Court Opinion

ID: 9584491
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:48:53.152607+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:08:00.579616
License: Public Domain

Jordan, Justice,
concurring specially as to Division 1, and dissenting as to Division 2.
1. I agree with the holding in Division 1 of the opinion that the distribution formula provided for in the Act is unconstitutional, but not for the reasons set forth in the majority opinion. In my opinion it is unconstitutional because giving cities a portion of funds raised by a county levy violates the "gratuity” provision (Code Ann. § 2-1413.1) of the Constitution and also violates the equal protection provision (Code Ann. § 2-102) of the Constitution.
The flaw in the Act is not because the levy was for an "improper purpose,” i.e., not a public purpose, but because the distribution formula results in the constitutional infirmities named above. I therefore agree with the result reached but for different reasons, and therefore concur specially in Division 1.
2. I think that the majority has made a grave error in holding that the severability clause in the Act is meaningless. The "legislative intent,” which must be our criterion, could not have been more clearly or forcefully expressed than in the Act itself where it was stated that "The General Assembly hereby declares that it would have passed the remaining parts of this act if it had known that such part or parts hereof would be declared or adjudged invalid or unconstitutional.” Ga.L. 1975, pp. 984, 994.
In view of this clearly expressed intent of the legislature this court should have allowed to stand the parts of the statute which are constitutional after the portions excised by our opinion in Martin v. Ellis, 242 Ga. 340 (249 SE2d 23) (1978) and by Division 1 of the opinion in this case. I therefore dissent as to Division 2 and would affirm the judgment of the trial court.
3. A dissenting opinion sets forth only the view of its author. Therefore, it can properly include suggestions or *367advice which would be inappropriate or inadvisable in the opinion of the court. With this in mind I can speculate on some of the options confronting the General Assembly in the light of this court’s opinion in this case and in Martin v. Ellis, supra.
Among these options are: (a) Take no action, leaving the situation as it existed prior to the Local Option Sales Tax of 1975; (b) Enact a local option sales tax for each county, providing that all of the funds generated will be used in a county-wide rollback of ad valorem taxes on all county ad valorem taxpayers; (c) In addition, enact a local option sales tax for each qualifying municipality, providing that all of the funds generated will be used in a city-wide rollback of ad valorem taxes on all city ad valorem taxpayers; (d) In lieu of (b) and (c), enact a state-wide levy of an additional one per cent sales tax providing for grants to counties and cities under an equitable distribution formula to be used for a rollback of ad valorem taxes.
In my opinion, either option (a), (b), or (c) or a combination thereof would (1) eliminate the uniformity problem (Code Ann. § 2-4603) in that the tax and the benefits would be equally applied to all the taxpayers in a taxing district, (2) eliminate the "gratuity” problem (Code Ann. § 2-1413.1) in that no county tax revenue would go to municipalities, and vice versa, and (3) eliminate the equal protection problem (Code Ann. § 2-102) in that all taxpayers would receive equal treatment applied uniformly within each taxing district.