147 Iowa 498 | Iowa | 1909
The Sioux City Stockyards Company is a corporation organized under the laws of this state, and having its principal place of business at Sioux City. It is capitalized at $3,000,000, represented by fifteen thousand shares of preferred stock, having a market value of $65 per share, and a like number of shares of common stock, having a market value of $20 per share. Its business is 'the owning, managing, and operating of stockyards at Sioux City, in pursuance of which it owns real estate with the necessary and convenient buildings, appurtenances, and appliances required in carrying on said business, and is authorized to buy and sell live stock or keep and care for the same for others. It constructs, owns, and operates railways, tracks, and rolling stock upon and about its property, and generally it does and may do all those things which go to the keeping,' operating, and man
The shares of stock of any corporation organized- under the laws of this state, except those which are not organized for pecuniary profit, and except corporations otherwise provided for in this act, shall be assessed to the owners thereof at the place where its principal business is transacted, the assessment to be on the value of such shares on the first day of January in each year, but in arriving at the total value of the shares of stock of such corporations, the amount of their -capital actually invested in real estate either in this state or elsewhere, shall be assessed as other real estate, and the property of such corporation, except real estate situated within the state, shall not be otherwise assessed. . . .
In Code, section' 1318, is found a provision regulating the assessment of merchándise purchased or consigned’ and held for sale by merchants to which provision is appended the following clause: “The provisions of this section shall apply and constitute the method of taxation of • a corporation whose business or principal business is of a like character and shall be in lieu of any tax on the corporate shares.” Tor the years 1903 to 1907, inclusive, the assessor of that taxing district treated the stockyards company as a “merchant,” listed and assessed its property under the provisions of Code, section 1318,
(1) Said shares are not .assessable under the laws of the state of Iowa. (2) The shares of stock of said corporation are exempt from taxation under section 1318 of the .Code of Iowa, provision therein being made for the taxation of the property of said corporation - in lieu of any tax upon said corporate shares. (3) The Sioux City Stockyards Company is a corporation whose business, or principal business, is of like character to that of a merchant, and is a merchant within the purview of section 1318 of the Code of Iowa, and was such during all of the years referred to in the notice served upon the objector. That during all of said years, 1903, 1904, 1905, 1906, and 1907, all of the property, real and personal of the Sioux City Stockyards Company was assessed and*502 taxed strictly in conformity with said sectión 1318, and said company furnished all of the information and evidence required by the statutes of Iowa, and said .assessment was not changed nor altered by any board of review or other reviewing tribunal, and the Sioux City Stockyards Company seasonably and promptly paid all of said taxes so levied during any and all of said years, and such assessment and taxation and the method observed in so assessing and taxing the property of said corporation constitutes a final determination and adjudication of all questions relative to the taxation of said shares of stock, and Woodbury County and its authorities and all of those interested in said proposed assessment are concluded and estopped from questioning the act of said assessors.
After hearing evidence of the facts concerning the nature of the business of the stockyards company and of the number and value of its shares, the treasurer overruled the demand of Shontz and the county for the assessment >of said shares. The decision was in writing, and is as follows:
In the matter of the county treasurer assessing the corporate stock of the Sioux City Stockyards for the years 1902 to 1907, inclusive, the following facts were agreed on, admitted by all parties or undisputed in the evidence offered before me, to wit: That the assessor made an examination of the character of the business carried on by the corporation for each of these years, and conferred with the officers of the company, and decided that the corporation was assessable as a merchant under section 1318, and not on its corporate stock under section 1323 of the Code of Iowa, as a corporation not otherwise assessable. That such assessment was made in good faith and not procured by fraud, and that a large and profitable part of this business at least was selling hay and feed, merchantable in character. I, as treasurer, am asked to decide the same question that the assessors had to before they made the assessments, to wit, whether the stockyards company was assessable as a merchant or on its corporate stock as not otherwise assessable. The assessor must have decided that “the business or principal business
I therefore decide that there is nothing left for me to assess against the stockyards company, or its corporate stock.
No attempt appears to have been made to obtain a review of the decision by certiorari or otherwise. Later this action in mandamus was instituted by the county and Shontz as joint plaintiffs, alleging the facts as to the omission of the corporate shares from taxation, the assessment of the corporate property under the provisions of Code, section 1318, and, after setting • forth the proceedings had before the county treasurer with the facts which had been stipulated and agreed to upon said hearing and the written decision made by such officer, the allegation is made that, notwithstanding the demand of the plaintiffs, the treasurer refused to determine the matter before him except as shown by the written decision, and refused to list and assess said shares for taxation. Upon this showing, a demand is made
This demurrer was sustained, tbe -petition dismissed, and plaintiffs appeal.
If this case presented tbe single question whether tbe assessor having determined that the corporate property w>as assessable under Code, section 1318, thereby' exempt
The action of mandamus is employed “to obtain an order on an inferior tribunal, board, corporation or person to do or not -to do an act the performance or omission of which the law enjoins as a duty resulting from an office, ■trust, or station. Where discretion is left to the inferior tribunal or person mandamus can only compel- it to act but can not control such discretion.” Code, section 4341. Without at all challenging the general soundness of the legal principles stated in appellant’s brief or questioning the authorities cited, it appears to us very clear that the conceded facts exclude the remedy by mandamus. While demanding that the treasurer act upon the facts and evidence produced before him and determine the question submitted to his decision, the petition .shows that he has already acted and already made his decision. AVhat the appellants really ask the court to do is to command the treasurer to act again, to reverse and set aside the decision made by him,, and to make another which shall accord with appellant’s view of the law. Certainly this is not the office of mandamus. If the -treasurer has any discretion in siich cases, if‘his decision is" either judicial or quasi judicial, the -order made by him may be erroneous, but it is not void, and his errors must be corrected by appeal where 'a right of appeal is given or by certiorari or other appropriate method of review. Mandamus does not contemplate the review of judicial acts or orders. That the treasurer does act judicially in the performance of this
Without, therefore, entering. upon any consideration of the merits of the claim that these shares of corporate stock should have been listed and assessed, we are constrained to hold that the remedy by mandamus is not available to the appellants, and that the demurrer to their petition was properly sustained.
The judgment of the district court is affirmed.