Smallwood v. Gallardo Ordonez v. Same Insular Motor Corporation v. Same Valdes v. Same Finlay, Waymouth Lee v. Same Portilla v. Same Porto Rico Tax Appeals
| Decision Date | 24 October 1927 |
| Docket Number | No. 211,No. 212,No. 215,No. 214,No. 213,No. 216,211,212,213,214,215,216 |
| Citation | 48 S.Ct. 23,72 L.Ed. 152,275 U.S. 56 |
| Parties | SMALLWOOD et al. v. GALLARDO, Treasurer of Porto Rico. ORDONEZ et al. v. SAME. INSULAR MOTOR CORPORATION v. SAME. VALDES et al. v. SAME. FINLAY, WAYMOUTH & LEE, Inc., v. SAME. PORTILLA et al. v. SAME. PORTO RICO TAX APPEALS |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Mr. Francis G. Caffey, of New York City, for petitioners Smallwood, Ordonez, Insular Motor Corporation and others.
[Argument of Counsel from pages 57-58 intentionally omitted] Mr. Carroll G. Walter, of New York City, for petitioners Valdes, Finlay, Waymouth & Lee, Inc., Portilla and others.
[Argument of Counsel from page 59 intentionally omitted] Mr. William Cattron Rigby, of Washington, D. C., for respondent.
These are suits brought in the District Court of the United States for Porto Rico to restrain the collection of taxes imposed by the laws of Porto Rico. On January 7, 1927, the Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed decrees of the District Court dismissing the bills. On March 4, 1927, by chapter 503, § 7, of the Acts of that year, Congress provided that section 48 of the act to provide a civil government for Porto Rico should be amended to read as follows:
'That no suit for the purpose of restraining the assessment of collection of any tax imposed by the laws of Porto Rico shall be maintained in the District Court of the United States for Porto Rico.'
44 Stats. 1418, 1421 (48 USCA § 872).
Writs of certiorari were granted by this court on May 16, 1927, but argument was ordered on the question whether the cases had not become moot by virtue of that act.
Apart from a natural inclination to read them more narrowly there would seem to be no doubt that the words of the statute covered these cases. To maintain a suit is to uphold, continue on foot and keep from collapse a suit already begun. And although the Circuit Court of Appeals in Gallardo v. Porto Rico Ry., Light & Power Co., 18 F.(2d) 918, 923, with some color of authority has held that the act does not apply, we cannot accept that view. To apply the statute to present suits is not to give it retrospective effect but to take it literally and to carry out the policy that it embodies of preventing the island from having its revenues held up by injunction; a policy no less applicable to these suits than to those begun at a later day, and a general policy of our law. Rev. Stat. § 3224 (26 USCA § 154 (Comp. St. § 5947)). So interpreted the act as little interferes with existing rights of the petitioners as it does with those of future litigants. There is no vested right to an injunction against collecting illegal taxes and bringing these bills did not create one. Hallowell v. Commons, 239 U. S. 506, 509, 36 S. Ct. 202, 60 L. Ed. 409. This statute is not like a provision that no action shall be brought upon a contract previously valid, which in substance would take away a vested right if held to govern contracts then in force. It does not even attempt to validate previously unlawful taxes. It simply...
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