Court Opinion

ID: 9469075
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:31:27.088089+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:12.189956
License: Public Domain

*243EAST, Senior District Judge,
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent. Any claim for a tax refund lodged with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) must meet three legal requirements:
(1) It must include a clear statement of the substance of the claim, and
(2) A clear statement of the asserted provisions of the Internal Revenue Code (IRC) and the regulations of the IRS relied upon for relief; and
(3) The claim must be timely presented to the IRS so as not to be barred by any appropriate statute of limitations.
Treas.Reg. § 301.6402-2(b), T.D. 7484, 42 FR 22143 (1977).
My reading of the record on appeal and the respective answers of the parties to a specific inquiry of this panel dictates a conclusion that the Huettls’ first claim of refund under IRS, §§ 901 and 904 was rejected by the IRS on the sole legal ground of the bar of the three-year statute of limitations, IRC, § 6511(a). The IRS, by its own admission, never considered the worth of the substantive claim for refund. In this case, the Huettls’ first claim did not assert any appropriate statute of limitations. The IRS bypassed its consideration of the merits of the refund claim and erroneously imposed the bar of the three-year statute of limitations. The majority does not hold otherwise, or else the Huettls would be frustrated by the doctrine of res judicata.
The Huettls’ second claim for a refund based upon an asserted entitlement to a foreign tax credit carryover was in fact identical to the substance of their first claim for such credit carryover; however, the second claim asserted a new and different legal ground for relief. This second claim for refund, free from any res judicata effect, was not rejuvenated by the rule of Woodmansee, but on the contrary it was declared to be alive and well until the expiration of the ten-year limitation for presentment to the IRS.
The IRS “did not refuse to allow the second claim to be filed, but received and filed it and thereafter considered the claim and rejected it, all of which indicates that [it] considered it to be different from the first claim.... The case of Pacific Mills v. Nichols [72 F.2d 103 (1st Cir. 1934)] is authority for the proposition that if the [IRS] entertains the second claim and decides it adversely to the claimant, suit may be brought within two years thereafter in accordance with the statute.” Charlson Realty Co. v. United States, 384 F.2d 434, 440-41 (Ct.Cl.1967). If the three-year statute of limitations was a sufficient legal ground to deny the Huettls’ first claim for refund, a fortiori, the assertion of a different appropriate statute of limitations is a different legal ground in support of the Huettls’ second claim.
Furthermore, the IRS again failed to decide the merits of the Huettls’ claim for refund but did determine the validity of the Huettls’ new legal ground for relief, the ten year statute of limitations, adversely to the Huettls. The IRS definitively ruled on July 10, 1979: “The ten year statute applies to adjustment to the amount of the credits and not to any carryover.” And, again, the IRS rejected the claim under the bar of the three-year statute of limitations, notwithstanding the decision in Woodmansee that the ten-year, and not the three-year limitations period, applied to such claims for refund. The IRS ruling directly conflicted with the rule of Woodmansee. For the full force and effect of the Woodmansee decision, see Hart v. United States, 585 F.2d 1025 (Ct.Cl.1978).
Simply stated, the majority takes the view that the Huettls’ second claim for refund with the IRS was identical to the first claim presented to and denied by IRS, and accordingly would not survive the effect of the limitations period for bringing suit for refund in the District Court. I, however, am anchored to the view expressed in Charlson Realty, 384 F.2d at 440, in these words:
The second claim was not a mere repetition of the first claim, but is based upon new grounds, and, therefore, constitutes a separate claim which is entitled to independent treatment with reference to the *244statute of limitations. Accordingly, the limitation period commenced to run from the date the second claim was disallowed. . . .
I would vacate the District Court’s order of dismissal and remand for appropriate further proceedings.