Case Title: Just Valuation & Taxation League, Inc. v. Simpson

Citation: 209 So. 2d 229

Docket Number: 

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 1968-04-10T00:00:00Z

Document:
209 So. 2d 229 (1968)
JUST VALUATION & TAXATION LEAGUE, INC., a Corporation et al., Appellants,
v.
Clyde H. SIMPSON, As Tax Collector of Duval County, Florida et al., Appellees.
No. 36486.

Supreme Court of Florida.
April 10, 1968.
William C. Bostwick of Bostwick & Bostwick, Jacksonville, Mallory E. Horne of Horne, Rhodes & Lamb, Tallahassee, for appellants.
F. William Marr, Jacksonville, for Clyde H. Simpson, Tax Collector, Duval County.
Walter C. Shea, Jacksonville, for Comptroller and Board of County Com'rs.
O.O. McCollum, Jr., Jacksonville, for Duval County Budget Commission.
Wm. Joe Sears, Jr., and Rogers, Towers, Bailey, Jones & Gay and Frank X. Friedmann, Jr., Jacksonville, for Tax Assessor.
Earl Faircloth, Atty. Gen., and Larry Levy, Asst. Atty. Gen., for Fred O. Dickinson, Jr., Comptroller of State of Florida.
ROBERTS, Justice.
We have for review the decision of a Chancellor denying relief to appellants-plaintiffs who sought to strike down on constitutional grounds the ad valorem tax machinery in Duval County, Florida. They contend that a unit of wealth invested in real or tangible personal property is required to pay more ad valorem taxes than the same unit of wealth invested in intangible personal property; that the investor in intangible personal property is favored by a tax limitation provided in Section 1, Article IX, Constitution of Florida, F.S.A., while the investor in real or tangible personal *230 property enjoys no such protection. They further contend that the operating incidence of such a taxing scheme, in its alleged discriminatory tax rate feature, constitutes an unlawful discrimination and tax burden on real and tangible personal property and its owners, and is in violation of the equal protection clauses and due process provisions of Sections 1 and 12, Declaration of Rights of the Florida Constitution, and the equal and due process requirements of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. On motion of the appellees-defendants the bill of complaint was dismissed. The Chancellor has favored us with an excellent opinion setting forth the reasons for his ruling.
Sections 1 and 2, Article IX, Constitution of Florida, provides: 
In the posture in which the case is brought here for review the controlling question is whether or not the separate classification of intangible property for ad valorem taxation with the imposition of a limited rate thereon is valid and not in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Section 12, Declaration of Rights, Constitution of Florida, is not involved since our state constitution expressly authorizes the placing of intangible personal property in a separate classification and fixes a maximum ceiling of two mills thereon. The reasonable classification of property for tax purposes has already been approved by this court. As to the disposition of the question by the courts of this state we quote with approval from the judgment of the learned Chancellor below this language: 
We then reach the question of whether or not the separation of intangible personal property into a separate classification with a state imposed organic ceiling of two mills offends against the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, often referred to as the equal protection clause of that constitution. Decisions by the federal courts recognizing the power of the state to classify property for the purpose of taxation are legion. We quote from the decision of the Chancellor a few of them: 
"In Frank Walters v. City of St. Louis, 347 U.S. 231, 98 L. Ed. 660, 74 S.C. 505, the court said:
"In Madden, Executor v. [Commonwealth of] Kentucky, 309 U.S. 83, 60 S. Ct. 406 [84 L. Ed. 590], the court stated:
"The Supreme Court of the United States has consistently applied the `reasonable classification' rule. In Allied Stores of Ohio v. Bowers, 358 U.S. 522 [79 S. Ct. 437], 2 [3] L.Ed.2d 480 (1959), the Court stated:
"In Nashville, C. & St. L.R. Co. v. Browning, 310 U.S. 362, 60 S. Ct. 968, 84 L. Ed. 1254, the court stated that:
"The latest case in the United States Supreme Court on this subject is American Oil Company v. Neill, 380 U.S. 451, 14 L. Ed. 2d 1, 85 S. Ct. 1130. In an opinion handed down April 16, 1965, Mr. Chief Justice Warren stated:
"In Morton Salt Company v. City of South Hutchinson (CCA 10), 159 F.2d 897), the Court significantly said as follows:
So it is our opinion and we hold that the citizens of Florida had the right by constitutional amendment to place intangible personal property in a separate classification and to authorize the Legislature to impose a special tax thereon and to place a limit on the amount of the tax thus to be imposed, and that in doing so they did not offend against the due process clause of the Constitution of the United States, and the learned Chancellor was eminently correct in so holding.
The other contentions have been examined and considered and found to be without merit, so the judgment of the court here under review is
Affirmed.
CALDWELL, C.J., DREW, ERVIN and ADAMS, JJ., and WALKER and POPPER, Circuit Judges, concur.