Court Opinion

ID: 7729313
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-30 19:41:54.218373+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:38:02.951815
License: Public Domain

The issue in this case is whether the 13.9-mill ad valorem tax levied by the Hoover City Board of Education ("Hoover's tax") falls within the definition of the phrase "the three-mill district school tax," commonly known as "the three-mill tax," appearing in §§ 40-4-2 and 40-5-4, Ala. Code 1975. Because I think the references in §§ 40-4-2 and 40-5-4 to "the three-mill tax" became terms of art describing taxes levied pursuant to Ala. Const. of 1901, Amend. 3, I respectfully dissent.
Amendment 3 was adopted in 1916. It provided county school districts with the "power to levy and collect a special district tax not exceeding thirty cents on each one hundred dollars worth of taxable property." This tax became known as "the three-mill tax" and was referred to as such in The Revenue Act of 1935, Ala. Act 1935, Act No. 194, §§ 22 and 161, pp. 272 and 335; those sections of the Act later became §§ 40-4-2 and 40-5-4, Ala. Code 1975, through several statutory amendments, all of which referred to the Amendment-3 tax as "the three-mill county school tax and the three-mill district school tax." In 1972, Amendment 325 was ratified, and it required counties and county school districts to increase the Amendment-3 tax. In compliance with Amendment 325, Jefferson County raised its Amendment-3 tax to 4 mills.
When the 1975 Code of Alabama was compiled, its §§ 40-4-2 and40-5-4 still referred to the Amendment-3 tax as "the three-mill county tax and the three-mill school district tax," even though the Amendment-3 tax then being collected was greater than 3 mills, pursuant to an increase authorized by Amendment 325. Furthermore, the Legislature has not seen fit to amend §§ 40-4-2 and 40-5-4, even though Amendment 373 was ratified in 1978, allowing counties and county school districts to further raise the Amendment-3 tax. Because the Legislature has not amended §§ 40-4-2 and 40-5-4 and because it used the term "the three-mill district school tax" when it wrote the 1975 Code, although by that time the tax was actually more than 3 mills, I believe that the phrase has become a term of art used to describe the Amendment-3 tax as adopted in 1916. Accordingly, I believe that Hoover's tax falls within the definition of the term "the three-mill district school tax" used in §§ 40-4-2 and 40-5-4, Ala. Code 1975, and that Jefferson County unlawfully withheld fees and commissions for the collection of Hoover's tax.
Hooper, C.J., and Maddox and See, JJ., concur. *Page 2