Court Opinion

ID: 9419794
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:51:31.618917+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:20.638410
License: Public Domain

Mr. Chief Justice Stone,
with whom Mr. Justice Frankfurter joins, concurring.
I concur in the result, but I do not join in so much of the opinion of the Court as undertakes to discuss the ter*571ritorial jurisdiction of the State of Minnesota over the land in question. The territorial jurisdiction of the state to lay the tax, said to be a novel question, was not raised in the state courts, by the petition for certiorari, or in argument or briefs in this Court. Under our decisions we are therefore not free to decide it. McGoldrick v. Compagnie Generale, 309 U. S. 430, 434-5; Wilson v. Cook, 327 U. S. 474, 483-484, and cases cited; see also Rule 38, par. 2 of the Rules of this Cqurt; Flournoy v. Wiener, 321 U. S. 253, 259. Since the opinion of the Court expresses no disapproval of these authorities, I take it that everything said on the question of Minnesota’s territorial jurisdiction to tax is dictum. Our opinion should be confined to the single question which the petitioner presents for our decision, whether the retention by the United States of the legal title to the taxed land precludes its taxation to petitioner, which, under its contract with the Government, has acquired possession and right to possession. As I have no doubt on this question, I agree the judgments should be affirmed.