Opinion ID: 1788757
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Newspapers and Advertisers

Text: Representatives of the advertising industry and the press argue that the act violates equal protection principals by reclassifying the sales of newspapers and advertising as nonessential goods and singling out the sale of those items for discriminatory taxation. We note first that the classification of an item as essential or nonessential has no constitutional significance. The government can tax essential goods and services, such as food, medicine, gasoline, or electricity if it chooses to do so. See Puget Sound Power & Light Co. v. City of Seattle, 291 U.S. 619, 54 S.Ct. 542, 78 L.Ed. 1025 (1934) (approving a license tax on electricity). Therefore, whether the act classifies advertising and newspapers as essential or nonessential is wholly irrelevant. Nor do we view chapter 87-6 as singling out either advertisers or the press for discriminatory treatment. Advertising is taxed under the same general taxation provision of the act that imposes a tax on all other nonexempt services. Ch. 87-6, § 1, Laws of Fla. (creating § 212.059, Fla. Stat.). Although newly created section 212.0595 of the Florida Statutes sets out a number of special provisions relating to the collection and apportionment of the tax as applied to the advertising industry, these rules do not themselves impose any additional tax obligations. Rather, they simply set out the specific clarifying rules that the peculiar nature of modern interstate advertising necessitates. We also disagree that the act facially discriminates against the advertising industry as a whole by placing upon it a disproportionate tax burden. As the state points out, the taxation of advertising is expected to account for only 4.7% of all revenues derived from the new sales and use tax on services. The revenues derived from the taxation of advertising services is projected to account for only 1.4% of the total tax revenues derived from chapter 212 of the Florida Statutes during the 1987-88 fiscal year. We cannot say that, on its face, this smacks of discrimination. Opponents of the tax on advertising also argue that the act violates due process by failing to fairly apportion the tax for interstate advertisers and by attempting to tax advertisers who have no significant nexus to Florida. Questions such as this, however, are wholly fact specific and we cannot answer them by a facial examination of the statute based on hypothetical fact patterns. Thus, this type of due process challenge must await a specific as applied challenge in an adversarial setting. [6]