Monongahela River Consol. Coal & Coke Co. v. Board of Assessors

• Decision Date: 20 November 1905
• Docket Number: 15,731
• Citation: 39 So. 601,115 La. 564
• Parties: MONONGAHELA RIVER CONSOL. COAL & COKE CO. v. BOARD OF ASSESSORS et al
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court

39 So. 601

115 La. 564

MONONGAHELA RIVER CONSOL. COAL & COKE CO. v. BOARD OF ASSESSORS et al

No. 15,731

Supreme Court of Louisiana

November 20, 1905

Appeal from Civil District Court, Parish of Orleans; Thomas C. W Ellis, Judge.

Action by the Monongahela River Consolidated Coal & Coke Company against the board of assessors and others. Judgment for defendants, and plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Rice &amp Montgomery, for appellant.

Francis Charles Zacharie, for appellee tax collector.

Henry Garland Dupre, Asst. City Atty., for appellee city of New Orleans.

George Hitchings Terriberry, for appellee board of assessors.

OPINION

BREAUX C.J.

The ground alleged by appellee to dismiss the appeal is that this court is without jurisdiction ratione materiae.

The amount in controversy as stated does not exceed the lower limit of this court's jurisdiction. But a legal question is at issue.

The jurisdiction of this court includes cases in which the constitutionality or legality of a tax is in contestation.

Plaintiff's petition sets up that it has property within the city's limits, but that it is not subject to taxation. This is denied by the defendants. They urge that plaintiff owes taxes under statutes of 1890 and 1898.

A question of construction presents itself.

Moreover the rule "Mobilia sequuntur personam" enters into the issues and presents a question of law -- as to whether or not it bears some application. The question of jurisdiction is disposed of by the following decisions in which jurisdiction was maintained:

In State v. Rosenstream, 52 La.Ann. 2127, 28 So. 295, this court said:

"Defendants resist the imposition of this license tax, in effect claiming that under the law they do not owe it. Whether they owe it or not depends upon the construction to be placed upon the statute herein before referred to. It is therefore clear that the case presents the question of the legality of the tax thus sought to be imposed. If the statute authorizes the tax collector to demand and collect the same, the tax is legal; otherwise, it is illegal. Judicial interpretation of the statute is necessary to determine this."

The following decisions express substantially similar views regarding jurisdiction: Moody Moody v. Spotorno, 112 La. 1009, 36 So. 836; Roy v. Schuff, 51 La.Ann. 86, 24 So. 788.

The motion to dismiss is overruled.

On the Merits.

Statement of facts: The plaintiff corporation is domiciled in the state of Pennsylvania, where its president resides and where it conducts its business of mining Pittsburg coal and tranships it to different parts of the country, including New Orleans.

The W. G. Wilmot Company, of New Orleans, are selling agents of its coal and receive the price therefor.

Plaintiff's complaint is that it has been assessed by the board of assessors for the parish of Orleans for taxation "upon money loaned on interest, all credits, and all bills receivable for money loaned for the year 1904, in the sum of twenty-five hundred dollars," and that this is illegal, because, it contends, its credits have not been reduced to a definite or concrete form, and that, in consequence, they have no situs in this state. The facts in this respect are: The company, through its agent here, accepts duebills payable on demand. These duebills are signed by the clerk of the steamboat to which coal is sold or by the chief engineer of the steamship. They are collected here by the agent. The intention of the assessing department was to carry on the assessment rolls the amount thus represented after the sale of coal by the company.

The duebills are received from steamboats. As relates to steamships, the coal is delivered on receipts, and after its delivery sometimes plaintiff, through its agents, waits three or four weeks for payment.

Judgment: Unquestionably the purpose of the statute is to tax all property not exempt from taxation, whether property of taxpayers domiciled here or that of taxpayers who are nonresidents. Tax Law 1898, p. 346, No. 170.

The only question is, as to the property of the latter, whether it is property which can possibly be assessed within the limits of the state; that is, whether it is situs sufficient to warrant its assessment for...