Leo Meyer v. Wells Fargo Company, No. 624
| Court | United States Supreme Court |
| Writing for the Court | Holmes |
| Citation | 223 U.S. 298,56 L.Ed. 445,32 S.Ct. 218 |
| Parties | LEO MEYER, as Auditor of the State of Oklahoma, Appt., v. WELLS FARGO & COMPANY |
| Decision Date | 19 February 1912 |
| Docket Number | No. 624 |
v.
WELLS FARGO & COMPANY.
Page 299
Mr. Charles West, Attorney General of Oklahoma, for appellant.
Messrs. S. T. Bledsoe, J. R. Cottingham, and C. W. Stockton for appellee.
Mr. Justice Holmes delivered the opinion of the court:
This is a bill for an injunction against a tax alleged to be unconstitutional as a regulation of commerce among the states. Upon demurrer, three judges sitting in the circuit court granted the injunction, and the defendant appealed to this court. The statute in question is entitled, 'An Act Providing for the Levy and Collection of a Gross Revenue Tax from Public-Service corporations in This State,' and from persons engaged in certain mining and similar occupations. By § 2: 'Every corporation hereinafter named shall pay the state a gross revenue tax . . . which shall be in addition to the taxes levied and collected upon an ad valorem basis upon the property and assets of such corporation equal to the per centum of the gross receipts hereinafter provided, if such public-service corporation operate wholly within the state, and if such public-service corporation operate partly within and partly without the state, it shall pay tax equal to such proportion of said per centum of its gross receipts as the portion of its business done within the state bears to the whole of its business;' with a proviso for fixing a different proportion if it 'more fairly represents the proportion which
Page 300
the gross receipts of any such public-service corporation for any year within this state bear to its total gross receipts.' By § 3 the per centum to be paid by express companies (such as the plaintiff is) is 3 per cent of the gross receipts, and, 'for the purpose of determining the amount of such tax,' they are required to report under oath the gross receipts 'from every source whatsoever.'
The plaintiff's receipts are largely from commerce among the states, and it also receives large sums as income from investments in bonds and land all outside the state of Oklahoma. So that it is evident that if the tax is what it calls itself, it is bad on the former ground, and that whatever it is, it is bad on the latter. Fargo v. Hart, 193 U. S. 490, 48 L. ed. 761, 24 Sup. Ct. Rep. 498. In that case the tax was proportioned to mileage, and it was held that it could not be sustained when, although purporting to be a tax on property, it took into account, in order to increase proportionately the value of the mileage within the state, valuable property outside of it. The same principle would apply to a property tax measuring the total property by the total gross receipts, increased by the special outside sources of income, and taxing a proportion of this total fixed by the ratio of business...
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