Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 32.djvu/446

410 410 HARVARD LAW REVIEW though it had notoriously restricted its soUcitations and ministra- tions to customers beyond the seas. By no Hmitation of its enter- prise less than a complete abandonment could it exclude itself from the terms of the Pennsylvania law. Nor did it have the possibiHty enjoyed by Mr. Ficklen of having the exaction measured by the amoimt of capital employed in the business rather than by the gross receipts therefrom. From every dollar received from interstate or foreign commerce Pennsylvania inexorably demanded that it render tribute unto Caesar. Formally and technically, therefore, the Su- preme Court was quite correct in saying that the authority of the Ficklen case "would have to be stretched in order to sustain such a tax as is here in question." ^*^ Hence formally and technically the Crew Levick case does not overrule the Ficklen case. In substance, however, the situations of Mr. Ficklen and of the Crew Levick Company were approximately the same. If the Penn- sylvania law had been identical with that of Shelby County, the Crew Levick Company would undoubtedly have asked for the same kind of license that Mr. Ficklen did. It would hardly have cut itself off from $47,000 of local business in order to avoid a tax of $215 on its receipts from foreign business. Nor would it be likely to suffer less by having the tax measured by the capital used in the business. Ten cents on each $100 of its capital would amount to more than $215 as soon as that capital exceeded $215,000. It would not ap- pear to be material that the capital of the Crew Levick Company may be otherwise taxed by Pennsylvania, for there is no indica- tion that Mr. Ficklen would have escaped the ordinary property tax on his capital if he had been fortunate enough to possess any. Looking through form to substance, both Shelby County and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania imposed an occupation tax measured by gross receipts from all business whether foreign or local. Had the Crew Levick Company, Hke Mr. Ficklen, done no local business whatever during the year in question, it would still have been within the terms of the Pennsylvania statute, but clearly would not have been engaged in a taxable occupation, and so would not have been caught, as he was caught, by reason of the peculiar provision of the Shelby County Law whereby taxabiHty depended upon professions and not upon events. But here by the course of ^** 245 U. S. 292, 296, 38 Sup. Ct. Rqj. 126 (191 7).