The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-12-11
TRANSPORTATION Company Must Paw
Tax On Cars.
SUPREME COURT OPINION
JUDGMENT FOR PIPER WAS RE-
TURNED YESTERDAY.
Judge Hiles Home From Ogden
James A. Williams Cited For Con-
tenpt-Joe Morris Will Be Tried
On Monday-Suits Filed-Probate
orders-other Court News.

An opinion affirming the judgment of
the lower court was handed down by
the supreme court yesterday in the
case Of the Union Refrigerator Transit
company, appellant, VS.. Stephen II.
Lynch, treasurer and collector of taxes
of Salt Lake county.
The action was brought in the lower
court by appellant to recover a. sum
of money paid as tax under protest,
the company contending the tax was
illegal. The contention was made that
appellant, an outside corporation, is en-
gagged in the business of furnishing re-
frlgerator cars for the handling of per
asnable freight and that its cars were
not leased to any particular line of
road, but were at the disposal of the
shipper; that the business was purely
interstate commerce.; that all the
freight transported through this state
was transported from points in an
other state or vice versa; that the cars
merely passed through this state and
at no regular intervals and in no reg
ular number; that the cars had no
Sltus IN that state, but that, notwith-
standing, the board of equalization
taxed ten cars of the value of s., 500,
and apportioned them to the several
counties, Salt Lake county the sum of
$210.
Bartch, J., delivered the opinion of
the court, which holds that the state
has a right to tax cars within its Dor
derS; that they have a situs here. As
to a contention that the tax is q regu-
1atlon of interstate commerce, the court
says:
1T is not a tax on persons or freight
IN transit through this state TO other
states or countries, nor on the right of
transit or transportation; nor is it a
license or privilege tax, or tax on bust
ness or occupation, or on property of
The United States located in this state.
1t is essentially a tax on property found
and used in this state, and valued, for
the purpose Of taxation, like other per-
sonal property within the jurisdiction
of the state, although the cars may
have been employed in interstate COM
merce, the state is not prohibited by
the constitution or laws of the United
States, from taxing them as other per-
sona1 property within its jurisdiction.
This has been SO declared by the su-
preme court Of the United States
Appellant also contends that the state
laws on taxation were only intended to
apply to car lines, or car companies
owning and operating within this state,
and that there was no language en-
ployed in any provisions of the law
which authorized the taxation of cars
belonging 10 some one residing IN an
other state, and used in interstate com
merce. The court, after quoting from
section 3, article Is, of the state consti-
tuition, finds that there is an express
provision covering the point in issue.
The court further finds that substan-
tally the same provision is contained in
section 1 Of the session laws of 1885,
AS no point was raised concerning the
apportionment of the tax among the
several counties of the state the cOIrrt
does not pass upon it.
The opinion concludes by holding that
the tax il question is lawful and that
Judge Cherry, from whose ruling the
appeal was taken, very properly dis
missed the action.