Harlan Sprague Dawley, Inc. v. Indiana Dept. of State Revenue

• Decision Date: 29 December 1992
• Docket Number: No. 49T05-9007-TA-00038,49T05-9007-TA-00038
• Parties: HARLAN SPRAGUE DAWLEY, INC., Petitioner, v. INDIANA DEPARTMENT OF STATE REVENUE, and John R. Gildea, Commissioner, Respondents.
• Court: Indiana Tax Court

Page 1222

605 N.E.2d 1222

HARLAN SPRAGUE DAWLEY, INC., Petitioner, v. INDIANA DEPARTMENT OF STATE REVENUE, and John R. Gildea, Commissioner, Respondents.

No. 49T05-9007-TA-00038.

Tax Court of Indiana.

Dec. 29, 1992.

Thomas A. Withrow, C. Daniel Yates, B. Keith Shake, James H. Rownd, Henderson Daily Withrow & DeVoe, Indianapolis, for petitioner.

Linley E. Pearson, Atty. Gen., Marilyn Meighen, Deputy Atty. Gen., Indianapolis, for respondents.

FISHER, Judge.

The Petitioner, Harlan Sprague Dawley, Inc. (HSD), appeals the denial of its claim for refund of gross retail and use taxes (sales taxes) assessed by the Respondent, Indiana Department of State Revenue (the Department). The matter is before the court on the parties' several motions for partial summary judgment.

ISSUES

The parties' motions raise the following issues:

I. Whether HSD's operations fall within the terms of the exemption provisions of IND.CODE 6-2.5-5-1, 6-2.5-5-2, 6-2.5-5-3, 6-2.5-5-5.1, and 6-2.5-5-6.

II. Whether HSD is entitled to the sales tax exemption under IND.CODE 6-2.5-4-5 for the purchase of utility services.

III. Whether a violation of Indiana's "ascertainable standards" rule amounts to an unconstitutional deprivation of federal due process rights, thereby creating liability under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983.

FACTS

In the field of laboratory rat breeding, HSD is an industry leader. HSD uses specialized techniques to breed and raise rats that are genetically different from their naturally occurring relatives. To ensure it continues to develop and perpetuate desired strains of rats suitable for sale to its public and private research laboratory customers, HSD breeds and raises the animals in a tightly controlled environment. HSD maintains pedigree records of its different rat colonies and selects breeding groups from those colonies based on the strains of offspring it desires to produce.

The breeding, gestation, and rearing take place in a quarantined environment in which the air is filtered, constant temperatures are maintained, and specific hours of light and darkness are established to maximize health and reproductive capacity. Moreover, because the rats' purchasers require specimens free from all viruses and other pathogens, the rats' environment is sealed off from the outside world to remain free of foreign contaminants at all times. Employees who work with the rats go through a twenty minute sterilization procedure before commencing work. While on duty, the employees wear sterile surgical masks, gowns, and shoes and take their lunch break in the sealed environment. Using autoclaves that produce steam heat of 250 degrees Fahrenheit, the employees sterilize the rats' food and bedding, filter the rats' water, and clean the rats' cages on strict schedules.

In the end, HSD's labors yield individual animals that are physically and genetically different from rats that occur in nature. Having been reared in a sterile and quarantined environment, HSD's rats are unable After a 1986 audit, the Department determined HSD owed sales tax on its purchases of supplies, utilities, and equipment. HSD paid the tax, and, after its claim for refund was denied, brought this original tax appeal. Additional facts will be supplied as necessary.

to thrive outside the laboratory setting, and, as with other animals whose breeding is controlled by humans, HSD's rats represent particularized strains with particularized desired characteristics. For example, one strain of HSD's rats is used solely in blood pressure testing and another is bred exclusively for use in AIDS testing.

DISCUSSION AND DECISION

STANDARD OF REVIEW

Summary judgment is proper only when there is no genuine issue of material fact and a party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. C & C Oil Co. v. Indiana Dep't of State Revenue (1991), Ind.Tax, 570 N.E.2d 1376, 1378. If no genuine issue of material fact exists, either the movant or the non-movant may be granted summary judgment. Id. (citing Indianapolis Pub. Transp. Corp. v. Indiana Dep't of State Revenue (1987), Ind.Tax, 512 N.E.2d 906, 907, aff'd (1990), Ind., 550 N.E.2d 1277).

For purposes of the present motions, the critical dispute between the parties is the legal question whether HSD is engaged in manufacturing or agriculture for purposes of exemptions from the gross retail tax. Resolution of all other issues hinges on HSD's status, and the parties at this stage do not dispute the facts of HSD's business, but rather the legal effect of those facts.

I THE INDUSTRIAL EXEMPTIONS

HSD claims its purchases of certain items used in its operation are exempt from sales taxes under IC 6-2.5-5-3 (the equipment exemption), 6-2.5-5-5.1 (the consumption exemption), and 6-2.5-5-6 (the incorporation exemption). These statutes, collectively referred to as the industrial exemptions, exempt from the sales tax certain purchases of tangible personal property used, consumed, or incorporated into other tangible personal property. During the years in issue, the industrial exemptions provided:

Transactions involving manufacturing machinery, tools, and equipment are exempt from the state gross retail tax if the person acquiring that property acquires it for his direct use in the direct production, manufacture, fabrication, assembly, extraction, mining, processing, refining, or finishing of other tangible personal property.

IC 6-2.5-5-3 (emphasis added).

Transactions involving tangible personal property are exempt from the state gross retail tax if the person acquiring the property acquires it for his direct consumption as a material to be consumed in the direct production of other tangible personal property in his business of manufacturing, processing, refining, repairing, mining, agriculture, horticulture, floriculture, or arboriculture.

IC 6-2.5-5-5.1 (emphasis added).

Transactions involving tangible personal property are exempt from the state gross retail tax if the person acquiring the property acquires it for incorporation as a material part of other tangible personal property which the purchaser manufactures, assembles, refines, or processes for sale in his business.

IC 6-2.5-5-6 (emphasis added). ¹

Under these exemptions, the first question is whether, as HSD argues, its activities fall within the definitions of manufacturing or any of the exemption provisions. The Department responds that rat breeding does not fit within the traditional definition of manufacturing. Because the statutes do not define manufacturing or any of the other exemption provisions, the court turns to the rules of statutory construction to determine HSD's eligibility for exemption.

A. Statutory Construction

When construing a statute, words and phrases are to be given their plain, ordinary, and usual meaning unless the legislature's intent reveals a contrary purpose. Hartman v. State (1992), Ind., 602 N.E.2d 1011, 1013; Park 100 Dev. Co. v. Indiana Dep't of State Revenue (1981), Ind., 429 N.E.2d 220, 222; Johnson County Farm Bureau Coop. Ass'n v. Indiana Dep't of State Revenue (1991), Ind.Tax, 568 N.E.2d 578, 580-81, aff'd (1992), Ind., 585 N.E.2d 1336. When a statute creates an exemption from tax, it must be strictly construed against the taxpayer. General Motors Corp. v. Indiana Dep't of State Revenue (1991), Ind.Tax, 578 N.E.2d 399, 404, aff'd (1992), Ind., 599 N.E.2d 588. Nonetheless, "the intent of the legislature embodied in a statute constitutes the law," Johnson County, 568 N.E.2d at 580, (citing Wedmore v. State (1954), 233 Ind. 545, 551, 122 N.E.2d 1, 4), and the court's foremost goal in construing statutes is to ascertain and give effect to the legislature's true intent. Id. (citing Scheid v. State Bd. of Tax Comm'rs (1990), Ind.Tax, 560 N.E.2d 1283, 1286). When construing an exemption, therefore, the court must always bear the legislature's intent in mind to avoid reading the exemption so narrowly its application is defeated in cases rightly falling within its ambit. General Motors, 578 N.E.2d at 404 (citing Johnson County, 568 N.E.2d at 580). Statutes are to be construed in the context of the whole act of which they are a part, giving effect, if possible, to each word and clause, Guinn v. Light (1990), Ind., 558 N.E.2d 821, 823 (citing Doughty v. State Dep't of Public Welfare (1954), 233 Ind. 213, 117 N.E.2d 651), and statutes applying to the same subject matter must be construed in harmony with one another. Caylor-Nickel Clinic, P.C. v. Indiana Dep't of State Revenue (1991), Ind.Tax, 569 N.E.2d 765, 768, (citing Marion County Sheriff's Merit Bd. v. Peoples Broadcasting Corp. (1989), Ind., 547 N.E.2d 235, 237), aff'd (1991), Ind., 587 N.E.2d 1311.

B. Manufacturing

The parties have expended a great deal of effort debating the meaning of "manufacture." This is understandable. "Manufacturing is not easy to define since it has many applications and meanings that vary depending upon the circumstances of its use." Jackson Excavating Co. v. Administrative Hearing Comm'n (1983), Mo., 646 S.W.2d 48, 49 (citing State ex rel. A.M.F. v. Spradling (1974), Mo., 518 S.W.2d 58, 60). The word, as it is "used in tax statutes is not susceptible of a definition that is exact and all-embracing." Annotation, What Constitutes Manufacturing and Who is a Manufacturer Under Tax Laws, 17 A.L.R.3d 7, 22-23 (1968).

In Anheuser-Busch Brewing Ass'n v. United States (1908), 207 U.S. 556, 28 S.Ct. 204, 52 L.Ed. 336, the United States Supreme Court rejected a brewer's claim that it manufactured the corks it used to seal its beer bottles. The court stated

[m]anufacture implies a change, but every change is not manufacture, and yet every change in an article is the result of treatment, labor and manipulation. But something more is necessary, as set forth and illustrated in Hartranft v. Wiegmann, 121 U.S. 609 [7 S.Ct. 1240, 30 L.Ed. 1012]. There must be transformation; a new and different article must emerge, 'having a distinctive name, character or use.' This cannot be said of the corks...