Case Name: COLOR-AD PACKAGING, INC., Respondent, v. COMMISSIONER OF REVENUE, Relator
Court: Minnesota Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Minnesota
Decision Date: 1988-09-16
Citations: 428 N.W.2d 806
Docket Number: No. C8-87-2103
Parties: COLOR-AD PACKAGING, INC., Respondent, v. COMMISSIONER OF REVENUE, Relator.
Judges: KELLEY, YETKA and POPOVICH, JJ., dissent.
Reporter: North Western Reporter 2d
Volume: 428
Pages: 806–813

Head Matter:
COLOR-AD PACKAGING, INC., Respondent, v. COMMISSIONER OF REVENUE, Relator.
No. C8-87-2103.
Supreme Court of Minnesota.
Sept. 16, 1988.
Hubert H. Humphrey, III, State Atty. Gen., David T. Schultz, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., St. Paul, for relator.
Christopher J. Chaput, Minneapolis, for respondent.

Opinion:
COYNE, Justice.
The issue presented is whether the capital equipment tax reduction program of chapter 297A applies to future goods ordered prior to the statute's effective date but not delivered or placed into service until after that date. The Commissioner of Revenue concluded it did not and denied respondent Color-Ad Packaging's claim for a refund. Color-Ad appealed and the Tax Court allowed the refund, holding that under the program both the purchase and sale of future goods occurs at the time of delivery. We affirm.
The parties have submitted the case on stipulated facts. Respondent Color-Ad Packaging Company, Inc. is engaged in the printing business in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. In December 1983, Color-Ad ordered a slitter rewinder from a firm in the United Kingdom by telephone. The order was confirmed by a written purchase order in February 1984. Two months later, in April 1984, Color-Ad ordered a gravure coating station from a company in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
The slitter rewinder was manufactured after June 30, 1984, and was shipped, assembled and placed into service at Color-Ad's place of business after August 1985. The gravure coating station was manufactured after June 30, 1984, and was later, in August 1985, delivered, assembled, and placed into service at Color-Ad's place of business.
The Minnesota General Sales Tax Law, Minn.Stat. § 297A.01 through 297A.44, embodies a comprehensive tax system created to impose an excise tax on the sale, use, storage, or consumption within Minnesota of tangible personal property and certain other commodities and services. The statutes provide two taxes, sales and use, which are mutually exclusive, but complementary, and which are designed to exact an equal tax based on a percentage of the purchase price of the property in question. It has been said that, in essence, a sales tax is a tax on the freedom of purchase, and a use tax is a tax on the enjoyment of that which was purchased. Wallace Berrie & Co. v. State Bd. of Equalization, 40 Cal.3d 60, 66, 707 P.2d 204, 209, 219 Cal.Rptr. 142, 147 (1985).
The sales tax provision reads: "Except as otherwise provided in this chapter, there is imposed an excise tax of six percent of the gross receipts from sales at retail made by any person in this state." Minn.Stat. § 297A.02, subd. 1 (1986). The section providing for the imposition of a use tax states:
For the privilege of using, storing or consuming in Minnesota tangible personal property, tickets or admissions to places of amusement and athletic events, electricity, gas, and local exchange telephone service purchased for use, storage or consumption in this state, a use tax is imposed on every person in this state at the rate of six percent of the sales price of sales at retail unless the tax imposed by section 297A.02 was paid on the sales price.
Minn.Stat. § 297A.14 (1986).
Both sections 297A.02 and 297A.14 provide that, notwithstanding the foregoing provisions, the rate of the excise tax imposed upon sales and the use tax imposed upon the sales price of capital equipment is four percent. Minn.Stat. § 297A.02, subd. 2 and 297A.14 (1986). The tax on capital equipment is so structured that the tax is paid at the rate of six percent and the purchaser applies for a refund equal to the two percent reduction as a result of the lower rate payable on capital equipment. Minn.Stat. § 297A.15, subd. 5 (1986). The reduction in the tax rate became effective with respect to "sales made after June 30, 1984, and also * ⅜ * to purchases of capital equipment and special tooling made after May 1, 1984, but not placed in service until after June 30, 1984." Act of April 25, 1984, ch. 502, art. VI, § 11, 1984 Minn. Laws 492, 564.
The Commissioner contends that the reduction in the tax rate on capital equipment was to "encourage new investment in capital equipment" and that Color-Ad should not be entitled to a rebate because its capi-' tal equipment orders were placed prior to the effective date for the statutory refund. The Tax Court concluded, however, that a "purchase" does not occur on the placement of an order for future goods but upon delivery of the completed goods. Color-Ad confirmed its telephone order of a slitter rewinder from a firm in the United Kingdom in February 1984 by written purchase - order, and in April 1984 Color-Ad ordered a gravure coating station from a firm in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Neither piece of capital equipment, however, was manufactured before July 1,1984, the effective date for the statutory refund, and then neither was shipped or delivered, assembled, or placed in service at Color-Ad's place of business before August 1985. Since both items of capital equipment were delivered after the June 30, 1984 effective date, the Tax Court ruled that Color-Ad was entitled to the two percent refund provided in section 297A.15, subd. 5.
That liability for the sales tax accrues at the time of the sale is not only apparent from the language of section 297A.02, but has been recognized in such cases as Leisure Dynamics, Inc. v. Falstaff Brewing Corp., 298 N.W.2d 33, 37 (Minn.1980), and is not disputed here. In Crown Iron Works Co. v. Comm'r of Taxation, 298 Minn. 213, 214 N.W.2d 462 (1974) (in which we were faced with the converse of the present situation), we held that a sale occurs, in accordance with the definition provided at Minn.Stat. § 297A.01, subd. 3, when transfer of title or possession, or both, of tangible personal property occurs, and we looked to the Uniform Commercial Code as adopted in this state for clarification of the term "transfer of title." We went on to point out that identification to the contract is a necessary prerequisite to the passing of title, Minn.Stat. § 336.2-401 (1986), and that where future goods are involved, as they are in the present case, appropriation of the goods to the contract must be something more than a selection by a seller who retains the right to choose the specific article to be supplied to the purchaser. Minn.Stat. § 336.2-501 designates the manner in which identification is accomplished. Moreover, Minn.Stat. § 336.2-401(2) (1986) provides that unless otherwise explicitly agreed, title passes at the time and place at which the seller completes his performance with respect to the physical delivery of the goods. Id. at 216-17, 214 N.W.2d at 464-65. Thus, in Crown Iron Works, this court held that the sale of goods, which were ordered prior to the effective date of the sales tax statutes but delivered after the effective date of the sales tax, took place when title passed on physical delivery of the goods. Accordingly, the sales tax was properly imposed. Id. at 218-19, 214 N.W.2d at 466.
In the present case the purchase orders for both the slitter rewinder and the gra-vure coating station were for future goods which did not come into existence until after June 30,1984. In fact, they were not delivered until more than a year after the effective date of the rate reduction in the tax applicable to capital equipment.
Had the sellers of the slitter rewinder and the gravure coating station been Minnesota retailers and the sales made in this state, thereby triggering the imposition of the sales tax (section 297A.02), the holding in Crown Iron Works would be dispositive: the sale occurred on transfer of title to the purchaser, an event which could not have occurred before the goods came into existence. Since the goods did not come into existence until after June 30, 1984, the purchaser should be entitled to the refund provided at section 297A.15, subd. 5.
The sales in question, however, were not made in Minnesota. The one manufacturer was located in the United Kingdom and the other in the State of Wisconsin. Color-Ad was, therefore, required to pay a use tax for the privilege of using, storing, or consuming in Minnesota tangible personal property. See § 297A.14 (1986). Section 297A.01, subd. 6, defines "use" as including the exercise of any right or power over tangible personal property, and we have previously noted that liability for use tax is triggered by any exercise of "the privilege of using, storing, or consuming in Minnesota tangible personal property." Miller v. Comm'r of Revenue, 359 N.W.2d 620, 621 (Minn.1985). Color-Ad could neither exercise any right or power nor enjoy any privilege of using, storing or consuming tangible personal property before that property came into existence. In the light of the statutory definition of "use," the provisions of Minn.Stat. § 336.2-401 (1986), and our decision in Crown Iron Works, the Tax Court properly determined that liability for use tax did not accrue until after July 1, 1984.
The State contends, however, that "sales" and "purchases," as those terms are used in the section of the session law providing for the effective date of the reduction in the rate of tax applicable to capital equipment, Act of April 25,1984, ch. 502, art. VI, § 11, 1984 Minn.Laws 492, 564, have a different meaning than that provided in the statutory definition at section 297A.01, subd. 3. While it is true that the statutory definition is not exclusive and while it is also true that the portion of the statute setting the effective date of the tax reduction is somewhat inartfully phrased, nothing in that provision justifies substituting "purchase order" for "purchase," construing "sale" and "purchase" in such a way that they can occur other than simultaneously, or in any other manner departing from the established statutory and judicial definition of "sale" and "purchase." A perfectly reasonable construction of the effective date provision can be achieved by according the terms "sales" and "purchases" their customary and accepted meanings.
The reduced tax rate is applicable to any sale made after June 30, 1984, that is, when there has been a transfer after June 30, 1984, either of title pursuant to thé Uniform Commercial Code, as adopted in Minnesota, or of possession. The effective date provision states that the reduced rate shall also apply to purchases of capital equipment made after May 1, 1984 if the purchaser has elected not to place the equipment in service until after June 30, 1984. In other words, this language provides an exception for a transaction which would otherwise be ineligible for the tax reduction: if the equipment is not placed in service until after June 30, 1984, the reduced rate applies as long as the transfer either of title pursuant to the Uniform Commercial Code as enacted in Minnesota or of possession occurred subsequent to May 1, 1984. It is, of course, the purchaser who must make the election whether to delay placing the equipment in service — a matter of business judgment which requires the purchaser to. weigh the economic benefit to be gained from utilization of the equipment against the benefit to be derived from the tax deduction. Moreover, it is the purchaser who must declare in its application for tax refund that even though the purchase occurred between May 1, 1984 and June 30, 1984, the equipment was not placed in service until after June 30, 1984. When one considers that eligibility for the reduced rate depends on the purchaser's conduct, the shift from "sale" to "purchase" becomes explainable and the provision is unambiguous.
The State buttresses its manufactured ambiguity in the effective date provision by reference to the legislature's intention to create an incentive for, or to remove an impediment to, acquisition of capital equipment by business units for employment in Minnesota plants. We do not disagree with the State's articulation of legislative intention but only with its conclusion that the Tax Court's decision frustrates the legislative purpose. In the present case the purchase order for the capital equipment in question was, indeed, made long before the legislative decision to reduce the tax applicable to capital equipment. Neither item of equipment was delivered, however, until more than one year after the effective date of the reduction. Whatever may be the validity of Color-Ad's contention that it could have cancelled the order because the equipment was not delivered timely, it is apparent that at any time for a period of about one year after the effective date of the tax reduction, Color-Ad could have avoided the imposition of Minnesota's use tax by removing its business to another state and directing delivery of the capital equipment to its new base of operation. The legislative intention is broad enough, we assume, to include encouragement of a Minnesota business unit to remain in Minnesota. Accordingly, affirmance of the Tax Court's decision in the present case promotes the legislature's intention as well as preserves uniformity in the construction and application of the terms "sale" and "purchase."
The Tax Court's allowance of Color-Ad's claim for a refund is affirmed.
KELLEY, YETKA and POPOVICH, JJ., dissent.