Straughn v. Kelly Boat Service, Inc., I--168
| Decision Date | 25 April 1968 |
| Docket Number | No. I--168,I--168 |
| Parties | J. Ed STRAUGHN, Director, Florida Revenue Commission; and the Honorable Haydon Burns, Governor; Tom Adams, Secretary of State; Earl Faircloth, Attorney General; Ray E. Green, Comptroller; Broward Williams, Treasurer; Tom D. Bailey, Superintendent of Public Instruction; Doyle Conner, Commissioner of Agriculture; members, and composing the Florida Revenue Commission, and Ray Wilson, Sheriff of Okaloosa County, Florida, Appellants, v. KELLY BOAT SERVICE, INC., Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Earl Faircloth, Atty. Gen., and Larry Levy, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellant.
David W. Palmer, Crestview, for appellee.
The defendants in a suit to enjoin the collection of state taxes levied against the plaintiff's deep sea fishing operations have appealed from a final decree entered by the Circuit Court for Okaloosa County, granting such relief.
The basic question presented for our determination in this appeal is whether the plaintiff's said operations were subject to the sales, use, and admission tax laws of the State of Florida (Chapter 212, Florida Statutes, F.S.A.)
The facts pertinent in the present consideration, as found from the evidence by the chancellor in his said decree, which facts are substantially undisputed by the parties to this appeal, are as follows:
The plaintiff is the owner and operator of a fleet of deep sea fishing boats in Destin, Florida, which, for a fee, carry individual fishermen to certain fishing banks which lie beyond the three-league limit in the Gulf of Mexico. While there, the plaintiff sells food and drinks to the fishermen and rents them fishing equipment. The fishing is done at the snapper banks in the Gulf or in the vicinity of those banks. The fishing equipment and tackle used on these trips 'are mainly used beyond the three-league limits in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico; and that most, if not all, of the food and drinks sold at the galley or the refreshment stand on the boat was outside of the three-league limits of the State of Florida. * * *'
The pivotal issue, then, is whether the State of Florida has the power and jurisdiction to impose and collect the taxes in question upon transactions occurring outside of the territorial limits of Florida in the Gulf of Mexico beyond the three-league limit.
This pivotal issue is controlled by the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in United States v. State of California, 381 U.S. 139, 85...
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...principle of law that a state may not tax interests which are not within its territorial jurisdiction. See Straughn v. Kelly Boat Serv., Inc., 210 So.2d 266, 267 (Fla. 1st DCA 1968) (invalidating taxes imposed on the rental of fishing equipment and sale of food and beverages that occurred w......
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...We acknowledge that some courts have reached a contrary conclusion on somewhat similar facts. See, e. g., Straughn v. Kelly Boat Service, Inc., 210 So.2d 266 (Fla. 1st DCA 1968); Undercofler v. Eastern Air Lines, Inc., 221 Ga. 824, 147 S.E.2d 436 (1966); and State v. Delta Air Lines, Inc., ......
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