Taxation-State and Local Commons^™

Local Government Law -- 1956 Tennessee Survey, Joseph Martin Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

The scope of local government law covers the problems arising out of the functioning of units of government essentially local in character--the municipality, the county, the school district. Involved are the relations between the unit and its constituents or between the units themselves, the validity of its actions, the status of its officers or employees. In the era of increased government, the impact of this body of law is pervading.

The Nature And Structure Of Sales Taxation, John F. Due

Vanderbilt Law Review

Sales taxation has, in the course of 25 years, become the chief single source of state tax revenue, now yielding about $2.5 billion or 21 per cent of total state tax revenue in the 1955 fiscal year.' In the 31 states using the tax, it yields approximately one third of state tax revenues, with yields of over 40 per cent in Washington, Georgia, Michigan, and Missouri. The tax has also been growing in importance at the local level, now yielding about $400 million, the bulk of this being obtained by a relatively few large cities. The federal government has never …

Forward: Symposium On State Sales Tax, Charles F. Conlon

Vanderbilt Law Review

One of the most remarkable developments in state finance is the rapidity with which the retail sales tax has become the most important fixture in the revenue system. Practically unknown a quarter century ago, by five years later in 1935 the tax yielded $284 million, slightly less than 13 per cent of state tax collections --unemployment compensation taxes aside. Last year, state sales tax revenues amounted to $2.6 billion, or about 23 per cent of state tax collections. For the future the prospect is that sooner or later all but a few, if indeed not all the states, will be …

The Measure Of Sales Taxes, Arthur H. Northrup

Vanderbilt Law Review

The measure of the tax is as significant a problem in sales taxation as is assessment in ad valorem property taxation or the determination of net income for income taxation. It is the base for taxation.

Sales taxes are creations of state statutes. The appendix presents a general summary of these statutes to show their provisions. Separate state excise taxes on cigarettes or spirits are not included within the scope of this paper, nor are taxes on selling, storing or distributing motor fuels or oils. These excises present special problems, as do separate taxes on extraction, oil drilling and mining. …

Sales And Use Taxes As Affected By Federal Governmental Immunity, Milton P. Rice, R. Wayne Estes

Vanderbilt Law Review

Sales and use taxes, since their advent in the early 1930's as significant state revenue producing measures have, like all other state levies, found, themselves subject to certain restrictions imposed by the Constitution of the United States. While the constitutional inhibition of greatest significance for most persons subject to these taxes has probably been the one posed by the commerce clause, or its first cousin the due process clause, an obstacle of no mean proportion to the states has been one not expressly mentioned or even alluded to in the Federal Constitution,' yet this barrier is as much a part …

Book Reviews, James C. Evans, Samuel E. Stumpf

Vanderbilt Law Review

State Taxation of Interstate Commerce By Paul J. Hartman Buffalo: Dennis & Co., 1953. Pp. xi, 323. $7.50

reviewer: James Clarence Evans

================================================

Church, State and Freedom By Leo Pfeffer Boston: The BeaconPress, 1953. Pp. xvi, 605. $10.00

reviewer: Samuel Enoch Stumpf

State Taxation Of Interstate Commerce --"Direct Burdens," "Multiple Burdens," Or What Have You?, Edward L. Barrett Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

The problem of determining the permissible extent of state taxation of interstate commerce is as old as the Constitution.' From Chief Justice Marshall's dissertation upon the subject in 1827 in Brown v. Maryland to the present, thousands of pages of words upon the subject have found their way into the Supreme Court reports. Despite this judicial outpouring, however, the Supreme Court of the United States has yet to evolve a satisfactory theory upon which to decide cases in this field. In fact, the Court in 1951 appears as sharply divided in its basic approach to the problem as at anytime …

Tax Problems Presented By The Tennessee Constitution, Eugene L. Parker Jr.

Vanderbilt Law Review

Although the North Carolina Constitution of 1776 had no specific tax provision, the draftsmen of Tennessee's Constitution of 1796 initiated a standard which reflected the creed of the frontier. These pioneers thought that every free man should contribute something to the support of the government and those with more ability should contribute more. The ability of the citizen was measured by the quantity of land and the number of slaves, which provided roughly a fair differentiation. Everyone had a similar log cabin; one lot in a settlement was worth about the same as another; one cleared acre was the equal …

Tennessee Death Taxes, Charles K. Cosner

Vanderbilt Law Review

The leading articles in this symposium stress the problems which federal death duties create in the planning of estates. The purpose of this note is to discuss the Tennessee Inheritance Tax,' and to indicate how its treatment of particular types of property and forms of ownership differs from the federal succession tax.

The federal tax poses no problem to the Tennessean of moderate means in planning his estate. By some elementary advance planning, all but very substantial estates may be made free of federal tax. In no event will an estate be subject to federal tax which is valued at …