Court Opinion

ID: 9546599
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:32:35.066734+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:16:39.999620
License: Public Domain

*412Grady, C. J.
This action was instituted by General Electric Company to recover from the state of Washington the sum of $938,437.25, with interest, representing business and occupation taxes paid. The court entered a judgment for the amount claimed. The state of Washington has taken this appeal.
Some years ago, the United States constructed a plant at Hanford, Washington, for the manufacturing of fissionable material. In 1943, a contract was made with E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company, Inc., a foreign corporation authorized to do business in the state of Washington, to carry on the manufacturing activity. The contract was negotiated and executed pursuant to the first war powers act of 1941. The question of liability to the state of Washington for the payment of business and occupation taxes was considered. The record indicates the corporation was seeking ways and means whereby in the performance of its contract with the United States it might be able to avoid payment of such taxes. A suggested method was the insertion in the contract of an agency clause, but this was not done. The thought was expressed that the attendant difficulties would more than offset the comparatively small tax saving involved.
The corporation and the United States sought a ruling from the state tax commission upon the question whether in performing its contract the corporation would be engaged in such a business activity that it would be amenable to the business and occupation tax, and also whether in the performance of the contract it would be an instrumentality or agency of the United States. It was recognized that the performance by a private corporation of a contract with the United States did not grant it immunity from a business and occupation tax, and the reason assigned was that the incidence or impact of the tax was not upon the operations of the corporation as an agency or instrumentality of the United States, but upon the corporation in its private capacity. It appears from the record that this recognition was based upon rules pronounced in Silas Mason Co. v. Tax Commission, 302 U. S. 186, 82 L. Ed. 187, 58 S. Ct. 233, and *413James v. Dravo Contracting Co., 302 U. S. 134, 82 L. Ed. 155, 58 S. Ct. 208, 114 A. L. R. 318. The tax commission made a ruling that the corporation would not be an agency or instrumentality of the United States in the performance of its contract, would not be immune from such tax, and that it would be engaged in a business activity within the meaning and intent of Laws of 1935, chapter 180, p. 706, as amended (RCW 82.04).
Respondent is the successor of the du Pont company. It is a foreign corporation, is authorized to transact business in this state, and is normally subject to its business and occupation tax. As a part of its business, the corporation manufactures fissionable material and uses specially constructed facilities owned by the United States.
The following statutes are a part of our business and occupation tax laws:
“ ‘Business’ includes all activities engaged in with the object of gain, benefit, or advantage to the taxpayer or to another person or class, directly or indirectly.” (RCW 82-.04.140.)
“ ‘Engaging in business’ means commencing, conducting, or continuing in business and also the exercise of corporate or franchise powefs as well as liquidating a business when the liquidators thereof hold themselves out to the public as conducting such business.” (RCW 82.04.150.)
“ ‘Manufacturer’ means every person who, either directly or by contracting with others for the necessary labor or mechanical services, manufactures for sale or for commercial or industrial use from his own materials or ingredients any articles, substances or commodities. When the owner of equipment or facilities furnishes, or sells to the customer prior to manufacture, all or a portion of the materials that become a part or whole of the manufactured article, the tax commission shall prescribe equitable rules for determining tax liability.” (RCW 82.04.110.)
“ ‘To manufacture’ embraces all activities of a commercial or industrial nature wherein labor or skill is applied, by hand or machinery, to materials so that as a result thereof a new, different or useful article of tangible personal property or substance of trade or commerce is produced and shall include the production or fabrication of special made or custom made articles.” (RCW 82.04.120.)
*414In September, 1946, respondent entered into a contract with the United States pursuant to the authority given by the first war powers act of 1941. In June, 1947, respondent and the United States made a supplemental contract pursuant to authority given to the latter by the atomic energy act of 1946 (Public Law No. 585, 79th Congress, 60 Stat. 755, 765, 766, 42 U. S. C. A. 803, 819, 820, § 1809(b)). The courts of this state have been asked in this action to construe the contract between respondent and the United States and determine whether one of the activities in which the respondent is engaged, the manufacturing of fissionable material, is that of the atomic energy commission or its own activity.
Because of the secrecy necessarily surrounding the manufacturing process in which respondent is engaged, it has agreed in its contract to submit to many contractual conditions with reference to supervision by government agents in the purchase of supplies and equipment, in fiscal affairs, and in many other respects not necessary to set forth, none of which, however, are inconsistent with or change the status of respondent as one engaged in business as a manufacturer, as defined by statute.
It is the contention of respondent that, by the terms of its contract with the United States, a relationship has been created whereby it must be said that the manufacturing business in which it is engaged is that of the governmental agency, and, therefore, it is immune from the business and occupation tax by virtue of § 9(b) of the atomic energy act of 1946. The part of § 9(b) relied úpon reads:
“The Commission, and the property, activities, and income of the Commission, are hereby expressly exempted from taxation in any manner or form by any State, county, municipality, or any subdivision thereof.”
The respondent cites and relies upon the cases of Roane-Anderson Co. v. Carson, 192 Tenn. 150, 239 S. W. (2d) 27, and Carson v. Roane-Anderson Co., 342 U. S. 232, 96 L. Ed. 257, 72 S. Ct. 257. We do not think the statute or the cited cases meet the question we have before us in this case, or that we should feel bound by the decision of the United *415States supreme court. In that case and the Tennessee case being reviewed, sales and use taxes were involved. The Tennessee court found as a fact that the goods sold and purchased became the property of the government and were in reality paid for by government money; hence, they were not subject to the Tennessee sales and use tax. The United States supreme court accepted the findings of fact made by the Tennessee court and affirmed its judgment.
The supreme court of Arkansas has recently decided in a similar case that, if the contractor is the purchaser of the goods, a sales tax is collectible; but if the United States is such purchaser, the taxes are not collectible; also, that who is the purchaser of the goods, is a question to be determined by state law, upon which subject only the courts of the state can speak with final authority. Parker v. Kern-Limerick, Inc., 254 S. W. (2d) (Ark.) 454. The court cited Alabama v. King & Boozer, 314 U. S. 1, 86 L. Ed. 3, 62 S. Ct. 43, 140 A. L. R. 615, holding to the same effect.
The questions before us are purely domestic and must be determined by a construction of the contract and the application of our statutes. The part of the atomic energy act above quoted is not before us for construction or application and does not affect respondent or appellant. The governmental agency is not carrying on any activity in connection with the manufacturing business of respondent, and therefore § 9(b) of the act has nothing to do with the legal questions we have under consideration. The incidence or impact of the tax falls only on respondent as a business corporation and not as an agency or instrumentality of the United States. The act does not in any way attempt to affect the operation of the business and occupation tax upon those who engage in manufacturing in this state, even though they may do so pursuant to a contract with the United States. If it did so, a very serious constitutional question involving the power of the United States to restrict the right of this state to impose such a tax upon those who exercise the privilege of doing business within its borders would be raised.
*416The manufacturing of fissionable material by respondent is done by it, not as an agent or instrumentality of the United States, but as a part of its authorized corporate functions. The taxpaying status of respondent must be determined by our statutes, and not by any status or relationship attempted to be created by contract. It is the nature of the business done by respondent in this state that must determine its taxpaying status, and not what it may denominate itself in its contract. The adroit use of words and phrases in the contract by which it is sought to establish a relationship between itself and the governmental agency whereby its manufacturing business and activity can be said to be that of the agency, is of no avail.
Reduced to its simplest form, we have a business corporation engaged in manufacturing a high explosive and delivering its product to a governmental agency. Our statute authorizes the imposition of a business and occupation tax for the privilege of carrying on such an activity in this state. The facts that respondent uses buildings and facilities . of the agency, that by contract it has submitted to certain supervision, and that special fiscal arrangements are provided for, do not make such activities those of the governmental agency, nor do they make respondent such an instrumentality of the United States or of the agency that it is immune, expressly or impliedly, from the business and occupation tax.
The reasoning of the court in the case of Carson v. Roane-Anderson Co., 342 U. S. 232, 96 L. Ed. 257, 72 S. Ct. 257, and in Roane-Anderson Co. v. Carson, 192 Tenn. 150, 239 S. W. (2d) 27, is unsound when applied to the situation presented by the record in this case. We find no reason based either on § 9(b) of the atomic energy act or the foregoing cases to depart in any way from what we decided in Mason, Inc., v. State Tax Commission, 188 Wash. 98, 61 P. (2d) 1269. The constitutional right of the state of Washington to exact a business and occupation tax from a corporation given the privilege of doing business within its boundaries and having a contract with the United States, was sustained on appeal. *417Silas Mason Co. v. Tax Commission, 302 U. S. 186, 82 L. Ed. 187, 58 S. Ct. 233.
The judgment is reversed, and the case remanded for the entering of an order dismissing the action.
Mallery, Hill, Hamley, Weaver, and Olson, JJ., concur.