Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/17pdf/17-494_j4el.pdf
Page Number: 18.0

Cite as:  585 U. S. ____ (2018) 

13 

Opinion of the Court 

businesses with  physical  presence  at  a  competitive  disad­
vantage  relative  to  remote  sellers.    Remote  sellers  can 
avoid the regulatory burdens of tax collection and can offer 
de facto  lower  prices  caused  by  the  widespread  failure  of
consumers to pay the tax on their own.  This “guarantees a
competitive benefit to certain firms simply because of the
organizational  form  they  choose”  while  the  rest  of  the 
Court’s  jurisprudence “is all about preventing discrimina­
tion between firms.”  Direct Marketing, 814 F. 3d, at 1150– 
1151 (Gorsuch, J., concurring).  In effect, Quill has come to 
serve as a judicially created tax shelter for businesses that 
decide  to  limit  their  physical  presence  and  still  sell  their 
goods and services to a State’s consumers—something that 
has  become  easier  and  more  prevalent  as  technology  has
advanced. 

Worse  still,  the  rule  produces  an  incentive  to  avoid 
physical  presence  in  multiple  States.    Distortions  caused 
by  the  desire  of  businesses  to  avoid  tax  collection  mean
that  the  market  may  currently  lack  storefronts,  distribu­
tion points, and employment centers that otherwise would 
be efficient or desirable.  The Commerce Clause must not 
prefer  interstate  commerce  only  to  the  point  where  a
merchant  physically  crosses  state  borders.    Rejecting  the
physical presence rule is necessary to ensure that artificial 
competitive  advantages  are  not  created  by  this  Court’s 
precedents.  This  Court  should  not  prevent  States  from
collecting  lawful  taxes  through  a  physical  presence  rule
that  can  be  satisfied  only  if  there  is  an  employee  or  a
building in the State. 

3 
The  Court’s  Commerce  Clause  jurisprudence  has  “es­
chewed formalism for a sensitive, case-by-case analysis of 
purposes and effects.”  West Lynn Creamery, Inc. v. Healy, 
512  U. S.  186,  201  (1994).    Quill,  in  contrast,  treats  eco­
nomically  identical  actors  differently,  and  for  arbitrary