128 Iowa 732 | Iowa | 1905
The plaintiff is a corporation engaged in the business of transferring, or hauling for hire, goods, wares, and merchandise from place to place in the city of Des Moines, upon the employment or at the direction of the owners of such property. It would appear, also, that in connection with or as an aid to such business the corporation keeps and makes use of one or more storehouses or places of deposit, where goods may, when so desired, be stored or preserved, subject to the order of the owner or shipper. In the year 1893 the city assessor assessed to the plaintiff for the purposes of taxation some thirty-three different items of merchandise, consisting mostly or entirely of farm implements and machinery. Plaintiff appeared before the board of review and resisted the assessment on the ground that none of the property belonged to it, and it w'as in no manner liable to or chargeable with the payment of taxes thereon. This objection being overruled, plaintiff appealed to the district court, where the ruling of the board of review was affirmed, and from said judgment as to nine of the assessed items it has appealed to this court.
It is not claimed that plaintiff was the actual owner of the property at the time of the assessment, but it is the theory
Sometimes repairs or articles of minor value are sent out by the shipper, which are not required to fill orders received; and at times orders for local dealers are canceled, thus bringing .about an. accumulation of goods for which no orders are outstanding; but the highest estimate of goods in this class in any one item assessed is 25 per cent, of the total value.
As we understand the record (though this is probably not a controlling circumstance) when a car load or quantity of machinery is thus sent, no particular machine or implement is set apart- marked and designated for any particular person or individual local dealer; but the shipper simply plans to send enough of each kind to the consignee at the transfer point to satisfy the outstanding orders as a whole, and relies upon that consignee to make the distribution when
Counsel argue that the reference here made to the property consigned to a person within the State- “ to be delivered or shipped by him within or without the State ” should be construed as modified and limited by the preceding words, “ with authority to sell,” and as the transfer company did not have authority to sell the goods they were not taxable under this section. We are very clear that this construction is unwarranted. If it was the intention of the Legislature to require the assessment of such property only as was held for sale by the party in possession that intent was fully expressed and effected by the preceding clause and there was no occasion for the use of the latter clause. Furthermore, when we
In another connection the same opinion says: “ The substance of these cases is that while the property is at rest for an indefinite time awaiting transportation, or awaiting the sale at its place of destination, or at an intermediate point, it is subject to taxation. But, if it be actually in transit to another State, it becomes the subject of interstate commerce, and is exempt from local assessment.” Unless, then, we are to entirely ignore that part of the opinion which we have italicized, the case is not an authority for the position taken-by the appellant herein, but goes rather to the support of the holding of the trial court. The goods, when assessed, were not in actual transit. They had been deposited in appellant’s warehouse, not as a mere incident to their carriage, but to facilitate a distribution thereafter to be made. Their further movement had not been delayed by accident or casualty of any kind, or by reason of any “ lack of facilities for immediate transportation.” They came into appellant’s possession, not as one of a succession of carriers between consignor and consignee, but appellant was itself the consignee and agent of the consignor, to receive, store, keep, and thereafter, upon orders from the consignor, to make distribution among its customers.
It would require a -most- violent perversion of the plain ordinary meaning of the words to say that goods so held are in any just sense “ in transit.”. The shipments had reached their destination for the time' being and become a part of the general property of the State. As such they were subject to the taxing power of the State. In this conclusion we
A rule to the same logical effect was also announced by that court in Brown v. Houston, 114 U. S. 622 (5 Sup. Ct. 1091, 29 L. Ed. 257), and Pittsburg Coal Co. v. Bates, 156 U. S. 577 (15 Sup. Ct. 415, 39 L. Ed. 538). In the latter case a coal company in Pennsylvania consigned several barge loads of coal to its agent in New Orleans for sale at that market. As a matter of convenience the barges weré stopped and moored in the river before reaching New Orleans, to be there held until forwarded upon order of the agent. While thus detained the local assessor of the taxing district where the boats were tied up listed the property for taxation, and this tax was held to be within the constitutional power of the State. To the same effect, see Burlington Lumber Co. v. Wil
Counsel seek to distinguish the American Steel & Wire Co. Case to which we have adverted by suggesting that, owing to some peculiar provisions of the contracts of sale made by-the company’s agents and the manner in which the business was done, such sales were in fact consummated after the goods had come into the hands of the transfer company. In our opinion it is equally true in .the case at bar that no sale was consummated until the appellant, acting upon the order of the manufacturer, assorted out the goods and shipped them from its warehouse to the customers. Up to that time the possession of the common carrier was the possession of the original shipper. No delivery actual or constructive had been made to the customer, no sale had been concluded, and no title passed. Whether these goods should ever be forwarded to .the retail dealers, or. should remain in the warehouse, or should be diverted to meet other demands of the trade, rested wholly in the will of the shipper. When the
Other points made in argument are controlled by the . conclusions already announced.
The judgment of the district court was right, and is affirmed.