Greene v. Wis. Tax Comm'n
| Decision Date | 31 March 1936 |
| Citation | 266 N.W. 270,221 Wis. 531 |
| Parties | GREENE v. WISCONSIN TAX COMMISSION ET AL. (TWO CASES). |
| Court | Wisconsin Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeals from judgments of the Circuit Court for Milwaukee County; Charles L. Aarons, Judge.
Reversed.
The plaintiff H. S. Greene commenced this action on April 11, 1935, against the Wisconsin tax commission and John H. Leenhouts, assessor of incomes for Milwaukee county, to review the act of the tax commission in assessing to the plaintiff additional taxes for the years 1929, 1930, and 1931. There was a trial before the court which held that a part of the additional income assessed was not assessable, and judgment was entered accordingly on October 28, 1935, from which the defendants appeal. The plaintiff has served notice of review, claiming that he was subject to no additional assessment.
The plaintiff Mary E. Greene commenced an action against the same defendants with the same result, and from the judgment entered in her favor on October 21, 1935, the defendant appeals, and she also served a notice of review claiming that she was subject to no additional assessment.
The two cases were heard, considered, and decided together. They will be considered together upon this appeal, although a mandate will be entered in each case.
Plaintiffs in these actions are husband and wife, and were residents of the city of Aurora, state of Illinois, down to September 30, 1929, and were residents of the state of Wisconsin from the 1st day of October, 1929, to December 31, 1929. Each taxpayer received a certain income after coming to the state of Wisconsin, which was reported in a joint return. In that return they listed only such income as had been received by them since they came to the state of Wisconsin. They made a joint return of their income for the year 1930. Each filed a separate income return for the year 1931. There is no controversy in the case with respect to the income received while plaintiffs were residents of this state. On January 1, 1929, H. S. Greene was the owner and holder of 120 shares of certain stocks which he sold in the month of February, 1929, for $48,000, deriving a profit of $35,838.68. Prior to January 1, 1929, Mary E. Greene was the owner and holder of 463 shares of stock which she sold at a profit of $130,551.87. Neither of the plaintiffs included the profit from these stock sales in their income tax return. In addition to the stock profits, H. S. Greene had income from other sources, salaries, dividends, etc., so that his total income from January 1, 1929, to September 30, 1929, was $47,023.63. Mary E. Greene's total income in 1929 prior to September 30 from all sources was the sum of $132,165.38.
The tax commission claimed that the income received by the plaintiffs prior to the establishment of their residence in Wisconsin should have been included in the return, and on that basis reassessed the plaintiffs by applying to the amended return section 71.09(2), which resulted in the following additional taxes:
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Department of Revenue v. Howick
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Scobie v. Wis. Tax Comm'n
...income from business transacted within the state by one who was a nonresident throughout the year. It is stated in Greene v. Tax Commission, 221 Wis. 531, 539, 266 N.W. 270, that the basis for taxation of a resident on income received from business transacted outside the state “is that it w......
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...of Hart v. Tax Commission, 240 Mass. 37, 132 N.E. 621; Kennedy v. Commissioner, 256 Mass. 426, 152 N.E. 747; Greene v. Wisconsin Tax Commission, 221 Wis. 531, 266 N.W. 270, which hold that a state is without constitutional authority and prohibited by the Fourteenth Amendment from taxing a r......
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...or person. However, the basis of taxation is that the income is received by the taxpayer within the state. See Greene v. Tax Commission, 221 Wis. 531, 266 N.W. 270 (1936). Similarly, the taxation of gain or loss in this instance is that it is received within Wisconsin. An economic gain or l......