246 N.W. 196 | Mich. | 1933
Plaintiff sued defendant to recover taxes. Defendant answered. The facts were stipulated. Plaintiff is an organized township in Van Buren county; defendant, a municipal corporation engaged in the manufacture and production of electrical energy for the purpose of lighting its streets and for municipal purposes, and supplying the inhabitants within its corporate limits with electrical energy. Defendant has an electrical line running into plaintiff township and is engaged in supplying electrical energy outside the corporate limits of defendant to the inhabitants of plaintiff township. Less than 25 per cent. of the electrical energy from defendant's municipal plant is sold outside the city. Plaintiff taxed the poles and lines of defendant in the township. It is conceded the assessment and taxation is correct unless the property of defendant is exempt from taxation.
In City of Traverse City v. Township of Blair,
"The exempting language of the general statutory provision is plain, without distinction as to location, and we find no rule of construction authorizing the court to read into the act any exceptions based on territorial boundaries. As it reads it clearly applies to such public property used for public purposes wheresoever located."
We think this case controlling of the present, and the property in controversy not subject to taxation.
Judgment affirmed, without costs.
McDONALD, C.J., and CLARK, SHARPE, NORTH, FEAD, WIEST, and BUTZEL, JJ., concurred. *495