Court Opinion

ID: 9810832
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 22:00:56.199774+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:40:15.792509
License: Public Domain

WalKee, J.,
dissenting: It is a mistake to suppose that this stock fence fund was collected under a levy upon all the taxpayers of Johnston County. It was collected from only a part of them. If this law is enforced it will, both in theory and in practice, be simply permitting one part of the people to be solely taxed for the benefit of another, and the cases cited in support of the opinion do not sustain such a proposition, or anything like it, but a very different one. It would be clearly violative of the principle declared in the recent case of Comrs. of Johnston Co. v. R. R. Lacy, State Treasurer, 174 N. C., 141. Justice IJ.olce, in his opinion delivered for the Court, says: “It is not within the legislative power to tax one community or local taxing district for the exclusive benefit of another' — a principle which has been directly approved in several recent decisions of this Court, and is one very generally accepted,” citing Keith v. Lockhart, 171 N. C., 451; Faison v. Comrs., 171 N. C., 411; Harper v. Comrs., 133 N. C., 106; Comrs. Prince George v. Comrs. Laurel, 70 Md., 443; Lumber Co. v. Township of Springfield, 92 Mich., 277; People of Salem, supra, citing Lexington v. McQuillan's Heirs, 39 Ky., 513; Cooley on Taxation (3d Ed.), 420; Judson on Taxation, sec. 254; 37 Cyc., 749. He adopts what Judge Gooley says upon the subject, as follows: “The taxing district through *97whiob tlie tax is to be apportioned must be tbe district which is to be benefited by its collection and expenditure. The district for the apportionment of the State tax is'the State, for the county tax the county, and so on. Subordinate districts may be created for convenience, but the principle is general, and in all subordinate districts the rule must be the same.” Cooley on Taxation, supra. And also the general principle, as stated by another standard text-writer, was approved. “The constitutional requirement of uniformity of taxation forbids the imposition of a tax on one municipality or part of the State for the purpose of benefiting or raising money for another.” 37 Cyc., supra. He further says, and what he says completely covers this case as with a blanket: “It is a fundamental principle in the law of taxation that taxes may only be levied for public purposes and for the benefit of the public on whom they are imposed, and to lay these burdens upon one district for benefits appertaining solely to another is in clear violation of established principles of right and contrary to the express provisions of our Constitution, Art. I, sec. 17, which forbids that any person shall be dis-seized of his freehold, liberties and privileges or in any manner deprived of his life, liberty or property but by the law of the land.”
It would be useless to pursue the discussion further, so apt and pointed are the extracts we have made from that well-considered opinion of this Court. Here the tax was a special one, levied upon the inhabitants of a stock law district in Johnston County, in and near Smithfield Township, for the purpose of building a fence to surround said district, the same having been created under a special statute and authority also given thereby to levy the tax. It was not a tax levied under legislative authority extending to the entire county of Johnston. If the excess of the tax levy can be given to the other inhabitants of the county for their benefit, it follows that one section of the county, in this indirect way, can be taxed for the benefit of another. Admitting that the surplus of a general tax can be thus constitutionally added to the general funds or revenues of the county, it does not follow that the surplus of a special tax can be thus applied to general county purposes. Every citizen should be made to contribute his full share to the particular burden of taxation resting upon him and those similarly situated, but the State cannot, under our Constitution, or under that of any other well regulated system of government, exact more of the taxpayer. There should always be, as near as may be, an equal distribution of benefit and burden. This may be adjusted, it is true, and it has been so held, upon some equitable principle of apportionment applicable alike to all (8 Cyc., pp. 1071 and 1132), for example, by districts or area or by lineal feet, as in the case of local assessments, but in whatever way it is done it must not amount to the taking of one taxpayer’s property and giving it to another, who *98contributed nothing to the tax. It had might as well be accomplished directly as indirectly. Circumlocution or indirection is no justification of it. In principle and in effect, it is the same to the taxpayer as if the State should reach into his pocket and, against his consent, hand over his money to his neighbor as a gratuity. It makes little difference to the loser whether it is taken in one way or the other, if he is wrongfully or inequitably deprived of it. If the surplus of the tax collected in this stock law district cannot be returned to its taxpayers they should, at least, have the benefit of it in their own district or locality. There is no more reason for giving it to those outside the district than for giving any surplus of county taxation to this special district, which we said in the Johnston case, supra, could not be done.