Morton v. Wilson

• Decision Date: 25 April 1916
• Citation: 115 Me. 70,97 A. 219
• Parties: MORTON, Tax Collector, v. WILSON et al.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

97 A. 219

115 Me. 70

MORTON, Tax Collector,

v. WILSON et al.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

April 25, 1916.

Report from Supreme Judicial Court, Penobscot County, at Law.

Action by Herbert E. Morton, Tax Collector of the Town of Etna, against Philip Wilson and others, doing business under the firm name of Wilson, Dow & Co. On report. Judgment for defendants.

Argued before SAVAGE, C. J., and CORNISH, KING, HALEY, HANSON, and PHILBROOK, JJ.

Donald F. Snow, of Bangor, for plaintiff. William H. Mitchell, of Newport, and Morse & Cook, of Bangor, for defendants.

HANSON, J. On report. Action of debt, brought by Herbert E. Morton as tax collector of the town of Etna for the year 1912, against Philip Wilson of Newport, and Moses J. Dow and George J. Payne, both of Plymouth, copartners doing business at Newport under the firm name of Wilson, Dow & Co., to recover for taxes assessed at $105 upon potatoes kept in a storehouse in the town of Etna. The action is brought under chapter 9, § 17, par. 1, of the Revised Statutes, as amended by chapter 140 of the Public Laws of 1911, which reads as follows:

"All personal property employed in trade, in the erection of buildings or vessels, or in the mechanic arts, shall be taxed in the town where so employed on the first day of each April; provided, that the owner, his servant, subcontractor or agent, so employing it, occupies any store, storehouse, shop, mill, wharf, landing place or ship yard therein, for the purpose of such employment."

It is admitted that all statutory requirements as to the assessment of this tax in question were complied with; but the defendants contend that the personal property assessed against them was not legally assessable in the town of Etna. No question is raised as to the declaration or the pleadings.

The defendants were engaged in buying potatoes, and on the 1st day of April, 1912, had in their storehouse in Etna a quantity of potatoes which had been purchased by them in Etna and surrounding towns. That the potatoes were intended for shipment in carload lots outside the town of Etna is conceded, but the plaintiff contends that "during the year 1912 several sales of potatoes were made in small lots to residents of Etna, and that a considerable amount of fertilizer was also sold from this building to residents of Etna and vicinity," and urges that the sales of small lots of potatoes and fertilizer bring the case within the meaning of the statute, because a part of the potatoes and...