Kelly v. Pittsburgh
| Court | United States Supreme Court |
| Writing for the Court | MILLER |
| Citation | 26 L.Ed. 658,104 U.S. 78 |
| Parties | KELLY v. PITTSBURGH |
| Decision Date | 01 October 1881 |
ERROR to the Supreme Court of the State of Pennsylvania.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.
Mr. Daniel Agenw and Mr. Albert N. Sutton for the plaintiff in error.
Mr. George Shiras, Jr., contra.
MR. JUSTICE MILLER delivered the opinion of the court.
The plaintiff in error, James Kelly, is the owner of eighty acres of land, which, prior to the year 1867, was a part of the township of Collins, in the county of Alleghany and State of Pennsylvania. In that year the legislature passed an act by virtue of which, and the subsequent proceedings under it, this township became a part of the city of Pittsburgh. The authorities of the city assessed the land for the taxes of the year 1874 at a sum which he asserts is enormously beyond its value, and almost destructive of his interest in the property. They are divisible into two classes; namely, those assessed for State and county purposes by the county of Alleghany, within which Pittsburgh is situated, and those assessed by the city for city purposes.
Kelly took an appeal, allowed by the laws of Pennsylvania, from the original assessment of taxes to a board of revision, but with what success does not distinctly appear. The result, however, was unsatisfactory to him, and he brought suit in the Court of Common Pleas to restrain the city from collecting the tax. That court dismissed the bill, and the decree having been
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affirmed on appeal by the Supreme Court, he sued out this writ of error.
The transcript of the record is accompanied by seven assignments of error. All of them except two have reference to matters of which this court has no jurisdiction. Those two, however, assail the decree on the ground that it violates rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States. As the same points were relied on in the Supreme Court of the State, it becomes our duty to inquire whether they are well founded. They are as follows:——
First, The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania erred in sustaining the authority of the city of Pittsburgh to assess and collect taxes from complainant's farm lands for municipal or city purposes, such exercise of the taxing power being a violation of rights guaranteed to him by article 5 of amendments to the Constitution of the United States.
Second, The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania erred in sustaining the authority of the city of Pittsburgh to assess and collect taxes from complainant's farm lands for municipal or city purposes, such exercise of the taxing power being a violation of rights guaranteed to him by art. 14, sect. 1, of the amendments to the Constitution of the United States.
As regards the effect of the fifth amendment of the Constitution, it has always been held to be a restriction upon the powers of the Federal government, and to have no reference to the exercise of such powers by the State governments. See Withers v. Buckley, 20 How. 84; Davidson v. New Orleans, 96 U. S. 97. We need, therefore, give the first assignment no further consideration. But this is not material, as the provision of sect. 1, art. 14, of the amendments relied on in the second assignment contains a prohibition on the power of the States in language almost identical with that of the fifth amendment. That language is that 'no State shall . . . deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.'
The main argument of the plaintiff in error—the only one to which we can listen—is that the proceeding in regard to the taxes assessed on his land deprives him of his property without due process of law.
It is not asserted that in the methods by which the value of
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his land was ascertained for the purpose of this taxation there was any departure from the usual modes of assessment, nor that the manner of apportioning and collecting the tax was unusual or materially different from that in force in all communities where land is subject to taxation. In these respects there is no charge that the method pursued is not due process of law....
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Simi Valley Recreation & Park Dist. v. Local Agency Formation Com.
...178--179 (28 S.Ct. 40, 52 L.Ed. 151); Forsyth v. Hammond, 166 U.S. 506, 518 (17 S.Ct. 665, 41 L.Ed. 1095); Kelly v. City of Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78, 80--81, 26 L.Ed. Similar observations appear in Weber v. City Council, supra, 9 Cal.3d 950, 957, 109 Page 663 Cal.Rptr. 553, 557, 513 P.2d 601......
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State v. A. H. Read Co., 1263
...under that amendment, must be answered in the negative. Booth v. Indiana, 237 U.S. 391, 35 S.Ct. 617, 59 L.Ed. 1011; Kelly v. Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78, 26 L.Ed. 658. The case of Atkin v. Kansas contains a reference to a former decision of the court upon one phase of the general question of t......
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State Ex Rel. Attorney General v. City of Avon Park
...of this court and are not inconsistent with the decisions in other states similar to the leading case of Kelly v. City of Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78, 26 L.Ed. 658, where it was not shown that the lands included within the corporate limits of a large city were not wholly beyond the potential ne......
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Railroad Tax Cases
...collections of taxes, established in this country, is, within the meaning of the constitution, due process of law. Kelly v. Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78. The revenue laws of a state may be in harmony with the fourteenth amendment, which declares that no state shall deprive any person of life, li......
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Simi Valley Recreation & Park Dist. v. Local Agency Formation Com.
...178--179 (28 S.Ct. 40, 52 L.Ed. 151); Forsyth v. Hammond, 166 U.S. 506, 518 (17 S.Ct. 665, 41 L.Ed. 1095); Kelly v. City of Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78, 80--81, 26 L.Ed. Similar observations appear in Weber v. City Council, supra, 9 Cal.3d 950, 957, 109 Page 663 Cal.Rptr. 553, 557, 513 P.2d 601......
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State v. A. H. Read Co., 1263
...under that amendment, must be answered in the negative. Booth v. Indiana, 237 U.S. 391, 35 S.Ct. 617, 59 L.Ed. 1011; Kelly v. Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78, 26 L.Ed. 658. The case of Atkin v. Kansas contains a reference to a former decision of the court upon one phase of the general question of t......
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State Ex Rel. Attorney General v. City of Avon Park
...of this court and are not inconsistent with the decisions in other states similar to the leading case of Kelly v. City of Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78, 26 L.Ed. 658, where it was not shown that the lands included within the corporate limits of a large city were not wholly beyond the potential ne......
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Railroad Tax Cases
...collections of taxes, established in this country, is, within the meaning of the constitution, due process of law. Kelly v. Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78. The revenue laws of a state may be in harmony with the fourteenth amendment, which declares that no state shall deprive any person of life, li......
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Third-Class Citizens: Unequal Protection Within United States Territories.
...at the time provided the opposite--that the Bill of Rights did not apply to state governments. See generally Kelly v. Pittsburgh, 104 U.S. 78 (1881); United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1876); Twitchell v. Pennsylvania, 74 U.S. (7 Wall.) 321 (1868); Barron v. Baltimore, 32 U.S. (7 Pet......
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Judicial Views On Tax Administration
...at the annual meeting of the Western States Association of Tax Administrators, Sun Valley, Idaho, October 4, 1961. 1 Kelly v. Pittsburg, 104 U.S. 78, 80 (1881). 2 People v. Central Pacific R.R. Co., 105 Cal. 576, 589, 38 P. 905, 908 (1895). People v. Skinner, 18 Cal.2d 439, 115 P.2d 488 (19......