Tennessee v. Whitworth
| Decision Date | 01 March 1886 |
| Citation | 117 U.S. 139 |
| Parties | TENNESSEE v. WHITWORTH. |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
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ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF TENNESSEE.
Mr. Samuel Watson, Mr. James M. Head and Mr. S.A. Champion for plaintiff in error.
Mr. Edward Baxter for defendant in error.
After stating the facts as above reported, he continued:
The question whether the capital stock of the Nashville and Decatur Company is entitled to the same exemption as that of the Nashville and Chattanooga Company depends, 1, on whether the grant to the Tennessee and Alabama Company of "all the rights, powers and privileges," and to the Central Southern Company of "all the powers and privileges" of the Nashville and Chattanooga Company, carried with it to the new companies the exemption from taxation provided for in section 38 of the Nashville and Chattanooga charter, and, if it did, 2, whether the Nashville and Decatur Company and its stockholders are entitled to the same exemptions as the original Tennessee corporations and their stockholders had.
As early as 1850, before either the charter of the Tennessee and Alabama Company or that of the Central Southern Company was granted, this court said in Philadelphia, Wilmington & Baltimore Railroad Co. v. Maryland, 10 How. 376, 393, speaking by Mr. Chief Justice Taney, that a statute which authorized the union of two railroad companies, and secured to the united company the "property, rights and privileges which that law, or other laws, conferred on them the separate companies, or either of them," extended to the united company an exemption from taxation in the charter of one of the uniting companies, and this although it was at the same time said that "the taxing power of a State is never presumed to be relinquished, unless the intention to relinquish is declared in clear and unambiguous terms." This has been expressly reaffirmed in Tomlinson v. Branch, 15 Wall. 460; Humphrey v. Pegues, 16 Wall. 244; Southwestern Railroad v. Georgia, 92 U.S. 676; and the correctness of the decision was recognized in Central Railroad & Banking Co. v. Georgia, 92 U.S. 665; Morgan v. Louisiana, 93 U.S. 217; Railroad Companies v. Gaines, 97 U.S. 697, 711; Railroad Co. v. Georgia, 98 U.S. 359, 360; Railroad Co. v. Hamblen, 102 U.S. 273, 277; Railroad Co. v. Commissioners, 103 U.S. 1, 4; Wilson v. Gaines, 103 U.S. 417; Louisville & Nashville Railroad Co. v. Palmes, 109 U.S. 244, 253; and Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad Co. v. Miller, 114 U.S. 176, 185.
From this it is clear that, under the settled rule of decision in this court, the exemption from taxation, which was one of the "rights and privileges" of the Nashville and Chattanooga Company, formed part of the charters of the Tennessee and Alabama Company and the Central Southern Company, unless a different rule is to be applied in Tennessee, because of a supposed limitation on the popular meaning of the words "rights," "powers" and "privileges" when used in statutes, on account of a peculiar provision of the constitution of that State. That constitutional provision is as follows:
"The legislature shall have no power ... to pass any law granting to any individual or individuals rights, privileges, immunities, or exemptions other than such as may be by the same law extended to any member of the community who may be able to bring himself within the provisions of such law: Provided, always, that the legislature shall have power to grant such charters of corporations as they may deem expedient for the public good." Constitution 1834, Art. XI, sec. 7.
In view of this the Supreme Court of Tennessee decided in effect, at its December Term, 1877, in Wilson v. Gaines, 9 Baxter, 546, that as the State in its constitution used in the same connection all the words "rights," "privileges," "immunities," and "exemptions," each of these words must be given in statutory interpretation a meaning so limited as not to include anything expressed by the others, and that when any one of them is found in a statute the legislature must be conclusively presumed to have used it in this restricted sense. To this we are unable to agree. As has already been seen, the word "privilege," in its ordinary meaning, when used in this connection, includes an exemption from taxation. This court so decided a year before the charter of the Tennessee and Alabama Company was granted, and nearly three years before that of the Central Southern. In fact the Supreme Court of Tennessee does not seem to doubt that such would be its meaning but for the constitution, for in the opinion it is said, We see nothing in the constitution which gives to the word "right," or "privilege," or "immunity," or "exemption," any different meaning than that which it has among the people at large. There may be, and probably are, some immunities, and some exemptions, which would not be considered as either rights or privileges in the popular acceptation of those terms. It was to reach such immunities and such exemptions, as it seems to us, that this particular form of expression was used in the constitution, and not to provide that under no circumstances should the word privilege in a statute of Tennessee be held to include a privilege of exemption from taxation. Words in a constitution, as well as words in a statute, are always to be given the meaning they have in common use, unless there are very strong reasons to the contrary. We find no such reasons in this case, and, as an exemption from taxation is a privilege in the popular sense of that term, we feel ourselves compelled to decide that both the Tennessee and Alabama Company and the Central Southern Company were granted such an exemption by their charters, notwithstanding the contrary opinion of the Supreme Court of Tennessee, which, although entitled to great respect, is not binding upon us as authority under the circumstances of this case.
It only remains to consider whether the Nashville and Decatur Company is entitled to the same exemption. When two railroad companies unite or become consolidated under the...
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