Opinion ID: 1206449
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: what did the constitutional convention intend?

Text: In order to further buttress the holding of Banner to the effect that Article 16 contemplates only the use of property taxes and not the use of excise taxes  we need to consider the problem within the framework of the intention of the authors of the Constitution. Did they contemplate that reliance upon any type of tax would create a constitutional debt, or did they contemplate that only a resort to general property taxation would have this effect? It is my judgment that the intendment was the latter, and thus the use of the coal excise tax funds for the purposes assigned under the Wyoming Community Development Act is constitutional and not repugnant to Article 16, § 2. In states where constitutional-debt-limitation statutes contain the assessed valuation language (such as Sections 1, 3 and 5), the courts have held the use of the tax which will incur the prohibited debt is the use of a real property tax  just as we did in Banner, supra. See, State v. Connelly, supra, and Briggs v. Greenville County, 137 S.C. 288, 135 S.E. 153. Contra, State ex rel. Diederichs v. State Highway Commission, 89 Mont. 205, 296 P.2d 1033, and State v. Martin, 62 Wash.2d 645, 384 P.2d 833. There is a split of authority upon this question, but in those states having constitutional indebtedness provisions such as ours, the better-reasoned view seems to be that only the use of property and not excise taxes are contemplated as being capable of structuring a constitutional indebtedness. In pursuit of our inquiry, we must take into account the fact that the terms indebtedness and debt, as they appear in §§ 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 of Article 16, would seem to mean the same thing throughout these various provisions. State v. Connelly, supra Note 2. In Banner, we said the term indebtedness contained in Article 16, § 5, did not contemplate a promise to repay revenue bonds out of fees, penalties, or excise taxes. If we assume that the only distinction between §§ 5, 3 and 1 (indebtedness in excess of a percentage of the assessed valuation of taxable property) and §§ 4 and 2 (debt in excess of taxes for the current year), is that the former provisions merely refer to the maximum overall indebtedness, while the latter refer to the maximum yearly indebtedness, then logically the term debt contained in Article 16, § 2, likewise does not contemplate a promise to repay revenue bonds out of fees, penalties, or excise taxes. This is so because debt and indebtedness are used in all five sections in the same context. All of the debt provisions of the originally proposed constitutional sections contemplated the creation of debts which relied, for payment, on property taxes alone. [6] Creation of debts by the state, and by the cities and towns, required thereunder the passage of legislation requiring the levy of a property tax as the sole source of payment for the obligations incurred. Elections by payers of property taxes were in some instances required. These various provisions were rejected, but their substance remained a part of the provisions enacted: (1) Reference is still made to the valuation of taxable property; and (2) the distinction between aggregate and yearly debts still is recognized. It is no answer to say that the word taxes, in Article 16, § 2, is not preceded by the word property, and, therefore, must refer to a reliance on any tax. Taxation, throughout Article 16, must be taken as referring to property taxation. Otherwise, the reference to taxable property and the singular distinction of aggregate versus yearly indebtedness would be without meaning.