Gully, State Tax Collector v. Jackson International Co

• Decision Date: 13 February 1933
• Docket Number: 30419
• Citation: 145 So. 905,165 Miss. 103
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: GULLY, STATE TAX COLLECTOR, v. JACKSON INTERNATIONAL CO

145 So. 905

165 Miss. 103

GULLY, STATE TAX COLLECTOR, v. JACKSON INTERNATIONAL CO

No. 30419

Supreme Court of Mississippi

February 13, 1933

Division B

1 STATUTES.

Section of statute imposing privilege tax upon persons selling tractors "and/or road machinery" held ambiguous authorizing resort to heading, "Road Machinery Dealers," to ascertain its meaning (Laws 1930, chapter 88, section 171).

2 STATUTES.

Constitutional requirement that title "ought" clearly to Indicate subject-matter of proposed legislation held directory, not mandatory (Constitution 1890, section 71).

3 STATUTES.

Headings to various sections of privilege tax statute are not strictly titles or subtitles, but lead lines which are part of statute itself (Laws 1930, chapter 88; Constitution 1890, section 71).

4. LICENSES.

Privilege tax law section carrying heading "Road Machinery Dealers," and taxing persons selling "tractors and/or road machinery," held not to impose tax on persons selling farm tractors, since intended to reach only road machinery dealers selling road construction machinery (Laws 1930, chapter 88, section 171).

5. STATUTES.

Tax laws are to be strictly construed against taxing power, which cannot be implied, and all doubts must be resolved in taxpayer's favor.

6. STATUTES.

In construing tax statute, construction put upon it by state tax commission is persuasive.

7. STATUTES.

Legislature, when re-enacting statute, is presumed to know and adopt construction placed thereon by state tax commission (Laws 1930, chapter 88, section 171; Laws 1932, chapter 89, section 180).

HON. W. H. POTTER, Judge.

APPEAL from circuit court of Hinds county, HON. W. H. POTTER, Judge.

Suit by J. B. Gully, state tax collector, against the Jackson International Company. From a judgment dismissing the suit, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Affirmed.

G. R. Nobles and W. H. Hughes, both of Jackson, for appellant.

"Road machinery dealers. Upon each person engaged in the business of selling tractors and/or road machinery, a state wide tax . . . of two hundred dollars."

Section 171, chapter 88, Laws of 1930.

It is, however, only when the meaning of provisions in the body of the act is doubtful that resort may be had to the title. And the title cannot control or vary the meaning of the enacting part, if the latter is plain and unambiguous nor, as a rule, can the title be used for the purpose of adding to the statute or extending or restraining any of its provisions. The ambiguity which justifies a resort to the title must arise in the body of the act; ambiguity in the title alone creates no embarrassment.

25 R. C. L., p. 1032, par. 267.

The enacting part of section 171, chapter 88, Laws of 1930, is written in plain, unmistakable language, and said section imposed a privilege tax on all persons dealing in tractors, regardless of the purpose for which they are sold, and regardless of the purpose for which they are manufactured or designed.

As an evidence that the legislature that enacted chapter 88, Laws of 1930, did not intend that titles to the different sections of said chapter, should limit, qualify or give meaning to any one of the different sections of said act, the court will only have to examine a few of the different sections of said act, with their respective titles to determine this point.

Sections 37, 46, 69 and 92 of Chapter 88, Laws of 1930.

The expression "road machinery" embraces each and all separate pieces of machinery, capable of being used and designed for use in contructing, building, and maintaining roads, such as tractors, graders, scoops, drags, and all other separate pieces of machinery that is used or designated for road use exclusively.

Why did the legislature use the comprehensive word tractor just preceding the words road machinery? It was certainly not used for the purpose of imposing a privilege tax on any machine used exclusively for roads, because all classes of machines used exclusively for roads were embraced in the expression "road machinery." The legislature, with unmistakable design and intention, purposely used the word "tractors" preceding the expression "road machinery;" because the expression "road machinery" did not take in and embrace farm tractors; but the word "tractors" (a comprehensive term) did embrace both farm tractors and road tractors.

The court will observe that dealers in farm tractors and road tractors were not assessed with a separate privilege tax in the privilege tax statute of 1930; that dealers in both farm and road tractors were embraced in section 171 in the 1930 privilege tax statute, no other section in the chapter mentioning or making reference to tractors. But the legislature at its regular 1932 session, in its privilege tax statute, separates the two classes of tractor dealers. And by section 180 of the 1932 act dealers in road tractors are required to pay a tax of two hundred dollars; and by section 214 of the 1932 act dealers in farm tractors are required to pay a privilege tax of fifty dollars.

The order of the state tax commission, holding that section 171 did not apply to dealers who sold farm tractors only, cannot be considered by this court at all, because the order was made and promulgated on September 15, 1931, long after the defendant had become delinquent for each of the years mentioned.

Had the order of the tax commission been made before the defendant became delinquent, and had the defendant acted upon such order, and become delinquent for the sole reason that it did act upon said order, that such order could not and would not have any application here because the language of section 171 under consideration is plain and unmistakable, free from doubt and ambiguity.

25 R. C. L., section 213, page 957.

A statute which is plain and unambiguous must be enforced as written.

Hamner v. Yazoo Delta Lumber Company, 56 So. 466; State v. Traylor, 56 So. 521.

It is clear that construction of statutes by administrative officials should be persuasive and carry weight, only when the statute construed and applied is of doubtful meaning.

Connard Furniture Co. v. Mississippi State Tax Commission, 133 So. 562.

Liability is not and should not be contingent upon the use to which the tractor may be designed, nor upon the class of customers who may buy and use the same.

Where the legislature has made no exception to the positive terms of statute, the presumption is that it intended to make none, and it is not the province of the court to introduce an exception by construction. If a statute is too rigid, or embraces matters that should have been omitted, the remedy is with the legislature.

26 R. C. L., section 224, page 972; Box v. Stanford, 13 S. & M. 93.

An exemption from taxation will not be created by implication.

25 R. C. L., section 313.

A claim of exemption from taxation by virtue of a statute is construed strictissimi juris. It must rest upon language in regard to which there can be no doubt as to the meaning, and the exemption must be granted in terms too plain to be mistaken.

25 R. C. L., page 313.

Chambers & Trenholm, of Jackson, for appellee.

It shall further specifically be the duty of the State Tax Commission, and it shall have power and authority to promulgate and have printed for distribution to revenue officers, and to taxpayers when requested, instructions for the enforcement of the Privilege Tax Law of 1930 and the Revenue Act of 1930, and rules and regulations governing the application of said laws; and shall promptly advise all revenue officers of any decisions of the courts with reference to the said laws.

Sec. 2, ch. 238, Laws of 1930.

State Tax Commission on Sept. 15, 1931, entered an order reciting its authority under said chapter 238, Laws of 1930, and adopting a regulation for the application of said section, by which it is specifically provided that: "The tax does not apply to a person engaged in the business of selling tractors for farm purposes only; tractors sold for farm purposes only being in no sense road machinery, provisions of section 171 do not apply and a sale of such tractor or tractors would not subject the dealer to the privilege tax imposed thereby.

It is not only where a statute is plain and unambiguous that it must be construed by the courts, for "it is the duty of the court to ascertain the real purpose and intent of the statute, where its meaning is not plain, or the letter leads to an absurdity or injustice.

Robertson v. Oil Company, 141 Miss. 356, 106 So. 449.

Laws imposing duties or taxes are not to be construed beyond the natural import of the language and are never to be construed as imposing burdens upon doubtful interpretation.

State v. Grenada Compress Co., 123 Miss. 191, 85 So. 137; Sperry & Hutchinson Co. v. Harbinson, 123 Miss. 674, 86 So. 455.

Tax laws are to be strictly construed against the taxing power, and if the right to tax is not plain it cannot be implied, all doubts being resolved in favor of the tax-payer.

Miller v. I. C. R. R. Co., 146 Miss. 422, 111 So. 558.

A law imposing a privilege tax will be liberally construed in favor of citizens sought to be passed with the tax, and no occupation will be taxed unless it clearly appears that it comes within the provision of the law.

Board of Levee Commissioners v. Howze Mer. Co., 149 Miss. 843, 116 So. 92.

Where a statute has been construed by the Supreme Court, and thereafter re-enacted in substantially the same terms, the reenactment is a Legislative adoption of the construction, the Legislature being presumed to have known of the construction.

White v. Williams, 159 Miss. 732, 132 So. 573.

The legislature, when re-enacting statute, is presumed to have known of and adopted the construction...