People of the State of New York New York Clearing House Building Company v. Edward Barker
| Decision Date | 30 October 1900 |
| Docket Number | No. 51,51 |
| Citation | 179 U.S. 279,45 L.Ed. 190,21 S.Ct. 121 |
| Parties | PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK ex rel. NEW YORK CLEARING HOUSE BUILDING COMPANY, Plff. in Err. , v. EDWARD P. BARKER, Theodore Sutro, and James L. Wells, Commissioners of Taxes and Assessments of the City and County of New York |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Messrs. David Willcox and William S. Opdyke for plaintiff in error.
Messrs. James M. Ward, Theodore Connoly, and John Whalen for defendants in error.
The plaintiff in error comes here for the purpose of obtaining a review of the judgment of the New York court of appeals, which affirmed the judgments of the courts below dismissing a writ of certiorari.
The relator is a corporation created under the laws of the state of New York and a resident of, and doing business in, the city of New York, and it procured the writ, as provided for in the statute, to review an assessment of $165,999 made upon its capital in the regular course of proceedings to levy and collect the annual tax budget of the city for the year 1896. Plaintiff sought to review the assessment on the ground among others, that it was illegal, and that to levy it, under the facts stated, would be to deny to the company the equal protection of the laws.
The facts upon which the question arises are these: The capital of the company was $900,000. The tax commissioners of the city of New York, in the course of their proceeding to tax the actual value of that capital, ascertained the actual value of what they termed the total 'gross assets' of the company, which they found to have been . . . $1,095,049
This value was arrived at from a statement of its property made by the company to the commissioners. By the term 'gross assets,' used by the commissioners, is meant the actual value of the capital and surplus of the company, but not its franchise. People ex rel. Union Trust Co. v. Coleman, 126 N. Y. 433, 12 L. R. A. 762, 27 N. E. 818.
From this total they deducted——
the company......... $329,050
of the company, otherwise taxed._600,000
___929,050
Leaving a balance of...............$165,999
which was the amount upon which the company was assessed upon its capital aside from the assessment of $600,000 separately made upon its real estate.
The company claims that these 'gross assets' should have been stated at $730,049, and the same deduction should be made as in the above statement, which would result in no assessment on the capital.
while the item as claimed by the company is made up of the value of the same building and lot as it was assessed by one of the deputy tax commissioners for the purpose of separate taxation under the law, such assessed value being...................$600,000
Added to that was the same item of.....................130,050
for other property as stated by the commissioners, the gross assets of the company by this valuation amounting to.......$730,050
and the difference between the two items is seen to be $365,000. The plaintiff in error insists that in arriving at the actual value of the capital for taxation under the statute of 1857 (the 3d section of which is set out below) the real estate which goes to make up a part of such value should be put in at its value as assessed for taxation in a separate manner, while the commissioners claim that as the law provides that the assessment upon the capital shall be at its actual value, it is necessary to arrive at the actual value of the real estate before a particular assessment can be reached in regard to the capital which includes it, and that in arriving at the actual value of the real estate they are not estopped from determining what that actual value is by the fact that for the purpose of a separate assessment the real estate had been mistakenly and improperly assessed at another and a lower figure.
These conflicting claims arise out of the statute which provides for the taxation of corporations, their capital stock and surplus, and the general statute which provides for the taxation of real estate belonging either to individuals or corporations. That portion of the statute relating to the taxation of the capital of corporations, which provides the method to be pursued, reads as follows:
'The capital stock of every company liable to taxation, except such part of it as shall have been excepted in the assessment roll, or as shall have been exempted by law, together with its surplus profits or reserved funds, exceeding 10 per cent of its capital, after deducting the assessed value of its real estate, and all shares of stock in other corporations, actually owned by such company, which are taxable upon their capital stock under the laws of this state, shall be assessed at its actual value and taxed in the same manner as the other personal and real estate of the county.' Laws 1857, chap. 456, § 3.
As the New York court of appeals, in People ex rel. Twenty-third Street R. Co. v. New York Tax Comrs. 95 N. Y. 554, has said, there is a most extraordinary confusion of ideas in the above section. Its meaning has, however, in some respects been made tolerably clear by the above-cited case, together with those of People ex rel. Union Trust Co. v. Coleman, 126 N. Y. 435, 12 L. R. A. 762, 27 N. E. 818, and People ex rel. Equitable Gaslight Co. v. Barker, 144 N. Y. 94, 39 N. E. 13.
In the first case it was stated that the general purpose of the statutes relating to assessments and taxation is to secure an assessment of all property, real and personal, at its actual value, and they are to be construed and enforced with this purpose in view. A construction of the statute in relation to other questions not material here was given in that case. In the case reported in 126 N. Y. it was held that the phrase 'capital stock,' contained in the section above quoted, meant, not the share stock owned by the individual members, but the capital owned by the corporation, and that this capital was to be taxed, together with the surplus, after making the reductions provided for in the section, and that the law did not include, for purposes of assessment and taxation, the franchises of the company.
In the Equitable Gaslight Company Case, 144 N. Y. 94, 39 N. E. 13, it was held that in arriving at the actual value of the capital for purposes of assessment, the assessors were not concluded by the assessed value of the real estate made for purposes of separate taxation if that assessment were a mistaken one, but might legally disregard such assessed valuation and estimate the real estate at its actual value, although it exceeded its assessed value.
Looking at the manner of assessing the real property of both individuals and corporations we find the general statute is as follows:
1 Rev. Stat. 393, § 17 ; 9th ed. p. 1685:
'All real and personal estate liable to taxation shall be estimated and assessed by the assessors at its full and true value, as they would appraise the same in payment of a just debt due from a solvent debtor.'
And also 1 Rev. Stat. 389, § 6:
'The real estate of all incorporated companies shall be assessed in the town or ward in which the same shall lie, in the same manner as the real estate of individuals. . . .'
The special statute applying to New York city is substantially the same so far as assessment at full or actual value is concerned. Consolidation act, chap. 410, Laws 1882, § 814.
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