United States v. United States Shoe Corporation (523 U.S. 360)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided March 31, 1998 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 523 U.S. 360 · 118 S. Ct. 1290
- Decided
- March 31, 1998
- Term
- October Term 1997
- Vote
- 9–0
- Majority author
- Justice Ginsburg
- Issue area
- Federal Taxation
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
- Constitutional ruling
- Federal law held unconstitutional
Opinion excerpt
Justice Ginsburg delivered the opinion of the Court. The Export Clause of the Constitution states: “No Tax or Duty shall be laid on Articles exported from any State.’’ U. S. Const., Art. I, §9, cl. 5. We held in United States v. International Business Machines Corp., 517 U. S. 843 (1996) (IBM), that the Export Clause categorically bars Congress from imposing any tax on exports. The Clause, however, does not rule out a “user fee,” provided that the fee lacks the attributes of a generally applicable tax or duty and is, instead, a charge designed as compensation for Government-supplied services, facilities, or benefits. See Pace v. Burgess, 92 U. S. 372, 375-376 (1876). This case presents the question whether the Harbor Maintenance Tax (HMT), 26 U. S. C. 14461(a), as applied to goods loaded at United States ports for export, is an impermissible tax on exports or, instead, a legitimate user fee. We hold, in accord with the Federal Circuit, that the tax, which is imposed on an ad valo-rem basis, is not a fair approximation of services, facilities, or benefits furnished to the exporters, and therefore does not qualify as a permissible user fee. I The HMT, enacted as part of the Water Resources Development Act of 1986, 26 U. S. C. §§4461-4462, imposes a uniform charge on shipments of commercial cargo through the Nation’s ports. The charge is currently set at 0.125 percent of the…
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