Court Opinion

ID: 9528664
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:42:55.093679+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:27:12.138476
License: Public Domain

Shanahan, J.,
concurring in part, and in part dissenting.
Since the State Board of Equalization and Assessment has failed to carry out its duty to equalize taxable property, a nonperformance the same as noted and disapproved in Natural Gas Pipeline v. State Bd. of Equal., 237 Neb. 357, 466 N.W.2d 461 (1991) (Shanahan, J., concurring), the equalization board’s order must be vacated and these causes must be remanded for further proceedings. However, the grounds used by this court’s majority today, striking down certain tax legislation, lack foundation in the Nebraska Constitution.
As a result of Northern Natural Gas Co. v. State Bd. of Equal., 232 Neb. 806, 443 N.W.2d 249 (1989), Nebraska had only a judicial or common-law definition for “fixture” in reference to taxation of property, a definition which directed that three elements or factors determined whether an article was a fixture and, therefore, real estate, or whether the article was personal property. Under the judicial definition expressed in Northern, the three elements or factors were (1) annexation or attachment to real estate whereby an article was actually added to the real estate to form a unit comprised of land and the article fastened to the land, (2) appropriation to the use or purpose of the land to which the article was connected, and (3) whether the one who connected the article to the land intended that the article be part of the land after the article’s annexation.
In view of Northern and to avoid the foregoing three-part judicially formulated test, the Nebraska Legislature, in L.B. 1, Neb. Rev. Stat. § 77-103 (Reissue 1990), eliminated appropriation to use and a connector’s intention as determinative factors for a fixture and directed that “actual annexation” was the only determinant for a fixture. In that manner, the Legislature statutorily replaced and narrowed the previous common-law definition of a “fixture” expressed in Northern.
*587Can the Legislature define types of property for tax purposes? The Legislature’s power to define is subject to two constitutional limitations: (1) The Legislature cannot abrogate or contradict a definitional provision in the Constitution and (2) the legislative definition cannot be arbitrary or without foundation in reality. See, State ex rel. Meyer v. Peters, 191 Neb. 330, 215 N.W.2d 520 (1974); Moeller, McPherrin & Judd v. Smith, 127 Neb. 424, 255 N.W. 551 (1934).
The Nebraska Constitution contains no provision specifying a definition for “real estate” or prohibiting the Legislature from defining “real estate.” Thus, subject to limitations imposed by a constitution and reality, a legislature can statutorily change the usually accepted common-law definition of real estate and can designate subjects to be assessed and taxed as real estate. See, Roberts v. Assessment Bd. of Rev. of New Windsor, 84 Misc. 2d 1017, 375 N.Y.S.2d 988 (1975) (a legislature has the power to determine that certain types of property, ordinarily characterized as personal property, may be deemed real property within a tax statute); United States v. Town of Marlborough, New Hampshire, 305 F. Supp. 718 (D.N.H. 1969) (a legislature has the power, through proper classification, to designate personal property as real estate for purposes of taxation, although the property is real estate by common-law definition for all other purposes); McCaslin v. DeCamp, 248 Cal. App. 2d 13, 56 Cal. Rptr. 42 (1967) (for purposes of taxation, the definition of real property, expressed in tax statutes, controls irrespective of whether the tax definition conforms with definitions for real estate used outside the tax statutes); Lantz Appeal, 199 Pa. Super. 310, 184 A.2d 127 (1962) (a legislature can change the usually accepted definition of real estate and can designate the subjects to be assessed and taxed as real estate); Matter of Beagell v. Douglas, 2 Misc. 2d 361, 157 N.Y.S.2d 461 (1955) (a legislature has the power to classify and define what property is taxable as real property, including property which under the common law is personal property); Portland Terminal Co. v. Hinds et al., 141 Me. 68, 39 A.2d 5 (1944) (a legislature has the authority, for the purposes of taxation, to use a valid definition by which real estate shall be assessed as personalty or that personalty shall be *588taxed as realty).
Legislatures in other states have included within the definition of “real estate” various articles or items annexed to real estate and have utilized a definition identical or substantially similar to the definition contained in L.B. 1; for example, see, Transcontinental Gas v. Bernards Tp., 111 N.J. 507, 545 A.2d 746 (1988) (gas transmission pipelines taxed as real property); Pitre v. Louisiana Tax Com’n, 493 So. 2d 196 (La. App. 1986) (pipelines as real property for tax purposes); Fischbach & Moore, Inc. v. State Bd., Etc., 117 Cal. App. 3d 627, 172 Cal. Rptr. 923 (1981) (transmission lines and supporting structures properly classified as realty); Wilmington Suburb. Water Corp. v. Board of Assess., 316 A.2d 211 (Del. 1973) (water pipelines as real property for taxation); Transco Corp. v. Prince William Co., 210 Va. 550, 172 S.E.2d 757 (1970) (gas mains classified as real property for tax purposes); Bangor-Hydro Electric Company v. Johnson, 226 A.2d 371 (Me. 1967) (lines of electric light and power companies defined and classified as real estate for tax purposes); People ex rel. Holmes Elec. v. Chambers, 1 Misc. 2d 990, 125 N.Y.S.2d 436 (1953) (telegraph lines, wires, poles, and appurtenances defined as real property for tax purposes); Railroad Co. v. Jefferson County, 114 Kan. 156, 217 P. 315 (1923) (railroad structures); Buffalo Gas Co. v. Volz, 31 Misc. 160, 64 N.Y.S. 534 (1900) (tangible property of a gas corporation, consisting of mains and pipes, has no status which prevents the legislative option of defining the property as land, or as personalty, or classifying property anew); People, ex rel. v. Com’rs of Taxes of N. Y., 101 N.Y. 322, 4 N.E. 127 (1886) (railroad structures as real estate); and Board of Directors v. Reconstruction Finance Corp., 170 F.2d 430 (8th Cir. 1948) (pipelines defined as real property under Arkansas’ tax law).
To maintain that only a court can define property for tax purposes, which is precisely the position of today’s majority in MAPCO’s case, is undeniable hubris and a claim of unique definitional capacity which is neither warranted nor countenanced under the Constitution.
Since the Legislature has the constitutional power to define types of property for taxation, the question is: Has the *589Legislature, in its definition of “real estate” in L.B. 1, acted reasonably, that is, consistent with reality and not arbitrarily? A very real and substantial difference separates the items of property classified as “real estate” in L.B. 1, such as pipelines and telecommunications towers, from the property excluded from “real estate,” such as a center pivot irrigation system. That difference between the various items of property was described and pointed out in Natural Gas Pipeline v. State Bd. of Equal., 237 Neb. 357, 390-91, 466 N.W.2d 461, 481 (1991) (Shanahan, J., dissenting):
When used on real estate, each of the items added in the expanded definition of “real estate” in § 77-103 (Reissue 1990) is rendered immobile and becomes stationary as the result of some physical connection to the real estate. For instance, a pipeline is usually buried in the ground which it crosses, while structures such as electrical and telecommunications poles and towers are immobile when part of the structure is buried in the earth to support the remaining part above ground or when such items are securely fastened to buried foundations for additional support.
. . . Irrigation systems used for agricultural and horticultural purposes may also consist of movable surface pipes as conduits for water sprayed from sprinklers attached to the pipes, thereby allowing mobility from one irrigation site to another. Therefore, mobility of a center pivot and other surface irrigation system distinguishes the foregoing property from those items which the Legislature has defined as “real estate” in L.B. 1.
Anyone who cannot distinguish between microwave towers and center pivot towers in. an irrigation system has less than a working knowledge about center pivot irrigation systems. More than likely, a center pivot irrigation system qualifies as personal property under the common-law definition of “fixture” recognized in Northern Natural Gas Co. v. State Bd. of Equal., 232 Neb. 806, 443 N.W.2d 249 (1989). In any event, someone out there had better tell creditors who repossessed and hauled away center pivot systems from debt-ridden irrigators that *590those creditors have replevied real estate — quite a legal phenomenon to say the least. In the final analysis, this court’s conclusion that the Legislature acted arbitrarily in defining “real estate” for L.B. 1 lacks valid and rational premises. The vice of arbitrariness, which this court now levies at the Legislature in conjunction with the legislative definition of “real estate,” is the very vice infecting the majority’s conclusion, which is, at most, a result without a stated reason or rational foundation.
Arbitrariness in the majority’s opinion is not so disturbing as is the inexorable destiny of property classifications and tax exemptions in Nebraska. The majority’s focal point is Neb. Const, art. VIII, § 1, the “uniformity” clause, that is, “Taxes shall be levied by valuation uniformly and proportionately upon all tangible property....”
However, before consideration of the majority’s view on the “uniformity” clause, there is the majority’s misunderstanding of Casey’s Gen. Stores v. Nebraska Liq. Cont. Comm., 220 Neb. 242, 369 N.W.2d 85 (1985), a misperception which must be set straight. In Casey’s, we observed that a statutory limitation on the number of liquor licenses was a legitimate state policy, namely, trade stability and temperance, and, therefore, a proper subject for legislation. However, as noted in Casey’s, subsequent legislation, which eliminated restrictions on many licensees, effectively expanded the number of licenses to such a level that any restriction on the number of licensees no longer served a valid governmental interest. See State ex rel. Spire v. Northwestern Bell Tel. Co., 233 Neb. 262, 445 N.W.2d 284 (1989) (when a fundamental right or suspect classification is not involved in legislation, a legislative act is a valid exercise of a state’s police power, if the act is reasonably related to a legitimate governmental interest). To adhere to the view that classification of property and tax exemptions serve no legitimate governmental purpose, which was the basis for the conclusion in Casey’s, is so farfetched that comment is unnecessary beyond the expression that Casey’s is absolutely inapplicable to MAPCO’s case.
Also, because the majority focuses on the “uniformity” clause, another part of the Nebraska Constitution is brought to *591bear in MAPCO’s case, namely, Neb. Const, art. VIII, § 2, which provides in part: “The Legislature by general law may exempt property owned and used exclusively for educational, religious, [or] charitable ... purposes ... .” Section 2 of article VIII further provides in part: “The Legislature may classify personal property in such manner as it sees fit, and may exempt any of such classes, or may exempt all personal property from taxation.”
Considering the “uniformity” clause in § 1 of article VIII in relation to tax exemption authorization in § 2 of article VIII, the majority pounces on Stahmer v. State, 192 Neb. 63, 218 N.W.2d 893 (1974), in which this court held that after allowance for exemptions authorized by the Legislature pursuant to § 2 of article VIII, tangible property, which is subject to taxation, must be taxed uniformly in accordance with § 1 of article VIII. By ousting Stahmer from Nebraska’s interpretative decisions concerning tax classifications and exemptions in relation to the uniformity clause, this court today reaches the utopian view and constitutionally indefensible position that uniformity in taxation is equated with and, therefore, requires absolute equality, since tax classifications and exemptions undermine equal treatment of property in Nebraska’s tax structure. In the majority’s view, since absolute equality of treatment is essential to uniformity in taxation, all tangible property must be treated the same for tax purposes, that is, taxed equally or not taxed at all. Moreover, according to the majority, Nebraska’s structure of property taxation, which includes classifications and exemptions, cannot “withstand muster under federal law.” That is a preview of coming attractions to be shown by this court.
None can realistically and justly contend that any within a valid class should be treated differently from the rest of the class. What, then, is the real meaning and effect of this court’s disdain for classifications of property, including the distinction between taxable and exempt tangible property? Carried to the logical and inevitable conclusion, judicial rejection of classification for tangible property means that residential property must be valued and taxed the same as commercial property; hence, a home must be valued the same as an *592industrial tract or a railroad’s right-of-way.
What is more frightening and disconcerting is the fact that the majority, without any litigant’s request or suggestion, has struck down and cut out the exemptions in Neb. Rev. Stat. § 77-202(6) to (9) (Reissue 1990) and thereby abolished 4 of Nebraska’s 13 categories of tax exemptions for tangible property, action which the majority then characterizes as a “meaningful resolution to the problem presented” in MAPCO’s case. While those excisions from § 77-202 may be “meaningful,” by no stretch of the imagination is the majority’s action a “required or plausible resolution.” In a stroke of poetic justice, however, the majority has abolished the tax exemption for previously exempt business inventories of several appellants in these tax cases, and other businesses similarly situated, which have challenged the status of various tax exemptions in Nebraska’s personal property tax system. Defeat is snatched from the jaws of victory.
Certainly, not many will lament the demise of tax exemptions for honeybees and fur-bearing animals, see § 77-202(9), which this court has struck down today. Although this court has taken the sting out of the bee exemption and skinned the furry animal exemption, one has to wonder what motivated the court to withhold a coup de grace to some of the other tax exemptions in § 77-202. Constitutional principle or personal predilection? For instance, § 77-202(10) provides a tax exemption for personal property of companies which qualify under Neb. Rev. Stat. §§ 77-4101 et seq. (Reissue 1990), Nebraska’s Employment and Investment Growth Act, the much publicized L.B. 775 enacted in 1987. Yet, the exemption under § 77-202(10) remains unscathed and intact. There is no logical and legal reason why exemptions under L.B. 775 are not constitutionally condemned and disallowed under the majority’s view and volunteered action abolishing other tax exemptions in § 77-202.
According to the majority, the Legislature has thwarted “the levy of taxes ‘by valuation uniformly and proportionately upon all tangible property . . .”’ as a consequence of exemptions authorized by the Constitution. If exemptions pertaining to bees, fur-bearing animals, agricultural machinery, and business *593inventories are judicially abolished, which is the feat accomplished by this court’s majority today, what about exemptions regarding household furnishings and personal effects, which are presently tax exempt under § 77-202(l)(d)? Obviously, judicial abolition of the tax exemption for household furnishings and personal effects would hit pretty close to almost everyone’s home, regardless of one’s occupation or station in life. However, for the time being and for some undisclosed reason, the majority has elected to spare the “household goods and personal effects” exemption from the gratuitous chain saw surgery performed on other exemptions in § 77-202. In any event, the legacy of the majority’s view is inevitable taxation of household furnishings and personal effects. It is only a matter of time, if logic has any place in the tax decisions of this court.
Then, there is the exemption for tangible property of educational, religious, and charitable organizations. In Indian Hills Comm. Ch. v. County Bd. of Equal., 226 Neb. 510, 412 N.W.2d 459 (1987), we recognized that a constitutional provision for tax exemption of property owned by a religious organization is not a matter of right, automatically extended as a self-executing right under the Nebraska Constitution, but depends entirely on legislative grace in the form of exemptive legislation. However, in the majority’s view, again carried to its logical and inevitable conclusion, tax exemption for tangible property of a religious organization is anathema and subject to excommunication from the body of tax exemptions, since the majority dictates that exemptions destroy the absolute equality which is essential for acceptable uniformity in taxation of tangible property, both real and personal. The tax exemption dominoes begin to fall. Would anyone have the audacity to challenge the present tax exemption for tangible property of a charitable, educational, or religious organization? Who would dare challenge the tax exemption of a hospital operated for charitable purposes? A university owned by an organization other than the State of Nebraska? Tangible property used exclusively for a religious purpose, even a church, synagogue, or other place of worship? Sound highly improbable, perhaps impossible? As Al Jolson quipped, “You ain’t heard nothin’ *594yet, folks.”
All of which brings us back to the majority’s focal point, the uniformity clause in Neb. Const, art. VIII, § 1. So long as the majority’s view about classification and tax exemptions exist, the uniformity clause is irreconcilable with the constitutional authorization for tax classification and exemption from taxation. Eventually, the house of cards built on classifications and tax exemptions must collapse if the uniformity clause is to subsist and endure as viewed and desired by this court’s majority. Amendatory augmentation of the Constitution, adding clause after clause and provision upon provision, while leaving the uniformity clause, as presently construed by this court’s majority, at odds with tax classifications and exemptions, is quite likely no solution, but a pollyanna approach to a Nebraska crisis that will soon reach epoch-making proportions, if such level has not already been reached. If classifications related to taxation and exemptions are totally incompatible with the uniformity clause, something must give way. Since the uniformity clause, as construed by this court’s majority, and all classifications and exemptions, destined to be categorically rejected by the majority of this court, are absolute contradictions in Nebraska’s present tax structure, one of those aspects of Nebraska taxation, namely, the uniformity clause or classifications and exemptions, must cease so that some semblance of order is substituted for the current chaos. That decision is left to the people of Nebraska and their Legislature.