Gregg Dying Co. v. Query, 286 U.S. 472 (1932)

Gregg Dying Co. v. Query


No. 170


Argued December 10, 1931
Decided May 31, 1932 *
286 U.S. 472

APPEALS FROM THE SUPREME COURT OF SOUTH CAROLINA

Syllabus

1. The constitutionality of a state taxing scheme is to be determined by substance, rather than by form, and the controlling test is the operation and effect of the statute as enforced by the state. P. 476.

2. The question of constitutionality is not necessarily confined to the particular statute attacked, but may depend upon the resultant of that and other statutes. Pp. 479-480.

3. When the supreme court of the state has held that two or more statutes must be taken together, this Court accepts that conclusion as if written into the statutes themselves. P. 480.

4. A state may tax gasoline bought and imported from another state which has come to rest within the taxing state and is stored there by the purchasers for future use in their local business. P. 478.

5. Such a tax is not bad for discrimination against interstate commerce or for discrimination violative of the equal protection of the laws if the same tax burden is in effect imposed on all other consumers of gasoline through a tax on local sales which is "passed on" to the purchasers. Pp. 480, 482.

166 S.C. 117, 164 S.E. 588, affirmed.

Appeals from decrees dismissing the complaints in two suits to enjoin collection of taxes.