Society for Savings in the City of Cleveland v. Bowers, Tax Commissioner of Ohio (349 U.S. 143)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided May 16, 1955 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 349 U.S. 143 · 75 S. Ct. 607
- Docket
- No. 204
- Argued
- March 28, 1955
- Decided
- May 16, 1955
- Term
- October Term 1954
- Vote
- 8–0
- Majority author
- Justice Harlan II
- Issue area
- Economic Activity
- Disposition
- Reversed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
- Constitutional ruling
- State/territorial law held unconstitutional
How the Justices voted
- Majority
- Chief Justice Warren, Justice Harlan (wrote), Justice Black, Justice Douglas, Justice Clark, Justice Frankfurter, Justice Reed, Justice Minton
Opinion excerpt
Mr. Justice Harlan delivered the opinion of the Court. In 1829 this Court decided in Weston v. City Council of Charleston, 2 Pet. 449, that obligations of the Federal Government are immune from state taxation. This rule, aimed at protecting the borrowing power of the United States from state encroachment, was derived from the “Borrowing” and “Supremacy” Clauses of the Constitution, and the constitutional doctrines announced in McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316 (1819). It was subsequently embodied in a succession of federal statutes, the existing statute being R. S. § 3701, 31 U. S. C. § 742. The rule has been carried forward to embrace indirect taxation of such obligations through their inclusion in a tax imposed on all the property of a taxpayer. It is quite immaterial that the state tax does not discriminate against the federal obligations. New York ex rel. Bank of Commerce v. Commissioners of Taxes, 2 Black 620 (1863); Bank Tax Case, 2 Wall. 200 (1865); Farmers & Mechanics Savings Bank v. Minnesota, 232 U. S. 516 (1914); New Jersey Realty Title Ins. Co. v. Division of Tax Appeals, 338 U. S. 665 (1950). The two cases now before us involve the application of that rule, in a somewhat novel situation. Society for Savings in the City of Cleveland and First Federal Savings and Loan Association of Warren, two mutual savings banks having no capital stock or shareholders, and…
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