United States v. King Trailer Company, 19758.

• Decision Date: 07 September 1965
• Docket Number: No. 19758.,19758.
• Citation: 350 F.2d 947
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Appellant, v. KING TRAILER COMPANY, Inc., Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

350 F.2d 947 (1965)

UNITED STATES of America, Appellant, v. KING TRAILER COMPANY, Inc., Appellee.

No. 19758.

United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.

September 7, 1965.

Louis F. Oberdorfer, Asst. Atty. Gen., Lee A. Jackson, David O. Walter, Fred E. Youngman, Dept. of Justice, Washington, D. C., Manuel L. Real, U. S. Atty., Loyal E. Keir, Asst. U. S. Atty., Chief, Tax Div., Los Angeles, Cal., for appellant.

W. S. Rainbolt, Long Beach, Cal., for appellee.

Before CHAMBERS, BARNES and ELY, Circuit Judges.

ELY, Circuit Judge:

The Government appeals from a judgment awarding a refund of certain excise taxes which the appellee, a manufacturer, claims to have been illegally imposed and collected. The manufactured articles, described as "pickup coaches", were held by the district court not to be "automobile truck bodies" or "automobile accessories" within the contemplation of Int. Rev. Code of 1954, § 4061. The careful reasoning of the district court is seen in its reported opinion. King Trailer Company v. United States, 228 F.Supp. 1013 (S.D. Cal.1964).

The question here, as in the court below, is succinctly put by the Government as follows:

"Whether certain articles manufactured and sold by the taxpayer, commonly designated `pickup coaches,\' designed and constructed after the fashion of small house trailers primarily for installation, transportation, and use in connection with a conventional pickup truck, but not permanently affixed to a truck, as temporary mobile housing while traveling, vacationing, etc., are subject to the manufacturers excise taxes under Section 4061(a) (1) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 as automobile truck bodies or under Section 4061(b) as automobile parts or accessories."

We have reviewed the record, which includes testimony given orally, answers to Requests for Admissions and Written Interrogatories submitted by the Government, and photographs, diagrams, and detailed descriptions of the pickup coaches. While they were clearly designed for easy use with a pickup automobile truck, were sold for such use, and were generally so used, they were manufactured as separate, independent units. They are, simply and essentially, small house trailers without wheels. House trailers and house trailer parts and accessories are exempt from the excise tax by express provisions of the statute. Int. Rev. Code of 1954, § 4061(a) (2). That the unit is made wheelless and of such styling as to enable its easy use for transportation as a load or cargo upon a pickup truck does not change its obvious characteristics. Its placement upon a truck does not require the removal of the existing "automobile truck body" of the pickup truck, nor, in our opinion, does it superimpose another.

We cannot extend the power to tax beyond the clear authority of statute. Crooks v. Harrelson, 282 U.S. 55, 61, 51 S.Ct. 49, 75 L.Ed. 156 (1930); Bowers v. New York & Albany Lighterage Co., 273 U.S. 346, 350, 47 S.Ct. 389, 71 L.Ed....