OF BALTIMORE et al.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

53 A. 942

96 Md. 310

CORRY v. MAYOR, ETC., OF BALTIMORE et al.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

January 16, 1903

Appeal from circuit court of Baltimore city; J. Upshur Dennis Judge.

Suit by James Corry against the mayor and city council of Baltimore and others. From a decree dismissing the bill, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Argued before McSHERRY, C.J., and FOWLER, BRISCOE, BOYD, PAGE, and SCHMUCKER, JJ.

Wm. P Maulsby, Jr., and William S. Bryan, Jr., for appellant.

Wm Pinkney Whyte, Olin Bryan, and Isidor Rayner, Atty.Gen., for appellees.

BRISCOE J.

James C. Corry, a resident of the state of Pennsylvania, and a nonresident of the state of Maryland, filed a bill in circuit court No. 2 of Baltimore city on behalf of himself and other nonresident stockholders of the New York & Baltimore Transportation Line, a corporation of the state of Maryland against the mayor and city council of Baltimore, James P. Gorter, collector. Murray Vandiver, treasurer of the state of Maryland, and the New York & Baltimore Transportation Line, to restrain and enjoin the defendants from collecting certain state and municipal taxes for the year 1899 on 150 shares of the capital stock of the transportation company, of the par value of $20 per share. The defendants answered the bill, but subsequently these answers were withdrawn, and by an agreement demurrers were considered as filed by the defendants; and from a decree of the circuit court of Baltimore city of the 24th of June, 1902, sustaining the demurrers and dismissing the plaintiff's bill, this appeal has been taken.

The principal and important question presented by the case is whether the method of taxation provided by the statutes of Maryland of stocks in Maryland corporations held by nonresidents of the state is valid and constitutional. The provisions of the several statutes of the state relating to the tax will be found in sections 2, 4, 141, and 144 of article 81 of the Code of Public General Laws and in the Supplement of the Code of 1900. These statutes distinctly provide that the shares of capital stock of all corporations, whether owned by residents or nonresidents, shall be liable to assessment and taxation, and by section 131 of the Code the stock held by nonresident stockholders in steamboat or other companies, etc., is situate for the purpose of taxation at the place where its principal office for the transaction of business is located; that is, in this case, in the city of Baltimore. The mode, method, and manner of the assessment, valuation, and taxation, as applicable to stock held by nonresident shareholders is clearly and fully provided and directed by the several statutes, and it is admitted that the taxes in this case were imposed according to the provisions of the statutes.

The appellant urges four grounds why the tax laws of the state here in dispute are not constitutional and valid: (1) Because the tax is a personal one, and is beyond the powers and jurisdiction of the state to levy a personal tax against a nonresident of the state; (2) to enforce the collection "is taking property without due process of law" or color of right, and in contravention of the constitution of the United States; (3) that no provision is made by the statutes for a hearing or opportunity to be heard by the nonresidents of the state; (4) that the levy of the city tax upon stock held by nonresidents in corporations in Baltimore city is exempt by the new charter (Act 1898, c. 123). Some of the questions raised on this appeal can hardly, at this date be regarded as res nova in this court. Similar statutes have been enacted from time to time by the general assembly of the state imposing a tax upon corporate stock in Maryland corporations held by nonresidents, and in one form or another have been brought to this court for construction. The principle of this legislation has been upheld and recognized by this court in all the cases, except where the statute was plainly in contravention of the state or federal constitutions. Whatever may be the adjudications in other states, it is quite certain that in the construction of this statute we are to be controlled by the decisions of our own court in so far as they are applicable to the case. It is distinctly declared by the fifteenth article of the bill of rights that "every person in the state or person holding property therein, ought to contribute his proportion of public taxes for the support of the government, according to his actual worth in real or personal property." In the case of Mayor, etc., of City of Baltimore v. Baltimore City Pass. Ry. Co., 57 Md. 31, it is said that express provision is made by the act for valuing the stock owned by nonresidents at the place where the company has its principal office for the transaction of business, that the shares of stock held by nonresidents are liable to taxation, and that for the purposes of taxation such shares are situate in the city of Baltimore, where the appellee has its principal office. The provisions of the statute under discussion clearly fixes the situs of stock held by nonresidents for taxation at the place of the principal office of business of the corporation within the state, and, the shares of stock being taxable property under the statute, the state and municipality of Baltimore, under the conceded facts of this case, clearly had jurisdiction to impose a tax upon the property situate here, and to collect taxes thereon, notwithstanding the fact that the appellant was a nonresident of the state. It would answer no good purpose to discuss at length the question of the constitutionality of this tax in the light of the many and recent adjudications of this court upon the subject, but we need only refer to the following cases, which...