The Mayor v. The Macon Sav. Bank

• Citation: 60 Ga. 134
• Parties: The Mayor, etc., of Macon. v. The Macon Savings Bank.
• Decision Date: 31 January 1878
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

60 Ga. 134

The Mayor, etc., of Macon. v. The Macon Savings Bank.

Supreme Court of the State of Georgia

(January Term, 1878.)

Municipal corporations. Tax. Banks. Before Judge Grice. Bibb Superior Court. October adjourned Term, 1877.

Reported in the opinion.

R. W. Jemison & Son, for plaintiff in error.

Hill & Harris, for defendant.

Jackson, Judge.

The city of Macon imposed a tax of $150.00 per annum upon all persons and banking corporations carrying on the *business of banking within that city. The Macon Savings Bank denied the right of the city to tax its business. Its capital or stock is taxed as other capital or property in the city—or rather, the shares of its stockholders is—and it claims that the city cannot tax it for carrying on the business of banking. Hence it filed a bill praying for an injunction against an execution levied to collect the tax of 1877; the chancellor granted an interlocutory order restraining the collection of the tax until the hearing, to which the city excepted, and that makes the question for our review.

The grant of power to the city is very broad. It is in these words: "They shall have power to levy and collect a tax upon factors, brokers and vendors of lottery tickets, upon agents and managers of gift enterprises, and upon all other persons exercising within the city any profession, trade or calling, or business of any nature whatever.'' Act of 1871-2, § 14.

Certainly this language covers all business of any sort that any person may carry on in Macon. Is the Macon Savings Bank a person? The Code declares that the word "persons, " inall statutes, shall include corporations (Code, § 5); and that persons are natural and artificial, (Code, § 1651)—the latter being, of course, corporations. If, therefore, the Savings Bank be an artificial person—a corporation—it is expressly enacted by the general assembly that every statute which names "persons" shall apply to and embrace it—of course, where applicable from the nature of things. This statute is thus made by law to read, upon all other persons, natural or artificial—all exercising business of any nature whatever. This bank being an artificial person, and being as fully embraced by our general legislation in the Code in all statutes which use the word "persons" as if called therein a corporation, and setting out in the bill by its showing that it is a corporation, chartered in 1874, the next question is, does it carry on any business of any nature whatever in Macon? It carries on therein the very important business of banking, of brokerage, of loaning money, of buying *and selling exchange, of receiving deposits, and all the business which bankers ordinarily do.

It comes clearly, therefore, within the power to tax granted to the city of Macon by the Legislature of Georgia.

Does its charter take it out of this general law? for that instrument is the measure of its stature as a person and the limit of its sphere of action; and if, among its privileges, there be any exemption from taxation, or limit upon the tax which it may be required to pay, it cannot be controlled by taxation imposed by the state, or any authority subordinate to the state, or deriving its power from the state. Nothing in the charter exempts it from taxation or limits the taxing power upon it. It is a charter granting to certain persons corporate rights with power to sue and be sued, to lend money, etc., etc., etc., but no privilege is granted in respect to taxes—state, county or municipal.

Is there anything in the former part of the act of 1871 which confers the power to tax the business of all persons which tends to show that the general assembly did not mean that the business of banking might be taxed by the city of Macon?

The former part of the section reads, that the city "shall have power and authority to levy and collect a tax upon all property, real and personal, within the limits of the city; upon the banking, insurance and other capital employed therein; upon salaries and incomes derived from property within the city, and upon gross sales within the city: provided, that no tax upon real or personal estate shall exceed one per cent. upon the value thereof, except for the purposes and as is hereinafter provided." Then follows the clause first cited in regard to the tax on business of all sorts. So that it will appear that all sorts of capital is taxed in the provision last cited—whether invested in real or personal estate, or in banking or insurance, or in the hands of...