National Metal Edge Box Company v. Town of Readsboro

• Decision Date: 05 October 1920
• Citation: 111 A. 386,94 Vt. 405
• Parties: NATIONAL METAL EDGE BOX COMPANY v. TOWN OF READSBORO
• Court: Vermont Supreme Court

111 A. 386

94 Vt. 405

NATIONAL METAL EDGE BOX COMPANY v. TOWN OF READSBORO

Supreme Court of Vermont

October 5, 1920

May Term, 1920.

ACTION OF CONTRACT to recover money paid for taxes under protest. Plea, the general issue. Trial by jury at the December Term 1919, Bennington County, Chase, J., presiding. At the close of all the evidence the Court directed a verdict for the plaintiff. Judgment on the verdict. The defendant excepted. The opinion states the case.

We find no error in the judgment and proceedings below, and the same is affirmed.

Collins M. Graves and Henry Chase for the defendant.

Present WATSON, C. J., POWERS, TAYLOR, MILES, and SLACK, JJ.

OPINION

MILES

This is an action on contract to recover money paid the defendant under an alleged protest, upon taxes claimed by the plaintiff to have been illegally and improperly assessed against it. At the close of the evidence both parties moved for a directed verdict. The motion of the plaintiff was granted, and upon the verdict thus directed judgment was rendered for the plaintiff. To the direction of the verdict and judgment thereon the defendant was allowed an exception and also an exception to the court's refusal to grant its motion for a directed verdict.

The evidence tended to show that the plaintiff is a corporation organized under the laws of Pennsylvania and located and having its principal place of business at Philadelphia, but is doing quite an extensive business in the defendant town where it owns real and personal property of large value; that for the year 1917, the plaintiff filed with the listers of the defendant its inventory of taxable property in that town, and in that inventory, to question 25a., which is as follows: "On April 1, 1917, what was the aggregate amount of existing debts then due or thereafter to become due to the maker hereof from all solvent debtors within or without the State of Vermont?"--it answered: "$ 31,635." The answer was correct, but the plaintiff insisted, before and at the time the inventory was delivered to the listers, that those debts were not taxable, because their situs was in Pennsylvania and not in Readsboro, and because they consisted of charges of book representing the purchase price of tangible personal property on which no interest was charged. No question is made but that those debts consisted of charges of book representing the purchase price of tangible personal property; but the defendant claimed that there was no evidence in the case tending to show that no interest was charged upon them nor evidence tending to show they had their situs in Pennsylvania.

The principal question raised is whether there was evidence tending to show those two claims. The evidence bearing upon the question of the situs of the accounts assessed tended to show that the accounts originating from the business in Readsboro were kept at the plaintiff's home office in Philadelphia, except some small matters in no way connected with the accounts in question, and all the branch office at Readsboro had to do with keeping those accounts was to send to the home office in Philadelphia a statement of the daily transactions and accounts originating during the day, which were usually sent on the following day after the transaction occurred and the account originated. A copy of the statements were kept at the office in Readsboro, and the originals were entered upon the books of the plaintiff in Philadelphia. The pay roll of the employees at Readsboro was sent to the plaintiff at Philadelphia, and checks were returned with which to pay the employees. All the merchandise manufactured and sold from the branch business at Readsboro was paid for at the office of the plaintiff at Philadelphia. All the plaintiff's business matters originating at Readsboro were attended to at the plaintiff's home office in Philadelphia. The business conducted at Readsboro consisted in manufacturing paper box board and pulp, which were principally sent to Philadelphia, but some was shipped elsewhere on orders from the Philadelphia office, in which case a memorandum of the shipment was sent to the home office. The office at Readsboro had nothing to do with the sale of the goods manufactured there, nor with fixing the price for which they were sold. We think this evidence clearly tended to show that the situs of the accounts assessed by the listers of defendant was in Pennsylvania and not in Readsboro.

It is a general rule of law, with few, if any exceptions, that debts can have no locality separate from the parties to whom they are due. Says Mr. Justice Field, respecting this rule, in Cleveland, etc., R. R. Co. v. Pennsylvania, 82 U.S. (15 Wall.) 300, 21 L.Ed. 179; "This principle might be stated in many different ways, and supported by citations in numerous adjudications, but no number of authorities and no forms of expression could add anything to its obvious truth, which is recognized upon its simple statement." With the creditor debts are property and may be taxed. All the property there can be in debts belongs to the creditor. Cleveland, etc., R. R. Co. v. Pennsylvania, supra; Bullock v. Guilford, 59 Vt. 516, 9 A. 360; State v. Clement National Bank, 84 Vt. 167, 199, 78

A 944, Ann. Cas. 1912 D, 22. The accounts assessed were not only due to and owned by the plaintiff, whose domicile was in Pennsylvania, but the accounts themselves were in fact permanently held and situated in Pennsylvania and...