69 N.Y.S. 1 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1901
By the provisions of the Revised Statutes which, prior to the Tax Law of 189.6 (Chap. 908), regulated the assessment and collection of taxes, it was required that “ Every person shall be assessed in the town or ward where he resides when the assessment is made, for all personal estate owned by him,” and that “ in case any person possessed of such personal estate shall reside during any year in which taxes may be levied, in two or more counties, towns or wards, his residence for the purposes and within the meaning of this section shall be deemed and held to be in the county, town or ward in which his principal business shall have been transacted.” (1 R. S. 389, § -5, as amd. by. Laws of 1850, chap. 92, and Laws of 1851, chap. 176, § 2.)
• This section, as amended, obviously furnished a.new test by which the fact of taxable residence was thereafter to be determined, and in the case of Bowe v. Jenkins (23 N. Y. Supp. 548; S. C., 69 Hun, 458) it was said by the General Term of the third department that since its enactment it cannot be doubted “ that a person may have two residences, although but one domicile.”
Such, indeed, is the plain meaning of the amendment, and it was doubtless designed by the Legislature to reach persons who, by residing in different places at different seasons of the year, or as their various business interests seemed to require, were enabled to escape the payment of all personal taxes. This view of the object and effect of the statute has been repeatedly expressed by the courts (Douglas v. Mayor, 2 Duer, 110; Bartlett v. Gity of New York, 5 Sandf. 44; Bell v. Pierce, 51 N. Y. 12), and in the case last cited it was said that “ to establish a residence requires a less permanent • abode than to give a domicile, or even to create an inhabitance,” and that where the principal business of a party is transacted is “ a matter of fact to be ascertained by proof and to be settled by judicial determination.”
In the present instance the assessors primarily determined that the plaintiff was either a resident of or transacted his principal business in the town of Elbridge, and they, therefore, placed his name
Upon these and other circumstances, which it is not necessary to
If the questions of fact thus disposed of were original ones, it is quite possible that we might feel constrained to reach a different conclusion than the one arrived at by the court below ; but, nevertheless, we. do not feel that we would be warranted, under all the-circumstances, in holding that the findings of that court are wholly unsupported by evidence.
This court has said that “the legal residence of a person rests, largely in the intent of the individual.” (People ex rel. Blocher v. Crowley, 21 App. Div. 304; affd., 155 N. Y. 700.) And while this, is doubtless true, it is equally true that what constitutes a legal residence is, generally speaking, dependent upon the facts of each individual case, and consequently it often happens that facts which constitute a legal residence in one locality for one purpose, do not necessarily establish such a residence for another purpose: To illustrate : A person may be a legal voter in the borough of Brooklyn, and yet be a taxable resident of the borough of Manhattan, where-he spends most of his time and transacts his principal business. But wherever his residence may be, it is well settled that for the purposes of taxation for personal property it will be deemed te continue until a hona fide change is affirmatively and satisfactorily shown to have taken place. (Matter of Nichols, 54 N. Y. 62;. People ex rel. Blocher v. Crowley, supra.)
It having been made to appear beyond all question that the plaintiff’s taxable residence for many years prior to 1883 was in the town of Elbridge, we think there is at least some reason for saying that,, under all the circumstances of this case, he has not established by affirmative and satisfactory proof the fact that for the purposes of taxation he did in good faith acquire another residence, so as to deprive the assessors of that town of jurisdiction. It, therefore, follows that the judgment appealed from should be affirmed.
Judgment affirmed,'with costs.
All concurred.
Judgment affirmed, with costs.