Scholey v. Rew , 23 L. Ed. 99 ( 1875 )

90 U.S. 331 (____) 23 Wall. 331

SCHOLEY
v.
REW.

Supreme Court of United States.

Mr. Theodore Bacon, for the plaintiff in error.

Mr. C.H. Hill, Assistant Attorney-General, contra, for the collector, defendant in error.

Mr. Justice CLIFFORD delivered the opinion of the court.

Questions of importance were discussed at the bar, some of which it cannot be admitted are properly presented for decision. Such questions only as are specified in the assignment of errors are, in general, to be regarded as open to the plaintiff, and it is very doubtful whether an assignment that the decision of the Circuit Court is for the wrong party is sufficient to present any question for decision, but inasmuch as the findings of the court in this case are in their nature a special finding, the better opinion is that their sufficiency to support the judgment is open to re-examination.

Enough has already appeared to show that the plaintiff took under his wife's will an equitable interest in one-third of the estate in question, and the United States contend that in view of those facts he is liable to pay a succession tax or duty in respect of the same by virtue of the act passed to levy such taxes, as it applies to every past or future disposition of real estate by will, deed, or laws of descent, by reason whereof any person shall become beneficially entitled in possession or expectancy to any real estate, or the income thereof, upon the death of any person dying after the passage of that act.

Apply the rule to be deduced from that enactment to the facts found by the court, and it must follow that the argument of the United States is well founded, unless some one or more of the special objections to the tax set up by the plaintiff are sufficient to exonerate him from such liability. Those objections are as follows: (1.) That the act imposing the duty is unconstitutional and void. (2.) That the case is not one within the act imposing the tax or duty. (3.) That the plaintiff being an alien the devise to him is absolutely void.

1. Support to the first objection is attempted to be drawn from that clause of the Constitution which provides that direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within the Union, according to their respective numbers; and also from the clause which provides that no capitation or other direct tax shall be laid unless in proportion to the census or amended enumeration; but it is clear that the tax or duty levied by the act under consideration is not a direct tax within the meaning of either of those provisions. Instead of that it is plainly an excise tax or duty, authorized by section eight of article one, which vests the power in Congress to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare.

Such a tax or duty is neither a tax on land nor a capitation exaction, as subsequently appears from the language of the section imposing the tax or duty, as well as from the preceding section, which provides that the term succession shall denote the devolution of real estate; and the section which imposes the tax or duty also contains a corresponding clause which provides that the term successor shall denote the person so entitled, and that the term predecessor shall denote the grantor, testator, ancestor, or other person from whom the interest of the successor has been or shall be derived.

Successor is employed in the act as the correlative to predecessor, and the succession or devolution of the real estate is the subject-matter of the tax or duty, or, in other words, it is the right to become the successor of real estate upon the death of the predecessor, whether the devolution or disposition of the same is effected by will, deed, or laws of descent, from a grantor, testator, ancestor, or other person from whom the interest of the successor has been or shall be derived; nor is the question affected in the least by the fact that the tax or duty is made a lien upon the land, as the lien is merely an appropriate regulation to secure the collection of the exaction.

Indirect taxes, such as duties of impost and excises and every other description of the same, must be uniform, and direct taxes must be laid in proportion to the census or enumeration as remodelled in the fourteenth amendment. Taxes on lands, houses, and other permanent real estate have always been deemed to be direct taxes, and capitation taxes, by the express words of the Constitution, are within the same category, but it never has been decided that any other legal exactions for the support of the Federal government fall within the condition that unless laid in proportion to numbers that the assessment is invalid.^[*]

Whether direct taxes in the sense of the Constitution comprehend any other tax than a capitation tax and a tax on land is a question not absolutely decided, nor is it necessary to determine it in the present case, as it is expressly decided that the term does not include the tax on income, which cannot be distinguished in principle from a succession tax such as the one involved in the present controversy.^[*]

Neither duties nor excises were regarded as direct taxes by the authors of the Federalist. Objection was made to the power to impose such taxes, and in answering that objection Mr. Hamilton said that the proportion of these taxes is not to be left to the discretion of the national legislature, but it is to be determined by the numbers of each State, as described in the second section of the first article. An actual census or enumeration of the people must furnish the rule, a circumstance which shuts the door to partiality or oppression. In addition to the precaution just mentioned, said he, there is a provision that all duties of imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.^[†]

Exactions for the support of the government may assume the form of duties, imposts, or excises, or they may also assume the form of license fees for permission to carry on particular occupations or to enjoy special franchises, or they may be specific in form, as when levied upon corporations in reference to the amount of capital stock or to the business done or profits earned by the individual or corporation.^[‡]

2. Sufficient appears in the prior suggestions to define the language employed and to point out what is the true intent and meaning of the provision, and to make it plain that the exaction is not a tax upon the land, and that it was rightfully levied, if the findings of the court show that the plaintiff became entitled, in the language of the section, or acquired the estate or the right to the income thereof by the devolution of the title to the same, as assumed by the United States.

Doubt upon that subject, it would seem, cannot be entertained if it be conceded that the subject-matter of the assessment is the devolution of the estate or the right to become beneficially entitled to the same, or the income thereof, in possession or expectancy, under the circumstances and conditions specified in the other parts of the section.

Decided support to the proposition that such is the true theory of the act is derived from the fact that the act of Parliament from which the particular provision under discussion was largely borrowed has received substantially the same construction.^[*]

Suppose that to be the true construction of the act imposing the duty, and it is undeniable that the case before the court falls within its operation, unless the fact that the plaintiff is an alien exonerates him from such an exaction. Proof of the introductory proposition is found in the conceded fact that the testatrix in her lifetime invested the personal property left her by the will of her first husband, or some part of it, in the said real estate, and that the plaintiff became entitled to the same or to the income of one-third of the same at her decease, and consequently became liable to pay the succession tax or duty in question unless he is exempted from the liability by his alienage.

He does not deny that the investment of the personal property in the manner stated was made by the executrix and her associates, under the decree of the Supreme Court of the State, nor does he attempt to impugn the regularity or the validity of those proceedings, nor is there anything in the record that would enable him to do so with success if the attempt was made. Proceedings, it is true, were instituted to effect a partition of the estate of the testatrix, and it is equally true that those proceedings were carried forward to final judgment, from which it appears that the entire block, in respect of which the controversy has arisen, was set off to the heirs of his deceased wife, but it is clear that that circumstance cannot relieve him from liability to pay a succession tax in respect to his share of the estate, for the obvious reason that he received its full value in other property assigned to him belonging to the same estate.

Beyond what may be inferred from the finding of the court, that the plaintiff is an alien, it does not appear that the defence of alienage was set up in the court below, nor does the assignment of errors contain any specification of such a question, except that the plaintiff is not liable to a succession tax and that the decision of the court below that he is so liable is erroneous. Such an assignment is not a compliance with the rule upon that subject, but the court is not inclined to rest the decision upon that ground.

Admit that the question is open, still the court is of the opinion that it cannot avail the plaintiff in this case, even under the comprehensive provision of the State statute. By that statute it is enacted that every devise of any interest in real property to a person who, at the time of the death of the testator, shall be an alien, not authorized by statute to hold real estate, shall be void.^[*]

Nothing appears in the record of an express character to show that the plaintiff was ever authorized by statute to hold real estate, but it does appear that he claimed a one-third interest in the block in respect of which the succession tax was levied, and that his claim was recognized by the court and all the parties in the partition suit, and that the same was finally adjudged to him in the judgment of partition by an allowance for the value in other property left by the testatrix; nor can it make any difference that the corresponding allowance to him was of personal property, never converted into real estate, as the record of the proceedings in partition shows that the referees, whose report was confirmed and adopted by the court, adjusted the amounts as if the block was personal property, probably for the reason that the consideration of the same at the time of the investment was paid out of the personal property left by the former husband of the testatrix.

Difficulty, it may be admitted, would attend the solution of the question if the issue was one between the plaintiff and the heirs at law of the testatrix, but the record shows that the testatrix became the owner of the property in the manner before stated, and that the interest claimed by the plaintiff was devised to him by the actual owner, and that he claimed it as if entitled to it under the will of the testatrix, and that he received one-third part of the income of the same from her decease to the commencement of the suit for partition, and that the claim made by him was fully recognized and included in the judgment of partition, and nothing is shown to support the theory that he is not still in the undisputed enjoyment of the allowance made to him in substitution for the one-third interest of the estate in respect of which the succession tax was levied.

Except for the purpose of avoiding the tax or duty due to the United States he has always claimed the benefit of the devise and still claims it for every other purpose. Had he disclaimed the right to take the interest devised to him the actual devolution of the estate would have given the right of possession to the heirs, either by the will or by the law of descent, and in that event the United States would not have met with any embarrassment in levying and collecting the succession tax or duty. By the terms of the will the devise was to the plaintiff, and inasmuch as he claimed the benefit of it without opposition, and has continued to enjoy its use, as before explained, to the present time, it followed that the heirs could not be subjected to such an exaction.

Tested by these suggestions it is clear that the claim of the plaintiff to recover back the amount of the tax or duty is inequitable, and in that regard the court here concurs in the proposition submitted by the United States, that the plaintiff is estopped to set up alienage as a ground of recovery under the circumstances of this case.^[*]

Having accepted the beneficial interest under the will, and being in the undisturbed enjoyment of the same, he must bear the burden which legally attaches to the interest.

JUDGMENT AFFIRMED.

NOTES

[*] Hylton v. United States, 3 Dallas, 171; 1 Kent, 12th ed., 255; Story on the Constitution, § 955.

[*] Insurance Co. v. Soule, 7 Wallace, 446; Bank v. Fenno, 8 Wallace, 546; Clark v. Sickel, 14 Internal Revenue Record, 6.

[†] Federalist, No. 36, p. 161; 7 Hamilton's Works, 847; License Tax Cases, 5 Wallace, 462.

[‡] Cooley on Constitutional Limitations, 495*; Provident Institution v. Massachusetts, 6 Wallace, 625; Bank v. Apthorp, 12 Massachusetts, 252.

[*] Wilcox v. Smith, 4 Drewry, 49; Blythe v. Granville, 13 Simons, 195; Attorney-General v. Middleton, 3 Hurlstone & Norman, 136; Same v. Fitz-John, 2 Id. 472; Same v. Gardner, 1 Hurlstone & Coleman, 649; Same v. Gell, 3 Id. 629; Braybrooke v. Attorney-General, 9 Clark (House of Lords Cases), 165; Lyall v. Lyall, Law Reports, 15 Equity, 11; Jeves v. Shadwell, Law Reports, 1 Chancery Appeals, 1; In re Badart, Law Reports, 10 Equity, 296.

[*] 2 Revised Statutes of New York, 58.

[*] Swain v. Seamans, 9 Wallace, 273; Picard v. Sears, 6 Adolphus & Ellis, 474; Freeman v. Cooke, 2 Exchequer, 654; Foster v. Dawber, 6 Id. 854; Edwards v. Chapman, 1 Meeson & Welsby, 231; Bigelow on Estoppel, 378; Hyde v. Baldwin, 17 Pickering, 303.