Court Opinion

ID: 9474450
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:57:26.932805+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:05.368792
License: Public Domain

WEIS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
The issue in this case is not complicated — it is simply whether we read the Internal Revenue Code as Congress wrote it or as the Internal Revenue Service would like us to amend it. In clear terms, § 6303(a) states that the Secretary of Treasury “shall, as soon as practicable, and within 60 days, after the making of an assessment of a tax pursuant to section 6203, give notice to each person liable for the unpaid tax.”
The reference to “each person liable” in § 6303 is not in the least ambiguous. In the case at hand, the government contends that defendant is liable for the tax. Therefore, it seems inescapable that defendant should have been given notice.
The IRS wishes us to redraft that section so that it requires notice only to those individuals against whom taxes have been assessed. The reasons offered for this re*984vision have some logic and would possibly ease administrative burdens on the government, but the arguments are directed to the wrong forum. They should be presented to Congress, not the courts.
In Iselin v. United States, 270 U.S. 245, 251, 46 S.Ct. 248, 70 L.Ed. 566 (1926), the Supreme Court said that courts should not revise a statute so that “what was omitted, presumably by inadvertence, may be included within its scope. To supply omissions transcends the judicial function.”
The courts’ limited role was reemphasized in TVA v. Hill, 437 U.S. 153, 98 S.Ct. 2279, 57 L.Ed.2d 117(1978). Once “Congress has spoken in the plainest of words” and “the meaning of an enactment is discerned ... the judicial process comes to an end. We do not sit as a committee of review, nor are we vested with the power of veto.” Courts may not “pre-empt congressional action by judicially decreeing what accords with ‘common sense and the public weal.’ Our Constitution vests such responsibilities in the political branches.” Id. at 194-95, 98 S.Ct. at 2301-02.
In this case, I cannot even say with assurance that the addition to the statute that the IRS proposes was inadvertently omitted. Certainly, the legislative history of § 6303 provides no basis for such a belief. Moreover, the legislative history of § 3505 does not suggest that notice should not be provided lenders who may be secondarily liable. “Congressional silence, no matter how ‘clanging’ cannot override the words of the statute.” Sedima v. Imrex Co., Inc., — U.S. —, 105 S.Ct. 3275, 3285 n. 13, 87 L.Ed.2d 346 (1985).
It bears mentioning that the dispute here is not about a meaningless formality. The assessment of taxes against Pennmount had the effect of enlarging the statute of limitations against defendant bank for six years. 26 U.S.C. § 6502(a)(1). United States v. Associates Commercial Corp., 721 F.2d 1094, 1097 (7th Cir.1983). The likelihood of prejudice because of the loss or destruction of records by one secondarily liable is real and substantial. United States v. Associates Commercial Corp., 548 F.Supp. 171, 174 (N.D.Ill.1982).
The net effect of the Code revision urged by the IRS is to give less procedural protection to one secondarily liable than to the primary obligor. The notice of assessment will alert the taxpayer directly liable to the lengthened statute of limitations. He may then preserve pertinent records, arrange for payment, compromise, or take other steps in his own best interests. Without notice of the assessment, however, the party liable under § 8505 may not be alerted to his continuing exposure and concomitant risks. I am not convinced that Congress intended such an anomalous result.
Two courts of appeals have already rejected the precise arguments advanced by the government in this ease. See United States v. Merchants Nat. Bank of Mobile, 772 F.2d 1522 (11th Cir.1985) and United States v. Associates Commercial Corp., 721 F.2d 1094 (7th Cir.1983). I find the IRS position no more persuasive than did those courts, and I join their insistence that the government adhere to the clear mandate of the statute.
The Internal Revenue Code has never been noted for facile comprehension, and dogged plodding through it uncovers little of cheer to any taxpayer. The challenged clause is an oasis of clarity in that desert of dull, deadly detail, but even here the IRS, would pile a sandy gloss on the language to obscure the obvious. In Temple University v. United States, 769 F.2d 126, 139 (3d Cir.1985), I saw “no need for the court to be unduly solicitous about curing statutory deficiencies to aid the IRS in doubtful cases.” That protest applies even more here where the government’s case is less meritorious.
I dissent.