Court Opinion

ID: 9568734
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:07:07.261026+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:05:09.990349
License: Public Domain

Schroeder, J.,
dissenting: In my opinion the dormant judgment statute (K. S. A. 60-2403) applies and limits the time within which the Director of Revenue may effect collection on unpaid sales or compensating tax.
The legislature has given no clear expression on the subject. K. S. A. 79-3617 and 79-3235 both provide in part:
. . The director shall have the right at any time after a warrant has been returned unsatisfied, or satisfied only in part, to issue alias warrants until the full amount of said tax is collected: . . .” (Emphasis added.)
The loose expression “at any time” used therein has entirely different connotations, in view of the court’s decision, depending on which statute is being applied. Under 79-3235, supra, relative to collection of unpaid income taxes, it could hardly be said to remove the limitation period of four years imposed by K. S. A. 79-3230 (a). In fact, this expression has had no significance beyond the limitation period imposed by 79-3230 (a), supra, since its inception in 1933 when the Kansas income tax law was first enacted. (See L. 1933, ch. 320, §§30 and 35.)
It follows the expression “at any time” gained no additional stature or significance in the subsequent adoption of this language from the income tax act (K. S. A. 79-3235) by reference in 1937 when the Kansas Retailers’ Sales Tax Act was adopted. (See L. 1937, ch. 374, § 17.) Subsequent enactments of the legislature do not alter the situation. The expression “at any time” used in this statute never had the meaning the court attaches to it throughout its legislative history.
It is a mere play on words and hypertechnical to say under 60-2403, supra, that judgments “rendered” in a court of record in this state do not include a judgment entered by virtue of the entry of a tax warrant on the judgment docket for unpaid sales tax. Prior decisions have held the language employed in K. S. A. 79-2101 makes the procedure after the filing of a tax warrant with the clerk who enters it on the judgment docket the same as if a judgment had been entered in the district court. (State v. Gamble, 164 Kan. 288, 188 P. 2d 935.)
It has been said the entry of the tax warrant on the judgment docket for delinquent personal property taxes was intended by *137the legislature to have the characteristics and attributes of a judgment — to have the same force as a judgment. (Kucera v. State, 160 Kan. 624, 164 P. 2d 115.)
Language similar to that used in K. S. A. 79-2101, concerning the force and effect of filing a tax warrant with the clerk who enters it on the judgment docket in the district court, is used in 79-3617, supra, and no reason exists why a different construction should be placed on the language used in 79-3617. Thus, the entry of a tax warrant on the judgment docket for unpaid sales tax was intended by the legislature to invoke the same procedure as if a judgment had been entered in the district court. To say a judgment entered in the district court is different from a judgment rendered is simply to quibble with the prior decisions of this court. There is no sound basis for distinction.
In my opinion the provisions of 60-2403, supra, apply to judgments entered in favor of the state, and this includes judgments arising from the entry of a tax warrant for unpaid sales tax on the judgment docket of the district court in favor of the Director of Revenue of the state of Kansas. In my opinion 60-2403, supra, fully controls the decision in this case.
It is respectfully submitted the judgment of the trial court should be reversed.
Fatzer and Fromme, JJ., join in the foregoing dissent.