Tunica County v. Tate

• Decision Date: 14 January 1901
• Citation: 29 So. 74,78 Miss. 294
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: TUNICA COUNTY v. SIMPSON TATE ET AL

29 So. 74

78 Miss. 294

TUNICA COUNTY v. SIMPSON TATE ET AL

Supreme Court of Mississippi

January 14, 1901

FROM the circuit court of Tunica county. HON. FRANK E. LARMIN Judge.

Tate and another, appellees, were the plaintiffs in the court below; Tunics county was defendant there. The facts in reference to the additional assessment involved are stated in the opinion of the court. The board of supervisors approved the assessment over the objection of appellees, who thereupon appealed to the circuit court. Upon trial in the circuit court, the action of the supervisors was reversed and vacated and judgment entered for appellees, and from that judgment the county appealed to the supreme court.

Reversed and remanded.

Monroe McClurg, attorney-general, for appellant.

Anderson v. Ingersoll, 62 Miss. 73, supports the contention of the board in the case at bar. Simmons v. Scott County, 68 Miss. 37, is authority for the action of the board at its May meeting.

Sections 80 and 3797, code 1892, must both be given effect. Section 80 is general on the subject of appeals, while § 3797 is special as to this particular matter, and must control. Therefore the motion made on the part of the county, to the effect that the appeal should not be considered until the taxes were paid, was proper, and should have been sustained.

The objection to the action of the board of supervisors in levying a tax upon the oil mill is too technical. It is not a substantial defense to say that the board regarded it as personal property, when, in fact, it was a fixture to the freehold, hence, real estate. The evident purpose of the board was to obtain taxes upon the value of the property, and the court will look to the substance rather than the form.

Judicial knowledge will be taken of the general assessment of real and personal property as required by law, and that the assessment of personalty is annual and that of land is quadrennial; that the land assessment years were 1896 and 1900. The record shows that the oil mill was placed upon the land in 1897 after the assessment of 1896. It follows that for the years 1898, 1899 and 1900, the value of the oil mills should be taxed, and it is not technically essential that any certain particular procedure should be adopted by which it must be assessed as a fixture and part of the freehold, or escape taxation entirely. It will be noted that the land upon which the mill stands was particularly described and the value of the mill fixed; therefore, the purpose of the board to get the proper tax, either upon the value of the oil mill as personalty, or upon the increased value of land, is made clear. The ordinary rules applicable to questions of fixtures in controversies between vendor and vendee, do not apply in matters of levying taxes. The general rule as to taxation is the payment of taxes; exemption upon any ground is the exception, and the burden is upon him who claims the exemption. Here the contention is not that the land was assessed at its true value, including the mill, but that it had been lawfully assessed in 1896 at its value then, and no particular procedure followed to equalize that assessment. In short, the proposition is whether the assessment has been placed upon the right roll. The sheriff and the board of supervisors and the assessors of 1900, put it on the personal roll. It is not necessary to the validity of additional assessments made by the board that they should be entered on the roll, either land or personal. The collection is from the minutes of the board, rather than from any roll. Sec. 3799 code of 1892. There is no merit in the claim that the procedure was unconstitutional or that the failure to raise the assessment in 1898 and 1899 was conclusive.

F. A Montgomery, Jr., for appellees.

The additional assessment was void, and the act of the circuit court was correct for two reasons:

1. Because the tax collector has no right, in any event, to make an additional assessment of property which had escaped taxation for former years. That is the duty of the assessor and not of the collector. Under § 3768 of the code of 1892 it is made the duty of the assessor, when he discovers persons or property that have escaped taxation for former years, to assess the same on the roll of the current year; § 3800 authorizes the assessor, after he has returned his roll, to add to it any person or thing at any time before action on it by the board.

Section 3804 authorizes and directs the tax collector to assess and collect taxes on land liable to taxation...