Court Opinion

ID: 9682834
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:18:20.43953+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:42.011467
License: Public Domain

MAUZY, Justice,
dissenting.
Section 11.20(d) of the Texas Tax Code provides the statutory guidelines for deciding whether property is used primarily for religious worship. It states:
Use of property that qualifies for the exemption prescribed [under Section 11.-20(a)(1) ] for occasional secular purposes other than religious worship does not result in loss of the exemption if the primary use of the property is for religious worship and all income from the other use is devoted exclusively to the maintenance and development of the property as a place of religious worship.
Under this provision, property used for occasional secular purposes may still be exempt from taxation so long as “all income” from the secular use is devoted exclusively to the maintenance and development of the property as a place of religious worship.
The court today tries to hedge on these clear statutory guidelines by stating that the “all income” test refers only to the church’s income and not to any income which some other entity may derive from the property. However, what the statute says is “all income.”
It is undisputed in this case that all income from the property’s use as a commercial parking lot does not go into the church’s coffers. Allright Parking, a private for-profit corporation, receives over half the total income from the parking lot and the income it receives certainly does not go toward developing the property as a place of religious worship. Therefore, as a matter of law, this property is not being used primarily as a place of religious worship, and the taxing authorities are entitled to collect the taxes due.
I do not read any ambiguity in the “all income” language of section 11.20(d). However, assuming some ambiguity exists, we have long held that any statutory exemption from taxation must be strictly construed. Hilltop Village, Inc. v. Kerrville Independent School District, 426 S.W.2d 943 (Tex.1968); see also Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church v. City of San Antonio, 201 S.W. 669 (Tex.Civ.App.—San Antonio 1918, writ ref’d). The court today refuses to abide by this rule of strict construction and instead construes the statute so as to favor exemption from taxation.
This is wrong, and it is not only wrong as a matter of statutory construction; it is wrong under the Texas Constitution. Under article VIII, section 2 of the Texas Constitution, only actual places of religious worship may be exempted from taxation. The court has construed section 11.20(d) so as to allow for the possibility that land used for a commercial enterprise may be exempt from taxation. In doing so, it effectively renders the statute unconstitutional and permits a state-subsidized competitive advantage to be given the commercial enterprise.
Providing for equal and uniform taxation was a major focus of the 1875 Constitutional Convention in Texas. See 1 The Constitution of the State of Texas: An Annotated and Comparative Analysis, 565 (G.Bra-den ed.). The legislature had previously granted unpopular exemptions from taxation and, by 1875, there was a strong feeling against such exemptions. See id. at 565, 595. Therefore, the delegates wrote into the Constitution of 1876 that taxation *722must be “equal and uniform” and that any laws exempting property other than that constitutionally authorized would be void. Tex. Const, art. VIII, §§ 1, 2. This constitutional prohibition is the reason behind the rule of strict construction applicable to tax exemptions; the rule is premised on the recognition that tax exemptions are “the antithesis of equality and uniformity.” Hilltop Village, Inc., 426 S.W.2d at 948.
The strong sentiment against exemptions apparently continued because, in adopting the 1906 amendment to article VIII, section 2, the people of Texas drove an extra nail1 into the exemption coffin. The amendment provided that all exemptions, other than those authorized by the constitution, would be not just void, but “null and void.” Id. at 596. In 1928, this constitutional provision was again amended so as to allow church parsonages to be exempt from taxation. Id. This amendment was adopted in response to the court’s decision in the Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church case that, regardless of what the statute might say, a minister’s residence was not an “actual place of religious worship” under the constitution and therefore could not be exempt from taxation. 201 S.W. at 670.
Given that a minister’s residence is not an actual place of religious worship, I am hard-pressed to see how a commercial parking lot is. If the people of this state want to exempt church-owned commercial parking lots from taxation, then they can amend the constitution to do so, just as they did for parsonages. However, the legislature cannot by statute authorize such an exemption because the constitution prohibits it.
No matter what the language of the statute may be, it is the language of the constitution that fixes the boundaries for exemptions from taxation. Trinity Methodist Episcopal Church, 201 S.W. at 670. The court’s construction of section 11.20(d) effectively renders the statute unconstitutional. It allows for the exemption of property that is not an “actual place of religious worship.” Under article VIII, section 2, such a statute is expressly “null and void.”
I would construe the statute in a manner consistent with the constitution and would hold that “all income” includes those revenues which the property’s secular use generates for a private for-profit corporation. Such a construction would preclude the possibility that commercial property could be tax exempt. Because there is no fact question remaining, I would reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and render judgment in favor of the taxing authorities.
SPEARS, ROBERTSON and KILGARLIN, JJ., join in this dissent.

. Whether this extra nail added any real meaning can be debated. It does, however reflect the people’s continued distaste for exemptions and their desire to solidify the constitutional mandate against them.