Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/22-166_8n59.pdf
Page Number: 12.0

Cite as:  598 U. S. ____ (2023) 

9 

Opinion of the Court 

Maine amended its law a decade later to permit the former 
owner to recover the surplus.  1848 Me. Laws p. 56, §4.  And 
Mississippi’s highest court promptly struck down its law for 
violating the Due Process and Takings Clauses of the Mis-
sissippi Constitution.  See Griffin v. Mixon, 38 Miss. 424, 
439,  451–452  (Ct.  Err.  &  App.  1860).    Louisiana’s  statute 
remained on the books, but the County cites no case show-
ing  that  the  statute  was  actually  enforced  against  a  tax-
payer to take his entire property.

The minority rule then remains the minority rule today:
Thirty-six States and the Federal Government require that
the excess value be returned to the taxpayer. 

C 
Our precedents have also recognized the principle that a
taxpayer  is  entitled  to  the  surplus  in  excess  of  the  debt
owed.  In United States v. Taylor, 104 U. S. 216 (1881), an
Arkansas taxpayer whose property had been sold to satisfy 
a tax debt sought to recover the surplus from the sale.  A 
nationwide  tax  had  been  imposed  by  Congress  in  1861  to
raise funds for the Civil War.  Under that statute, if a tax-
payer did not pay, his property would be sold and “the sur-
plus  of  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  [would]  be  paid  to  the 
owner.”  Act of Aug. 5, 1861, §36, 12 Stat. 304.  The next 
year, Congress added a 50 percent penalty in the rebelling 
States, but made no mention of the owner’s right to surplus
after a tax sale.  See Act of June 7, 1862, §1, 12 Stat. 422.
Taylor’s property had been sold for failure to pay taxes un-
der the 1862 Act, but he sought to recover the surplus under 
the 1861 Act.  Though the 1862 Act “ma[de] no mention of 
the  right  of  the  owner  of  the  lands  to  receive  the  surplus
proceeds of their sale,” we held that the taxpayer was enti-
tled  to  the  surplus  because  nothing  in  the  1862  Act  took 

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unregistered “swamp lands,” 1842 N. C. Sess. Laws p. 64, §1, but other-
wise  continued  to  follow  the  majority  rule,  see  1792  N. C.  Sess.  Laws 
p. 23, §5.