Loop, Inc. v. Collector of Revenue

• Decision Date: 09 September 1987
• Docket Number: No. 87-C-0621,87-C-0621
• Citation: 523 So.2d 201
• Parties: LOOP, INC. v. COLLECTOR OF REVENUE, State of Louisiana. 523 So.2d 201
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court

Page 201

523 So.2d 201

LOOP, INC. v. COLLECTOR OF REVENUE, State of Louisiana.

No. 87-C-0621.

523 So.2d 201

Supreme Court of Louisiana.

Sept. 9, 1987.

Rehearing Granted Oct. 15, 1987.

On Rehearing April 11, 1988.

Mack E. Barham, Robert Arceneaux, Barham & Churchill, New Orleans, Thomas P. James, Lake Charles, CaSandra Jeanell Cooper-Gates, New Orleans, for applicant.

Joanna Wilson, Robert Carpenter, Jr., Baton Rouge, Douglas Hebert, Kinder, for respondent.

DENNIS, Justice.

A special statutory procedure authorizes the Collector of Revenue to petition for judicial review of a Board of Tax Appeals decision within a specified time in the district court of the parish of the taxpayer's principal office. La. R.S. 47:1434, et seq. The question presented by this case is whether the statutory procedure constitutes the Collector's exclusive means of invoking the jurisdiction of the courts and of obtaining judicial review. The district court dismissed the Collector's petition because he failed to file in the parish of the taxpayer's principal office within the time specified by law. The court of appeal reversed holding that a timely filing in any district court properly invokes judicial jurisdiction, that the place-of-filing requirement is a venue rule, and that a petition timely filed in the wrong district court may be transferred to the parish of the taxpayer's principal office for judicial review. 504 So.2d 592. We reverse. A district court is vested with jurisdiction to review administrative action as provided by law. Consequently, when a litigant relies upon a statute as providing a particular court with jurisdiction to review his case, he must follow the statutory procedure for invoking that court's jurisdiction. The statute relied upon by the Collector, which reflects legislative policies favoring taxpayer convenience and prompt conclusion of litigation, requires that he must timely seek judicial review in the parish of the taxpayer's principal office, as his exclusive means of review and of invoking the subject matter jurisdiction of the courts.

The Department of Revenue and Taxation assessed Loop, Inc. for alledgedly unpaid corporate franchise taxes for the years 1979, 1980 and 1981. Loop appealed the Department's assessment to the Board of Tax Appeals. After a hearing the Board of Tax Appeals ruled in favor of Loop and dismissed the assessment.

The Department sought judicial review by filing a petition for review, within the time prescribed by law, in the district court of Jefferson Parish. It is undisputed that at that time Loop's principal place of business was in Orleans Parish. Loop filed declinatory exceptions of lack of jurisdiction over the person, lack of jurisdiction over the subject matter, and improper venue. The district court heard the exceptions and sustained Loop's exceptions of lack of subject matter and personal jurisdiction.

On appeal, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeal affirmed in part the trial court's decision. It disagreed that the trial court lacked jurisdiction but found that the action had been filed in an improper venue. However, the court of appeal refused to transfer the case to the proper venue and dismissed the case, holding that the Collector's claim had either prescribed or had been perempted. Loop, Inc. v. Collector of Revenue, 464 So.2d 785 (La.App. 5th Cir.1985).

The Collector applied for writs and this court summarily granted partial relief. We granted the writ with an order holding that the exception of venue was correctly sustained, but that the appeals court erroneously refused to transfer the case to the proper court. The action was transferred to the civil district court of Orleans Parish with a notation that the " 'underlying question' of prescription or peremption" could be raised there. Loop, Inc. v. Collector of Revenue, 470 So.2d 112 (La.1985).

In the civil district court, Loop filed peremptory exceptions contending that because of the Collector's failure to file his petition for judicial review in a competent court within the thirty day period set out in La. R.S. 47:1434, his right of judicial review was prescribed or perempted. After a hearing, the civil district court sustained the exception of peremption.

On appeal, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal reversed, holding that because the statute must be construed strictly in favor of judicial review of administrative action, the requirement that a review requested by the collector be filed in the parish of the taxpayer's principal place of business must be construed as a rule of venue rather than of jurisdiction. Accordingly, the court of appeal concluded that any civil district court has jurisdiction to entertain the Collector's petition for review, that his filing of the petition in the instant case nevertheless constituted a timely exercise of the Collector's right to judicial review in a court of proper jurisdiction, and the Collector's failure to file in the proper venue had been corrected when the case was transferred. Loop, Inc. v. Collector of Revenue, 504 So.2d 592 (La.App. 4th Cir.1987).

We granted a writ to review the court of appeal's holding that the statutory rule obliging the Collector to seek review in a particular forum is a rule of venue, not jurisdiction. 504 So.2d 868.

It is well settled that an individual's right of judicial review of administrative proceedings is presumed to exist. La. Const. of 1974, Art. 1, Secs. 2 and 22. Delta Bank & Trust Co. v. Lassiter, 383 So.2d 330 (La.1980); Buras v. Board of Trustees of Police Pension Fund of City of New Orleans, 367 So.2d 849 (La.1979); Bowen v. Doyal, 259 La. 839, 253 So.2d 200 (1971). However, where the legislature has provided a reasonable procedure for obtaining judicial review of a particular agency decision, an individual litigant must follow such procedure in order to obtain review. Corbello v. Sutton, 446 So.2d 301 (La.1984); see also, Whitney National Bank v. Bank of New Orleans & Trust Co., 379 U.S. 411, 85 S.Ct. 551, 13 L.Ed.2d 386 (1965). A government agency which does not have a constitutionally guaranteed right of judicial review necessarily must rely upon and comply with statutory provisions for such review. See, Estep v. United States, 327 U.S. 114, 66 S.Ct. 423, 90 L.Ed. 567 (1946); Board of Commissioners v. Department of Natural Resources, 496 So.2d 281, 287 (La.1986).

Moreover, the 1974 Louisiana Constitution provides that "A district court shall have appellate jurisdiction as provided by law." La. Const. Art. V, Sec. 16 (B). By definition, appellate jurisdiction is the power to review the judgment of another tribunal. Generally, a court's review of an administrative tribunal's action is considered functionally to be an exercise of its appellate review jurisdiction. ¹ Central & Southern Motor Freight Tariff Association v. United States, 345 F.Supp. 1389 (D.Del.1972); Neumeister v. City Development Board, 291 N.W.2d 11 (Iowa 1980); Public Employment Relations Board v. Stohr, 279 N.W.2d 286 (Iowa 1979); Walton v. McNamara, 408 So.2d 1144 (La.App. 3d Cir.1981); Collector of Revenue v. Murphy Oil Corporation, 351 So.2d 1234 (La.App. 4th Cir.1977); 5 B. Mezines, J. Stein & J. Gruff, Administrative Law, Sec. 45.04 (1977) [hereinafter Mezines]; 16 C. Wright, A. Miller, H. Cooper & E. Gressman, Federal Practice and Procedure Act, Sec. 3940 (1977); Force and Griffith, Louisiana Administrative Procedure Act, 42 La.L.Rev. 1227, 1272 (1982). Therefore, for the purpose of judicial review of administrative action, the district courts are courts of limited jurisdiction, having only such appellate jurisdiction to review administrative actions as is provided by law or constitutionally required.

Consequently, a litigant seeking judicial review of administrative action in a district court must establish that there is a statute which gives subject matter jurisdiction to that court. When the statute upon which he relies establishes a specific procedure for judicial review of an agency's action, a litigant may invoke the reviewing court's jurisdiction only by following the statutorily prescribed procedure, unless there can be found within the act a genuine legislative intent to authorize judicial review by other means. Corbello v. Sutton, 446 So.2d 301 (La.1984); see also, Whitney National Bank v. Bank of New Orleans & Trust Co., 379 U.S. 411, 85 S.Ct. 551, 13 L.Ed.2d 386 (1965); Memphis Trust Co. v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, 584 F.2d 921 (6th Cir.1978); Investment Co. Institute v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, 551 F.2d 1270 (D.C. Cir.1977); Application of Lakeview Gardens, Inc., 227 Kan. 161, 605 P.2d 576 (1980); Montana Health Systems, Agency, Inc. v. Montana Board of Health and Environmental Sciences, 188 Mont. 188, 612 P.2d 1275 (1980); and Bay River, Inc. v. Environmental Quality Commission, 26 Or.App. 717, 554 P.2d 620 (1976). Usually, however, the existence of a special statutory procedure implies a legislative aim that the special statutory procedure is to be the exclusive means of obtaining judicial review for the situations to which it applies. Whitney National Bank v. Bank of New Orleans & Trust Co., supra; Mezines, supra, at Sec. 45:01; Note, Jurisdiction to Review Federal Administrative Action: District Court or Court of Appeals, 88 Harv.L.Rev. 980, 982 (1975).

Applying these precepts to the statute in this case, we conclude that the special statutory procedure requiring the Collector to file a petition within the specified time in the parish of the taxpayer's principal office was intended to be the exclusive method for obtaining judicial review. This is implied by the existence of the specific procedure itself and borne out by a reading of the statute as a whole with consideration of its underlying purposes.

The Board of Tax Appeals and the procedures for the review and enforcement of its decisions were established for the speedy, convenient and inexpensive decision of controversies...