Court Opinion

ID: 9452275
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 17:35:20.648239+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:08.836287
License: Public Domain

HAYS, Circuit Judge, with whom LUMBARD, Chief Judge, and WATERMAN, MOORE, FRIENDLY, KAUFMAN and FEINBERG, Circuit Judges,
concur:
It is the decision of the court en banc that the district court’s instruction on the issue of burden of proof was correct.
The circumstances of the case have been adequately described in Judge Smith’s opinion.
The charge of the district court on burden of proof was:
“A tax assessment * * * is presumed valid.
The burden is upon plaintiff to convince you by a fair preponderance of the credible or believable evidence to overcome the valid presumption of regularity of assessment.”
This charge followed closely the charge approved in United States v. Lease, supra, which read as follows:
“the burden is therefore on the taxpayer in the first instance to disprove the computations made by the Commissioned by a fair preponderance of the credible evidence. * * * ”
In Bull v. United States, 295 U.S. 247, 260, 55 S.Ct. 695, 700, 79 L.Ed. 1421 (1935), Roberts, J., writing for a unanimous court, said:
“Thus, the usual procedure for the recovery of debts is reversed in the field of taxation. Payment precedes defense, and the burden of proof, normally on the claimant, is shifted to the taxpayer. The assessment supersedes the pleading, proof, and judgment necessary in an action at law, and has the force of such a judgment.”
“The basis of the presumption” Judge Moore said in Lease, “[is] that governmental officers act reasonably and according to law.” He quoted from Bull v. United States, supra: “taxes are the life-blood of Government, and their prompt and certain availability an imperious need.”
The result of the rule proposed by Judge Smith, that the burden of proof is on the government when the government is asserting the claim, would be to encourage taxpayers to wait for the government to sue. If such a rule were adopted the tax bar would quickly move to make the task of the government more difficult by advising clients not to pay taxes under protest but, by forcing the government to collect by levy and suit, secure the advantage of shifting the burden of proof.
The judgment on the counterclaim is reversed and the ease is remanded for further proceedings in accordance herewith.