taxation

Opinion in Westmoreland v. Dept of Revenue: Taxes Paid to Crow Tribe on Coal Mine Not a State Tax Deduction

Kate Fort2 Comments

Opinion here.

Applying § 15-35-102(11), MCA, to disallow a state tax deduction does not undermine the Tribe’s sovereign authority to tax or govern itself. The Legislature has simply chosen to limit the class of governments to which payment of taxes constitutes a deductible expense for coal producers. By so doing, the Legislature did not implicate tribal sovereignty.
Moreover, as the Department notes, WRI lacks standing to raise a claim implicating the Tribe’s sovereignty. See Northern Border Pipeline Co. v. State, 237 Mont. 117, 128-29, 772 P.2d 829, 835-36 (1989) (Taxpayer corporation had standing to challenge a state property tax, but did “not have standing to assert the Tribes’ sovereign right of self-government in doing so.”). The District Court did not err in so concluding.

Appellant’s Brief

Appellee’s Brief

Reply Brief

Wash. Dept. of Licensing Ofc. of Admin. Hearings Rules in Favor of Nontaxability of Fuel Imports to Yakama Indian Reservation

Matthew L.M. Fletcher1 Comment

Here is in the Matter of Cougar Den Inc.:

In re Cougar Den 7-24-14 DOL decision

We posted on a similar matter here.

Blast from the Past: 2009 MSU ILPC Report on the History of Michigan Tribal-State Relations

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Five years ago, we at MSU conducted a study of what became an oral history of modern Michigan tribal-state relations under a contract with the National Congress of American Indians. Our former students did all the work — Alicia Ivory, Adrea Korthase, and Sheena Oxendine. For whatever reason, we never published the paper on our occasional paper website. The students interviewed many of the major players in tribal-state relations from the 2000s and before, including John Wernet, Jim Bransky, and Kathryn Tierney on the 2007 inland consent decree; Mike Petoskey and Kathryn Tierney on Michigan Court Rule 2.615; and Bill Brooks and John Wernet on the Michigan tribal-state tax agreements.

Here it is in its full glory, “Tribal-State Relations: Michigan as a Case Study”:

Michigan Tribal-State Intergovernmental Relations

Opening Ninth Circuit Brief in Yakama/King Mountain Tax Dispute with US

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here is the opening brief in Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Indian Nation v. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau:

Yakama Opening Brief

Lower court materials in King Mountain Tobacco Co. v. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (E.D. Wash.) are here.

Federal Court Refuses to Allow Blue Lake Rancheria to Add Section 1983 Claims in FUTA Tax Dispute

Matthew L.M. Fletcher2 Comments

Here are the materials in Blue Lake Rancheria v. Morgenstern (E.D. Cal.):

67 Blue Lake Motion to Amend

69 California Opposition

70 Blue Lake Reply

72 DCT Order Denying Motion

Blue Lake had prevailed in the Ninth Circuit before.

Washington Counties Refunding Tax Dollars in accordance with Ninth Circuit’s Chehalis Ruling

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here is “County refunding $5 million in taxes to building owners on tribal land.“

Oklahoma Supreme Court Affirms District Court Decision in Oklahoma v. Native Wholesale Supply

Kate Fort

Here.

Here, NWS purposefully targeted the Oklahoma cigarette market and reaped the economic benefit of selling cigarettes in Oklahoma. Defiantly, NWS continued to import and distribute contraband Seneca cigarettes into Oklahoma and reap millions of dollars from the sale of the contraband cigarettes to Oklahoma consumers for more than two years after Oklahoma’s chief law enforcer filed this suit. NWS may not evade the public policy embodied in the MSA, the Escrow Statute, and the Complementary Act and thereby shift the burden of tobacco-related health care costs to the State. Disgorging gross receipts that NWS, a cigarette importer and distributor, received when it intentionally distributed contraband cigarettes into the Oklahoma market in violation of the Complementary Act is no more excessive than seizing and forfeiting contraband cigarettes from a cigarette distributer or wholesaler.22 NWS’ claim to Eighth Amendment protection minimizes the egregiousness of its flagrant disrespect for Oklahoma, our laws, and our citizens.

¶38 NWS had gross receipts that totaled at least $47,767,795.20 from the sale of contraband Seneca cigarettes for resale in Oklahoma from August of 2006 to August of 2010. Based upon the Complementary Act, the settled law of the case, and the undisputed material facts on summary judgment, the summary judgment was proper, and the district court did not abuse its discretion in denying NWS a new trial.

NITA Annual Conference Brochure — Sept. 24-25, 2014

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here, with agenda, (PDF):

Conference Brochure 2014_Page_1 Continue reading →

SCOTUS Denies Village of Hobart v. Oneida Indian Nation

Matthew L.M. Fletcher2 Comments

Order list here.

Cert petition here. Cert opp briefs here.

Lower court materials here.

Seminole Tribe Complaint Dismissed by 11th Circuit in Revenue Case

Kate Fort3 Comments

Decision here.

Briefs here.

Lower court briefs and decision here.

For various reasons, this might be a good case for en banc review by the 11th Circuit. First, one of the three judges deciding this was from the D.C. district court, sitting by designation. Second, the decision is based on an issue not briefed (which leads to a broader research question we have about federal Indian law generally–how often this happens). Third, and perhaps most importantly, the Court’s analysis of Ex Parte Young an issue of broader, national, concern.

The Court’s issues with equitable relief, and characterizing the relief should the Tribe win as a continued “damages” against the state because of the state’s collection regime is strange.

A declaratory judgment exempting the Tribe from the tax is the functional equivalent of ordering recurring payments of money damages. The Tribe points to no other way around the alleged constitutional violation other than a recurring refund paid to the Tribe from the Department after it precollects the tax from the fuel suppliers.

***

Unlike the tax regimes in those appeals, the only relief available to the Tribe under Florida law is a refund of taxes it will already have paid, and state sovereign immunity bars that relief. See Ford Motor Co., 323 U.S. at 463–64, 65 S. Ct. at 350.

As Judge Jordan in the dissent writes:

The majority’s opinion, as I read it, apparently would allow a state to shield the enforcement of any tax, no matter how constitutionally untenable, from challenge in federal court simply by enacting a precollection procedure.