Court Opinion

ID: 9785397
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 21:39:57.503967+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:23.533411
License: Public Domain

WATT, C.J.,
with whom OPALA, V.C.J., HODGES and BOUDREAU, JJ. join, dissenting:
DISSENTING OPINION
T1 In 2003, the legislature amended 68 0.8. Supp.2008 § 1852 to expressly provide that "Extractive activities and field processes shall not be deemed to be a part of a manufacturing operation even when performed by a person engaged in manufacturing." This, of course, was precisely what Apache was doing. The majority opinion holds that the language of the 2003 amendment cannot be considered in interpreting earlier versions of *1070the statute. I disagree because it is a fundamental rule of statutory construction that amendatory language will be given retroactive effect in order to clarify language in an earlier version of a statute that was ambiguous.
12 Where, as here, a prior enactment was ambiguous, "it may be presumed that the amendment was made to more clearly express the legislative intention previously indefinitely expressed." Magnolia Pipe Line Co. v. Oklahoma Tax Commission, 1946 OK 113 at ¶ 11, 167 P.2d 884 at 888, quoted with approval in Texas County Irrigation and Water Resources Ass'n v. Oklahoma Water Resources Board, 1990 OK 121, 803 P.2d 1119. This matter is clearly such a case so the 2003 amendment should be applied retroactively. Thus, I think that the opinion's reliance on Dolese Bros. v. Oklahoma Tax Commission, 2003 OK 4, 64 P.3d 1093, as a basis for its refusal to do so is misplaced. To apply the reasoning of Dolese in the face of the clear language of the 2003 amendment appears agnostic to me, as it seems likely that the amendment was the legislature's response to Dolese.
13 Allowing the refund for the 1997-98 period would require reaching the conclusion that the legislature intended to change the law, not simply clarify it, when it passed the 2003 amendment. But, given the timing of Dolese and the subsequent 2003 amendment, passed in the first legislative session after Dolese was decided, it is clear that the legislature never intended for the manufacturing exemption to apply to field processing of oil, gas, or other minerals extracted from the earth. Accordingly, I would have let stand the opinion of the Court of Civil Appeals.
"I 4 I respectfully dissent.