Court Opinion

ID: 9734239
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 17:29:21.340151+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:47.169828
License: Public Domain

On Petition for Rehearing
Wickens, P.J.
— If the original opinion of this court in this appeal can be interpreted as conferring by legislative enactment “indelible imprint” of non-taxability or if the opinion can be construed as holding that the legislature purported “to perpetuate the tax exempt status” of certain property, then the opinion needs clarification. Those charges which appellant makes by petition for rehearing, we trust are not the deductions of a disinterested reader.
Our purpose in the opinion was to note that up to the time of this action the General Assembly had indicated no effort to change tax exemptions. We think and trust it is clear to all that this court has not seen nor indicated that it detected an effort by the General Assembly to bind its successors to any tax policy.
As to the principle that a long adhered to administrative interpretation may raise a presumption of legislative acquiescence, appellant seems to interpret this erroneously as a comment on appellant Board’s action or lack of action in the past. As part of that argument appellant points out that there was no evidence that the State Board of Tax Commissioners ever had knowledge of and ac*384quiesced in a decision by local assessing officials or county boards of review that such subject property had been ruled by such local officials or local boards to be exempt from taxation. Appellant’s assertion is correct as to the evidence. But, administrative interpretation is not limited to interpretation by appellant Board. The interpretation referred to is the interpretation of all administrative agencies. Under the legal fiction mentioned in Baker v. Compton (1965), 247 Ind. 39, 211 N. E. 2d 162, 164, Vol. 6, #13, Ind. Dec. 663, 666, it is assumed that the legislature knows how local assessing officials and county boards of review had interpreted the exemption statutes, and it is assumed that the legislature was satisfied with that interpretation and the results hereof. Enforcement of tax laws and application of exemption statutes are not intended to be only the obligation of the State Tax Board.
Appellant questions whether the opinion was the “in banc” opinion of this court as referred to in Acts 1901, ch. 247, § 2, p. 565, § 4-202, Burns’ 1946 Replacement. So far as the effect of the opinion on the subject matter of this case is concerned, that question appears to be moot.
An “in banc“ opinion of this court is no more or or no less binding than the opinion of either division.
In the interest of consistency and where a ruling- precedent or a matter of public interest is involved the practice has been followed of consultation with the judges of both divisions. The concurrence of all judges of both divisions merely bears out that that course of conduct was followed here.
The petition for rehearing is overruled.
Smith, C. J., Bierly, Carson, Faulconer, Hunter, Mote, and Prime, JJ., concur.
Note. — Reported in 215 N. E. 2d 57. Rehearing denied in 217 N. E. 2d 596.