Page:Henry Osborn Taylor, A Treatise on the Law of Private Corporations (5th ed, 1905).djvu/504

 § 481.] THE LAW OF PRIVATE CORPORATIONS. [CHAP. VIII. ordinarily discriminate in its taxation between foreign and domestic corporations, 1 and may lay additional taxes on a foreign corporation as a condition of its being allowed to trans- act business within the limits of the state. 2 § 481. But the most important of the restrictions in the Federal constitution on the power of the states to tax arise by implication from the exigencies of the Federal government, and from the nature of certain powers granted to Congress. Within the scope of tile exigen- its constitutional powers the Federal government is Federal 116 superior to the state governments. 3 And, since a men" 1 power to tax the agencies and instruments of a gov- ernment involves a power to trammel and destroy them, it is evident that any power in the state to tax the agen- Restric- tions on the power of the states to tax aris- Anglo-American Prov. Co. v. West India Iinp't Co., 169 N. Y. 506; Hawley v. Hurd, 72 Vt. 122. 1 Ducat v. Chicago, 48 111. 172; Phoenix Ins. Co. v. Commonwealth, 5 Bush (Ky.), 68; Tatem v. Wright, 23 N. J. L. 429; see Commonwealth v. Gloucester Ferry Co., 98 Pa. St. 105, and compare Commonwealth v. Texas and Pacific R. R. Co., 98 Pa. St. 90. It is not entirely clear to the writer that these decisions are in accord with the Federal Circuit Court decision of Railroad Tax Cases, supra. With that decision, however, the view of the New York Court of Appeals, in People v. Fire Ass'n, 92 N. Y. 311, is perfectly reconcilable; i. e., that the Amend- ment XIV., which prohibits states from denying to any person the equal protection of the laws, does not apply to conditions imposed on foreign corporations on entering the state, although it may afford them security after they have complied with such conditions. See § 400. At all events, corporations are " per- sons " within the meaning of the clause in the Fourteenth Amend- ment to the Federal constitution, 484 son of property without due process of law, or deny to any person the equal protection of its laws. Min- neapolis Ry. Co. v. Beckwith, 129 U. S. 26; Pembina Mfg. Co. v. Penn- sylvania, 125 U. S. 181; Santa Clara County v. Southern Pac. R. R., 118 U. S. 394. 2 People v. Fire Ass'n, 92 N. Y. 311; Phoenix Ins. Co. o. Welch, 29 Kans. 672; State ». Western Un. Tel. Co., 73 Me. 518; Western Un. Tel. Co. v. Mayer, 28 Ohio St. 521; but see Clark v. Port of Mobile, 10 Ins. Law Journal, 357; Scottish Union, etc., lus. Co. v. Herriot, 109 Iowa, 606; except where such taxation would conflict with the exercise of powers granted to Congress by the Federal constitution, see § 486. The state may levy a franchise tax upon a cor- poration doing business in that state from which are exempted corpora- tions foreign and domestic wholly engaged in manufacture in that state. New York State v. Roberts, 171 U. S. 658. See, also, §§ 379 et seq., on the territorial extent of corporate powers. 3 See ante, § 4696.
 * forbidding states to deprive any per-