Opinion ID: 1223410
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Provisions Related to Taxation

Text: The 1877 Constitution is divided into only 13 Articles, and two of them relate to taxation. Article IV Power of General Assembly over Taxation, etc., and Article VII Finance, Taxation, and Public Debt. A close examination of the placement of the provisions, their purpose, and the other constitutional provisions ratified at the same time, reveals that the State was profoundly interested in obtaining tax revenue from those corporations who were profiting from being in the State in order to provide tax revenues for the benefit of those individuals who benefited the State. Article IV, Power of the General Assembly over Taxation, etc. is composed of two sections: Section I Taxation contains one paragraph that limits the General Assembly's power of taxation. (This is the Article that the trial court held bars the contract.) Section II Regulation of Corporations contains seven paragraphs, five of which are concerned exclusively with corporations. The placement alone, indicates the drafter's main concern was stopping corporate tax immunity. Article VII, Finance, Taxation, and Public Debt, in pertinent part, expressed the strong state policy in favor of benefiting those individuals who benefited Georgia. Art. VII, Sec. I, Par. I, declared that one of the purposes of taxation was to provide for injured or disabled Confederate soldiers and their widows. [3] This provision announced the State's intention to allow certain individuals a constitutional right to share in the State's tax revenues. The 1877 Constitution manifests the strong policy of Georgia to protect those individuals who have benefited the State, provide them with a constitutional right to share in the State's tax revenues, some of which would come from stopping the corporate tax immunity practice, and stop the General Assembly from granting future corporate tax immunity.