Court Opinion

ID: 9616536
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:47:36.230694+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:03:58.757691
License: Public Domain

Collins, J.,
dissenting:
When the people of Nevada approved the sales and use tax of 1955 by referendum vote in 1956, they consented to three things. They gave their approval to the legislature to be taxed *271upon purchase by them of tangible personal property1 at the rate of 2 percent,2 with the tax revenue produced to go to the general support of state government.3 The incidence or burden of the tax was to fall squarely upon them as consumers.4
Because it was a legislative enactment referred to the people for their approval, the statute when approved by them stood as the law of the state.5
Thereafter it could not be “amended, annulled, repealed, set aside, suspended or in any way made inoperative except by the direct vote of the people.” Article 19, Constitution of Nevada, Section 1(2). The otherwise unlimited power of the legislature was thus constitutionally limited directly and indirectly in amending the sales tax. This direct and indirect limitation extended, in my belief, to all three facets of this particular tax, i.e.: (1) as a tax upon the purchase of tangible personal property; (2) at the rate of 2 percent; (3) with the proceeds going to the general support of state government.
It would appear the legislature did indirectly what it could not do directly. Counsel for respondent State Tax Commission admitted during his argument that the legislature could not constitutionally raise the present sales tax to 3 percent or order that 1 percent of it be devoted to direct support of the schools instead of state government generally, without prior approval of the people. That would be a direct amendment of the sales tax and prohibited.
My colleagues feel that by calling the new tax a local school *272tax, fixing the rate at 1 percent, directing its reversion to the county of origin for support of the schools, and enacting it as a separate law, it avoids the clear import of Art. 19, section 1(2) of the Nevada Constitution. They concede the method of collecting the two taxes is identical and that the necessary effect is an increase in the present sales and use tax from 2 percent to 3 percent. But they say the purposes of the two taxes do not coincide and therefore it is constitutionally permitted.
I feel the people have clearly made known their views in the matter of sales and use taxes to the legislature. They limited the legislature not only as to source and rate, but also to purpose. A sales tax has a well known incidence or burden and affects the taxpayers in a clearly understood manner. Economically it casts a heavier burden on the low or fixed-income groups than upon the wealthy or increasing income groups, especially where food and drugs are taxed as they are in both the 1955 sales tax and the 1967 school support tax. The people simply said, and our constitution supports them, we do not want further taxes of this kind imposed upon us, regardless of what you might call them or where you intend to spend them without our approval in advance.
I would declare the 1967 local school support tax unconstitutional.

 “372.105 Imposition and rate of sales tax. For the privilege of selling tangible personal property at retail a tax is hereby imposed upon all retailers at the rate of 2 percent of the gross receipts of any retailer from the sale of. all tangible personal property sold at retail in this state on or after July 1, 1955.”

 See Footnote 1.

 “See preamble to Chapter 397, Stats, of Nev. 1955, at page 762, which reads, “An Act to provide revenue for the State of Nevada;

 “372.110 Method of collection of sales tax. The tax hereby imposed shall be collected by the retailer from the consumer insofar as it can be done.”

 “Art. 19, Constitution of Nevada, Section 1(2) which reads: “When the majority of the electors voting at a state election shall by their votes signify approval of a law or resolution, such law or resolution shall stand as the law of the state, and shall not be overruled, annulled, set aside, suspended, or in any way made inoperative except by the direct vote of the people. When such majority shall so signify disapproval the law or resolution so disapproved shall be void and of no effect.”