U.S. Elec. Power & Light Co. v. State
| Decision Date | 13 March 1894 |
| Citation | 28 A. 768,79 Md. 63 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES ELECTRIC POWER & LIGHT CO. v. STATE. |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Appeal from court of common pleas.
Action by the state of Maryland against the United States Electric Power & Light Company to recover a tax. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed.
Argued before ROBINSON, C.J., and BRYAN, BRISCOE, McSHERRY, FOWLER ROBERTS, PAGE, and BOYD, JJ.
Tho. Hughes, for appellants.
Atty Gen. Poe and J. Alex. Preston, for the State.
We find no difficulty in affirming the judgment appealed from in this case. The appellant is a company incorporated under the laws of Maryland, and transacts its business within this state. It has a capital stock divided into shares, and owns real and personal property. This real property has been duly assessed for taxation, and the valuation placed thereon has been deducted from the assessed value of the capital stock, as required by section 141, art. 81, of the Code. The state taxes upon the company's real estate have been paid, and so, also, have the state taxes on its shares of stock. In addition to these taxes, the state levied, under the act of 1890, c. 559, a further tax of one-half of 1 per cent. on the gross receipts of this and other like companies, and for a failure to pay this latter tax the pending suit was instituted. The defense relied on is that the gross-receipt tax is a double tax upon the same property, and therefore unauthorized and illegal. It is claimed to be a double tax because it is insisted that the value which the capital stock possesses after the assessed value of the real estate has been deducted is such, only, as arises out of the ownership and operation of the franchises of the company, and, as a tax on gross receipts is a tax on the franchise, a tax on the capital stock, whose value is the ownership and use of the company's franchises, is an additional tax on the same thing; but this argument is obviously fallacious. The taxable value of shares of capital stock is fixed by the state tax commissioner. He is required, by the statutes, to deduct from the aggregate value of all the shares of the capital stock of banks and other corporations the assessed value of the real estate owned by the company, and to divide the residuum by the number of shares of the stock, and the quotient is declared to be the taxable value of each share for state purposes of taxation. Upon the valuation thus ascertained the state tax is levied. But the tax is not a tax upon the stock, or upon the corporation, but upon the owners of the shares of stock, though the officers of the corporation are made the agents of the state for the collection of the state tax. It is not material what assets or other property make up the value of the shares. Those shares are property, and under existing laws, are taxable property. They belong to the stockholders, respectively and individually, and when, for the sake of convenience in collecting the tax...
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