Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Co. v. Phillips, State Revenue Commissioner (332 U.S. 168)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 23, 1947 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 332 U.S. 168 · 67 S. Ct. 1584
- Docket
- No. 385
- Argued
- April 9, 1947
- Decided
- June 23, 1947
- Term
- October Term 1946
- Vote
- 9–0
- Majority author
- Justice Frankfurter
- Issue area
- Economic Activity
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
How the Justices voted
- Majority
- Chief Justice Vinson, Justice Burton, Justice R. H. Jackson, Justice Douglas, Justice Frankfurter (wrote), Justice Reed, Justice Black, Justice Murphy
- Concurring in the judgment
- Justice Rutledge (wrote)
Opinion excerpt
Mr. Justice Frankfurter delivered the opinion of the Court. This was a proceeding in the courts of Georgia to declare invalid an assessment by the State Revenue Commissioner against the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Company on the ground that the tax as applied to the appellant impairs the obligation of contracts. United States Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 10. To encourage railroad development, the State of Georgia in 1833 chartered the Georgia Railroad Company (which later became the Georgia Railroad and Banking Company), and gave the railroad certain immunity from taxation. Georgia’s increasing need of tapping new sources of revenue has not unnaturally brought to the courts the scope of this immunity. Its construction in relation to the claim of Georgia, that despite the charter of 1833 the appellant is subject to its corporate income tax, is the sole issue before us. The case is this. Georgia, in 1937, imposed a tax of 5% per cent, on the net income of all domestic and foreign corporations. Acts 1931, Extra. Sess. pp. 24, 26, amended, Acts 1937, pp. 109, 117; Ga. Ann. Code §92-3102. No claim under this corporate income tax was made against the Atlantic Coast Line, one of the lessees of the Georgia Railroad, until 1941. For the calendar years 1941, 1942, 1943, the State Revenue Commissioner assessed against the appellant deficiency taxes on the basis of its net income from the…
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