State of Alabama v. United States
| Decision Date | 24 February 1931 |
| Docket Number | No. 82,82 |
| Citation | 75 L.Ed. 492,282 U.S. 502,51 S.Ct. 225 |
| Parties | STATE OF ALABAMA v. UNITED STATES |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Messrs. Thomas E. Knight, Jr., of Montgomery, Ala., Oscar W. Underwood, Jr., of Washington, D. C., and Charlie C. McCall, of Montgomery, Ala., for petitioner.
[Argument of Counsel from pages 502-504 intentionally omitted] The Attorney General and Mr. Thomas D.Thacher, Sol. Gen., of Washington, D. C., for the United States.
This is a suit brought in the Court of Claims by the State of Alabama to recover from the United States a tax imposed by the law of the State upon the privilege of manufacturing and selling hydro-electric power, together with interest at eight per cent. and a penalty of fifteen per cent. for failure to pay the tax when due. The claim is based upon a sale by the United States of the surplus power generated by it at its dam at Muscie Shoals, Alabama, under the Act of June 3, 1916, c. 134, § 124, 39 Stat. 166, 215 (50 USCA § 79). The Government demurred on the ground that the petition does not set forth a cause of action within the jurisdiction of the Court. The demurrer was sustained and the petition dismissed upon its merits. A writ of certiorari was granted by this Court. 281 U. S. 718, 50 S. Ct. 463, 74 L. Ed. 1138.
We are of opinion that the petition should be dismissed, not upon the merits, which would import jurisdiction to deal with them, but for want of jurisdiction under the Act establishing the powers of the Court of Claims. Judicial Code, § 145, U. S. Code, title 28, § 250 (28 USCA § 250). That jurisdiction extends to 'all claims (except for pensions) founded upon the Constitution of the United States or any law of Congress, upon any regulation of an executive department, upon any contract, express or implied, with the Government of the United States, or for damages, liquidated or unliquidated, in cases not sounding i to rt, in respect of which claims the party would be entitled to redress against the United States either in a court of law, equity, or admiralty if the United States were suable: Provided,' etc.
The contract to be recovered upon under section 145, Jud. Code, must be an actual one, and, if implied, must be implied in fact. not merely implied by fiction, or as it is said, by law. Baltimore & Ohio R. Co. v. United States, 261 U. S. 592, 597, 43 S. Ct. 425, 67 L. Ed. 816. There is no ground for asserting an actual contract here. The State suggests that cases of property taken by eminent domain furnish an analogy. But in those cases where there is a recovery the United States admits the title that it takes and in view of the Constitution reasonably is understood to promise the compensation that...
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