In re First Natinal Bank of Ossining
| Decision Date | 10 October 1905 |
| Citation | 182 N.Y. 460 |
| Court | New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | In the Matter of the Application of THE FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF OSSINING, Appellant, for a Writ of Certiorari v. THE BOARD OF ASSESSORS OF THE TOWN OF OSSINING, Respondent. |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Appeal from Supreme Court, Appellate Division, Second Department.
Application of the First National Bank of Ossining for writ of certiorari against the board of assessors of the town of Ossining. From an order of the Appellate Division (95 N. Y. Supp. 1128, 107 App. Div.--) affirming an order of the Special Term quashing the writ, applicant appeals. Affirmed.
Thomas F. Gilroy, Jr., Smith Lent, and Samuel Watson, for appellant.
Benjamin Fagan, for respondent.
The First National Bank of Ossining, N. Y., sued out a writ of certiorari to review the proceedings of the board of town assessors upon the assessment of its shares of capital stock for the purposes of taxation for the year 1904. Its complaint is that the assessors, in determining the value of the stock, included the value of the bank's real estate and refused its application to make any deduction thereof. The bank has failed, in the courts below, to obtain the relief to which it deemed itself entitled, and now appeals to this court, claiming, in substance, that under the provisions of section 24 of article 2 of the tax law (Laws 1896, p. 806, c. 908) the real estate should have been ‘eliminated from consideration as part of the capital stock, surplus and undivided profits of the bank.’ That the bank was aggrieved, within the meaning of section 250, p. 882, of the tax law, and, therefore, was entitled to sue out the writ of certiorari, is, in my opinion, beyond question. The tax law makes the bank the agent for the collection of the tax, and subjects it to a penalty for failure to pay over the same to the county treasurer, or, in the city of New York, to the receiver of taxes. The representative capacity of a bank to maintain a suit in behalf of its stockholders, in relation to the assessment and taxation of its shares of stock, was sufficiently declared in the recent case of Mercantile National Bank v. Mayor, etc., of N. Y., 172 N. Y. 35, 45,64 N. E. 756, and it can, undoubtedly, institute such a proceeding as this. Such was the procedure as far back as the case of People ex rel. Gallatin National Bank v. Commissioners of Taxes, 67 N. Y. 516.
As to the principal question in this case, the relator argues that chapter 550, p. 1350, of the Laws of 1901, which amended section 24, art. 2, of the tax law of 1896 (Laws 1896, p. 806, c. 908), should be construed as intending that the real estate shall be excluded in ascertaining the value of the shares of bank stock, and suggests, in favor of such a construction, that, if the law is not so construed, the result is double taxation. I think that the board of assessors proceeded correctly. The tax law, as amended with respect to banks in 1901, devised a new plan for the assessment and taxation of shares of stocks of banks and banking associations. It is apparent from the language of the enactment, among other things, that their real estate remained, as before, subject to taxation as a part of the corporate property, although entering into the valuation of the shares when assessed against the shareholders. As section 24 of the tax law read, when originally enacted in 1896 (chapter 908, p. 806, Laws 1896), it was expressly provided that the assessed value of the real estate should be deducted, in the assessment, from the value of the shares of stock. In 1901 the Legislature passed the act in question, which was entitled ‘An act to amend the tax law relating to the taxation of the stockholders of banks and banking associations.’ Section 24 was re-enacted without that provision for the deduction of the value of the real estate, and there was provided a new and complete system for taxing the shares of banks, under which a uniform rate of 1 per cent. upon their value was imposed as a tax, which was to be in lieu of all other taxes whatsoever for state, county, or local purposes. This was to be collected and paid over by the bank, and the privilege to share owners to claim deductions from the...
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