Court Opinion

ID: 9686591
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 15:56:47.983917+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:20.532072
License: Public Domain

Peterson, J.
(dissenting) — I respectfully dissent.
The facts are stated in the majority opinion.
The principles involved in the application of use tax to goods in interstate transportation are stated and analyzed in three cases where the question has been before this court. Michigan-Wisconsin Pipe Line Co. v. Johnson, 247 Iowa 583, 73 N.W.2d 820; Bruce Motor Freight, Inc., v. Lauterbach, 247 Iowa 956, 77 N.W.2d 613; and the instant case. The question involved is the application of those principles to the goods under consideration. The majority opinion is based largely on Miehigan-Wisconsin Pipe Line Co. v. Johnson, supra, as a precedent.
I contend there is a clear distinction between the goods under consideration in Michigan-Wisconsin Pipe Line Co. v. Johnson, supra, and those involved in the case at bar. In the Miehigan-Wisconsin case the goods consisted largely of lumber and other material for the erection of nine houses and other construction in connection with headquarters for the company in the state.
In the instant ease the goods consisted of pipe to carry gas in interstate commerce, and compression engines to be incorporated into plaintiff’s system to accelerate the movement of the gas. The goods to which the tax was attached were never diverted from interstate commerce. They never became a “ ‘common mass of property within the state of destination.’ ”
There was no taxable moment at which the goods came to rest. They moved continuously from the out-state shipping point of origin into the ground as to pipes and into connection with the plant as to accelerator. The fact that it might have been a short time or longer time to get the pipes in the ground or to get the accelerator connected was immaterial, as long as the intention continued uninterrupted, in good faith, that the goods were going into the interstate establishment.
The nature of the goods was such that they had to be unloaded from cars to become included in the cross-country and interstate gas transportation system, but there never was any *896intent, nor any action taken, that they should or could be used for anything but an integral part of the interstate system.
We could with equal validity say that a tax attached when a company first built an interstate line across the state, and when the pipe in such process was transferred from railroad car or truck to underground.
There is a vast distinction between lumber and building material, capable of a multitude of uses, to pipe and accelerators capable of only one use, the interstate pipe line.
I would reverse.
Larson, C. J., joins in this dissent.