State v. Cook

• Decision Date: 31 January 1933
• Citation: 108 Fla. 157,146 So. 223
• Parties: STATE et rel. PACKARD v. COOK, Constable.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

146 So. 223

108 Fla. 157

STATE et rel. PACKARD v. COOK, Constable.

Florida Supreme Court

January 31, 1933

En Banc.

Error to Circuit Court, Duval County; De Witt T. Gray, Judge.

Habeas corpus proceeding by the State, on the relation of H. C Packard, against H. H. Cook, as Constable of the Seventh Justice of the Peace District of Duval County.To review a judgment remanding petitioner to custody, petitioner brings error.

Affirmed.

COUNSELJohn B. L'Engle and Robert H. Anderson both of Jacksonville, for plaintiff in error.

Cary D. Landis, Atty. Gen., and H. E. Carter, Asst Atty. Gen., for defendant in error.

OPINION

DAVIS Chief Justice.

This is a writ of error taken to a judgment rendered in a habeas corpus proceeding, the purpose of which was to have judicially declared the proper construction to be placed upon chapter 15787, Laws of Florida, Acts of 1931, Ex. Sess (section 1279(111) et seq. 1932, Supp. Comp. Gen. Laws), with respect to the requirement of a documentary stamp on an assignment of wages, when the amount of the wages assigned is less than $100.The judgment below was in favor of the state's right to the tax.

The title to chapter 15787, supra, is as follows:

'An Act Levying and Imposing an Excise Tax on Documents to Raise Revenue for the Support of the State Government; and Prescribing Penalties for Failure to Pay Said Tax.'

The fourth paragraph of schedule A, under section 1 of said act (Comp. Gen. LawsSupp. 1932, § 1279(111), schedule A, par. 4), reads as follows:

'On promissory notes, non-negotiable notes, written obligations to pay money, assignment of salaries, wages, or other compensation, made, executed, delivered, sold, transferred, or assigned in the state of Florida, and for each renewal of the same on each $100.00 of the indebtedness or obligation evidenced thereby, 10¢.Mortgages which incorporate the certificate of indebtedness, not otherwise shown in separate instruments, are subject to the same tax at the same rate.'

The first paragraph of section 4 of said act (Comp. Gen. LawsSupp. 1932, § 7473(7), is as follows:

'Section 4.Whoever makes, signs, issues, or accepts, or causes to be made, signed, issued, or accepted, any instrument, document or paper of any kind or description whatsoever, without the full amount of the tax herein imposed thereon being fully paid, or whoever makes use of any adhesive stamp to denote any tax imposed by this Act, wihtout cancelling or obliterating such stamps as herein provided, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction shall be punished accordingly.'

The first paragraph of section 1 of the act(Comp. Gen. LawsSupp. 1932, § 1279(111), par. 1) reads as follows:

'Section 1.That on and after the passage of this Act, there shall be levied, collected and paid for and in respect of the several documents, bonds, debentures or certificates of stock and indebtedness, and other documents, instruments, matters, writings, and things mentioned and described in schedule A of this act, or for or in respect of the vellum, parchment, or paper upon which such document, instrument, matter, writing, or thing, or any of them, are written or printed by any person, firm, association, or corporation who makes, signs, executes, issues, sells, removes, consigns, assigns, or ships the same, or for whose benefit or use the same are made, signed, executed, issued, sold, removed, consigned, assigned, or shipped in the state of Florida, the taxes specified in said schedule A.'

As the petitioner, H. C. Packard, was charged in the warrant with procuring the issuance of an assignment of wages for $7.30, it follows that his detention was illegal, unless it can be held that the statute in question, properly construed, requires the stated documentary stamp tax to be exacted on promissory notes, nonnegotiable notes, written obligations to pay money, assignment of salaries, wages, or other compensation mentioned in the statute, though the amount of indebtedness or obligation evidenced thereby be less than $100.

At the outset, it must be conceded that the correct rule of construction to be applied in such controversies is that, if there is any doubt as to the liability of an instrument to taxation under the act, the construction is in favor of exemption, because a tax cannot be imposed without clear and express words for that purpose.United States v. Isham,17 Wall. 496, 21 L.Ed. 728.

The well-established rule is that, where there is an ambiguity in the language of a statute imposing a tax, and that ambiguity raises a doubt as to the legislative intent, the persons upon whom it is sought to impose the burden are to be given the benefit of the doubt, because a tax, to be sustained in any given case, must come clearly within the letter of the statute.Edwards, Internal Revenue Collector, v. Wabash Ry. Co. (C. C. A.)264 F. 610;33 C.J. 285;25 R. C. L. 1092.See, also, State v. Beardsley,84 Fla. 109, 94 So. 660.

Tested by the foregoing rule, it has not been made to appear that any substantial doubt can be raised as to the legislative intent to have the tax under consideration apply on all promissory notes, nonnegotiable notes, written obligations to pay money, assignment of salaries, wages, or other compensation, made, executed, sold, transferred, or assigned in the state of Florida, and for...