Court Opinion

ID: 9734076
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 17:24:45.105407+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:45.511821
License: Public Domain

Smith, J.,

dissenting:

I respectfully dissent from that portion of the majority opinion which holds approximately 460 acres of farmland and woodland in Case No. 33 to be exempt from taxation.
It seems to me that Morning Cheer v. Co. Com’rs, 194 Md. 441, 71 A. 2d 255 (1950), stretches to its outer limits the exemption here under consideration. The provision in Maryland Code (1957, 1969 Repl. Vol.) Art. 81, § 9, that the exemptions there set forth “shall be strictly construed” is a statutory enactment of the statement by our predecessors in Co. Comm’rs v. Sisters of St. Joseph, 48 Md. 34, 40 (1878), that “[o]ne of the fundamental rules of construction of legislative Acts relating to taxation is, that ‘nothing is more *367conclusively established, as well by the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States as by those of Maryland and of other judicial tribunals, than that the right of taxation is never to be presumed to be surrendered by the sovereign power, and that such surrender is never made, unless it be the result of express terms or necessary inference.’ Baltimore v. R. R. Co., 6 Gill [288, 292 (1848)]; Cooley on Taxation, 146.”
I am just unable to comprehend how approximately 460 acres of farmland and woodland can be said to be “grounds appurtenant . . . and necessary” for “buildings used exclusively for public worship” as those terms are normally understood by average individuals. We have said many, many times that the cardinal rule of statutory construction is to ascertain and carry out the real legislative intent and in ascertaining that intent the Court considers the language of a statute in its usual and ordinary meaning. Md.-Nat’l Cap. P. & P. v. Rockville, 272 Md. 550, 556, 325 A. 2d 748 (1974); City of Gaithersburg v. Mont. Co., 271 Md. 505, 511, 318 A. 2d 509 (1974); Grosvenor v. Supervisor of Assess., 271 Md. 232, 237-38, 315 A. 2d 758 (1974); Radio Com., Inc. v. Public Serv. Comm’n, 271 Md. 82, 93, 314 A. 2d 118 (1974); Scoville Serv., Inc. v. Comptroller, 269 Md. 390, 393, 306 A. 2d 534 (1973); Silberman v. Jacobs, 259 Md. 1, 267 A. 2d 209 (1970); and Atlantic, Gulf v. Dep’t of Assess. & T., 252 Md. 173, 249 A. 2d 180 (1969), to mention but a few of our holdings.
I do not know just when the present language came into the Code exempting from taxation “[h]ouses and buildings used exclusively for public worship . . . and the grounds appurtenant to such . . . buildings . . . and necessary for the respective uses thereof,” but this exact language is to be found at least as far back as Code (1939) Art. 81, § 7. Thus, we know that it was enacted before the 1948 amendment to the Maryland Declaration of Rights, Art. 38. Prior to that amendment it was necessary to obtain the consent of the Legislature for a “gift, sale or devise of land ... to any Religious Sect, Order or Denomination” other than for “any sale, gift, lease or devise of any quantity of land, not exceeding five acres, for a church, meeting-house, or other house of worship . . . .” Since the present Code (1957, 1969 *368Repl. Yol.) Art. 81, § 9 (4) here under consideration was enacted prior to 1948,1 feel morally certain that the General Assembly at the time of its enactment did not contemplate an exemption from taxation of a tract of this size as connected with “buildings used exclusively for public worship.” Moreover, I feel morally certain that the General Assembly since that time has not contemplated that a tract of land more than ten times the size of that exempted in Morning Cheer, decided after the 1948 amendment, would be exempted from taxation as necessary for “buildings used exclusively for public worship.” Therefore, I conclude that the administrative agency, the Maryland Tax Court, erred as a matter of law.
Chief Judge Murphy authorizes me to say that he concurs in the views here expressed.