Republic Steel Corp. v. Horn, 3 Div. 820
| Decision Date | 11 September 1958 |
| Docket Number | 3 Div. 820 |
| Citation | 105 So.2d 446,268 Ala. 279 |
| Parties | REPUBLIC STEEL CORPORATION v. LaRue HORN, Commissioner of Revenue. |
| Court | Alabama Supreme Court |
Burr, McKamy, Moore & Thomas, Frontis H. Moore, Birmingham, for appellant.
John Patterson, Atty. Gen., and Willard W. Livingston, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
This suit was instituted by way of bill for declaratory judgment filed by the appellant, Republic Steel Corporation, against appellee, LaRue Horn, as Commissioner of Revenue, in the Circuit Court of Montgomery County, in Equity, praying that the court declare appellant entitled to a refund of sales and use taxes paid by it on fuel oil used and consumed in the operation of its open hearth furnaces at its manufacturing plant at Gadsden, Alabama.
Appellant seeks a refund under the terms of Act 839, approved September 19, 1953, Acts Regular Session 1953, p. 1130, which is as follows:
'An Act
'To exempt fuel oil purchased or stored or consumed as fuel for kiln use in manufacturing establishments from the state sales and use taxes imposed by Articles 10 and 11, Chapter 20, Title 51, Code of Alabama (1940), as amended.
'Be it Enacted by the Legislature of Alabama:
'Approved September 19, 1953.'
The court below by its final decree denied relief and from such decree appellant brings this appeal.
Appellant contends that the term 'kiln use' as applied to the purchase, use and consumption of fuel oil is a term of general application applying to those types of furnaces in manufacturing establishments which employ the same, or substantially the same, processes and whose general object is the same, to wit, the introduction of certain raw materials into the furnace and by the application of high degrees of heat to cause those raw materials to undergo physical and chemical changes, and that a new product, different from those which went into the furnace, is produced. Appellant contends that an open hearth furnace comes within such definition and hence the fuel oil therein used is a kiln use.
The appellee, on the other hand, says the term 'kiln use' has acquired a limited meaning by popular parlance, such meaning being limited to those structures which are usually referred to as 'kilns,' and that the legislature adopted 'kiln use' with the intent to limit the exemption to those structures which are commonly called kilns.
Does the word 'kiln' as employed in the 1953 Act, supra, include a hearth furnace used in making steel?
'Kiln' is not defined in the Act. There is a generally accepted canon of statutory construction to the effect that where there is nothing to indicate to the contrary, words in a statute will be given the meaning which is accepted in popular everyday usage. Holloway v. State, 262 Ala. 437, 79 So.2d 40; State v. Maddox Tractor & Equipment...
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...when a term is not defined in a statute, the commonly accepted definition of the term should be applied. Republic Steel Corp. v. Horn, 268 Ala. 279, 281, 105 So.2d 446, 447 (1958). Furthermore, we must give the words in a statute their plain, ordinary, and commonly understood meaning, and w......
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