Dept. Of Treasury v. Ingram-Richardson Mfg. Co., 313 U.S. 252 (1941)

Department of Treasury of Indiana v.

Ingram-Richardson Manufacturing Co. of Indiana, Inc.
No. 655

Argued April 1, 1941
Decided May 5, 1941
313 U.S. 252

CERTIORARI TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT

Syllabus

An Indiana corporation, having a factory in that State at which it manufactured enamel and applied it by heat to metal articles, obtained through its traveling salesmen from manufacturers in other States orders for the enameling of metal parts which they used in the making of stoves and refrigerators, pursuant to which contracts it transported the parts from the customers’ plants to its own plant, enameled them there, and returned them to the plants of the customers, doing the transportation by means of its own trucks. Thereafter it billed the customers for the enameling, and remittances were made to it by mail. The value of the metal parts as units after the completion of the enameling process was from two and one-half to three times the value of the parts before the enameling.

Held:

1. That the income was derived from services, not from sales of the enamel in interstate commerce. P. 254.

2. The gross receipts from the enameling were taxable by Indiana under its Gross Income Tax Law. P. 254.

3. The transportation was an incident to the enameling service. P. 255.

4. If the transportation was an item of service for which deductions should have been allowed in the tax, the taxpayer should have claimed the deduction and shown its amount. P. 255.

5. The question whether the Indiana tax law allows the taxpayer to claim deductions in his tax return and secure an apportionment of the tax is a question of state law which this Court is not called upon to answer, the taxpayer not having presented it to the state authorities. P. 256.

114 F.2d 89, reversed.

Certiorari, 312 U.S. 671, to review a judgment affirming a recovery in a suit for a refund of taxes alleged to have been unlawfully collected.