Standard Oil Company v. Peck/Opinion of the Court

by William O. Douglas

United States Supreme Court

342 U.S. 382

Standard Oil Company  v.  Peck

 Argued: Jan. 3, 4, 1952. --- Decided: Feb 4, 1952

Appellant, an Ohio corporation, owns boats and barges which it employs for the transportation of oil along the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. The vessels neither pick up oil nor discharge it in Ohio. The main terminals are in Tennessee, Indiana, Kentucky, and Louisiana. The maximum river mileage traversed by the boats and barges on any trip though waters bordering Ohio was 17 1/2 miles. These 17 1/2 miles were in the section of the Ohio River which had to be traversed to reach Bromley, Kentucky. While this stretch of water bordered Ohio, it was not necessarily within Ohio. The vessels were registered in Cincinnati, Ohio, but only stopped in Ohio for occasional fuel or repairs. These stops were made at Cincinnati; but none of them involved loading or unloading cargo.

The Tax Commissioner of Ohio, acting under §§ 5325 and 5328 of the Ohio General Code, levied an ad valorem personal property tax on all of these vessels. The Board of Tax Appeals affirmed (with an exception not material here), and the Supreme Court of Ohio sustained the Board, 155 Ohio St. 61, 98 N.E.2d 8, over the objection that the tax violated the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case is here on appeal. 28 U.S.C. § 1257(2), 28 U.S.C.A. § 1257(2).

Under the earlier view governing the taxability of vessels moving in the inland waters, City of St. Louis v. Wiggins Ferry Co., 11 Wall. 423, 20 L.Ed. 192; Ayer & Lord Tie Co. v. Kentucky, 202 U.S. 409, 26 S.Ct. 679, 50 L.Ed. 1082; cf. Old Dominion S.S.C.o. v. Commonwealth of Virginia, 198 U.S. 299, 25 S.Ct. 686, 49 L.Ed. 1059, Ohio, the state of the domicile, would have a strong claim to the whole of the tax that has been levied. But the rationale of those cases was rejected in Ott v. Mississippi Barge Line Co., 336 U.S. 169, 69 S.Ct. 432, 93 L.Ed. 585, where we held that vessels moving in interstate operations along the inland waters were taxable by the same standards as those which Pullman's Palace Car Co. v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 141 U.S. 18, 11 S.Ct. 876, 35 L.Ed. 613, first applied to railroad cars in interestate commerce. The formula approved was one which fairly apportioned the tax to the commerce carried on within the state. In that way we placed inland water transportation on the same constitutional footing as other interstate enterprises.

The Ott case involved a tax by Louisiana on vessels of a foreign corporation operating in Louisiana waters. Louisiana sought to tax only that portion of the value of the vessels represented by the ratio between the total number of miles in Louisiana and the total number of miles in the entire operation. The present case is sought to be distinguished on the ground that Ohio is the domiciliary state and therefore may tax the whole value even though the boats and barges operate outside Ohio. New York Central & H.R.R. Co. v. Miller, 202 U.S. 584, 26 S.Ct. 714, 50 L.Ed. 1155, sustained a tax by the domiciliary state on all the rolling stock of a railroad. But in that case it did not appear that 'any specific cars or any average of cars' was so continuously in another state as to be taxable there. 202 U.S. at page 597, 26 S.Ct. at page 717. Northwest Airlines, Inc. v. State of Minnesota, 322 U.S. 292, 64 S.Ct. 950, 88 L.Ed. 1283, allowed the domiciliary state to tax the entire fleet of airplanes operating interstate; but in that case, as in the Miller case, it was not shown that 'a defined part of the domiciliary corpus' had acquired a taxable situs elsewhere. 322 U.S. at page 295, 64 S.Ct. at page 952, 88 L.Ed. 1283. Those cases, though exceptional on their facts, illustrate the reach of the taxing power of the state of the domicile as contrasted to that of the other states. But they have no application here since most, if not all, of the barges and boats which Ohio has taxed were almost continuously outside Ohio during the taxable year. No one vessel may have been continuously in another state during the taxable year. But we do know that most, if not all, of them were operating in other waters and therefore under Ott v. Mississippi Barge Line Co., supra, could be taxed by the several states on an apportionment basis. The rule which permits taxation by two or more states on an apportionment basis precludes taxation of all of the property by the state of the domicile. See Union Refrigerator Transit Co v. Commonwealth of Kentucky, 199 U.S. 194, 26 S.Ct. 36, 50 L.Ed. 150. Otherwise there would be multiple taxation of interstate operations and the tax would have no relation to the opportunities, benefits, or protection which the taxing state gives those operations.

Reversed.

Mr. Justice BLACK dissents.

Mr. Justice MINTON, dissenting.

Notes