TAXATION - INTERSTATE COMMERCE - USE TAX ON GASOLINE

Authors

M. D. Blackwell, University of Michigan Law SchoolFollow

Abstract

A statute provided that it was unlawful to operate an automobile over the state highway without paying a certain tax on the sale or use of gasoline. Plaintiff operated a common carrier between two cities which were not in the state, the route taken by the carrier, however, running through the state. Plaintiff habitually brought gasoline into the state in the tanks of its motor carriers, and in this suit it sought to enjoin collection of the tax, alleging that as applied to its business the statute was unconstitutional because the tax thus imposed was an unreasonable burden on interstate commerce. Held, that since the highest court in the state had previously interpreted this tax to be one levied as compensation for the use of the state highways, and since this court was bound by that interpretation, the tax was not invalid as a burden on interstate commerce. Dixie Greyhound Lines, Inc. v. McCarroll, (D. C. Ark. 1938) 22 F. Supp. 985.

Recommended Citation

M. D. Blackwell, TAXATION - INTERSTATE COMMERCE - USE TAX ON GASOLINE, 37 Mich. L. Rev. 681 (1939).
Available at: https://repository.law.umich.edu/mlr/vol37/iss4/29