Central Railroad Banking Company v. Wright

This was an intervening petition filed by William A. Wright, comptroller general of the state of Georgia, praying that the receivers of the Central Railroad & Banking Company, appointed in a suit for the foreclosure of a mortgage to the Farmers' Loan & Trust Company, be required to pay him certain taxes said to be due by the corporation, for the year 1891, upon its property in different counties and cities upon the line of its road in the state of Georgia, which taxes were claimed to be a lien upon the property of the road.

The taxes were assessed in pursuance of certain acts of the general assembly, passed in 1889 and 1890, authorizing counties and cities to tax railroad property. The taxes were levied upon the railroad and appurtenances of that portion of the Central Railroad between Savannah and Macon, and included no other property of the company. The defendants claim the taxes to be invalid, upon the ground that the railroad and its appurtenances over that part of the line from Savannah to Macon were subject only to a taxation of one-half of 1 per cent. upon the net annual income of the road, and that the acts of 1889 and 1890, in so far as they authorized the taxation of its property by counties and other municipalities, impaired the obligation of the original contract of the state contained in its charter, and were, therefore, void.

The circuit court was of opinion that the taxes were properly levied, and made a decree for their payment by the receivers, and from that decree the corporation and its receivers appealed to this court.

A. R. Lawton, for appellants.

J. M. Terrell, for appellee.

Mr. Justice BROWN, after stating the facts in the foregoing language, delivered the opinion of the court.