Page:United States Reports, Volume 209.djvu/373

 THOMPSON =. KENTUCKY. 209 U.  Opinion of the Court the State, though it is' actually present in the State, making it, indeed, as though it were outside of the territorial limits of the State. And it is hence concluded that plaintiff in error by the law of Kentucky is made to pay taxes on property be- longing to another person outside of the jurisdiction of the State, and, it is contended, the decision of the court giving the laws these effects denies plaintiff in error the equal protec- tion of the laws and deprives him of his property without due process of law. There are many elements involved in the contention, and it is not easy, without extending this opinion to a great length, to give them separate and individual discussion. We will therefore consider only the main one, to wit, the power of the Federal Government over the' spirits and the warehouse and the absolute want of power in the State to tax them or subject them to its process. This is the basic principle of the conten- tions of plaintiff in error, "for," he says, "the warehouseman cannot be made liable for the tax on the property if the prop- erty itseft is not liable for the tax." There is further argument, to the effect that by reason of the control of the Federal ernment the State cannot give, in all events and against all possibilty of the exercise of that control, to the warehouseman the means to enforce the lien conferred by the statute to reim- burse himself, and he should therefore "be by that fact dis- charged from all liability on account of such assessment." But these contentions rest upon an exaggerated view of the control of the Federal Government and the effect of the Ken- tucky statute. The scheme of the statute is iimple, and it is an exercise of the power which, we said in Carstairs v. Cochrdn, 193 U.S. 10, 16, the State undoubtedly possessed "to tax private loperty having a situs within its territorial limits." And this was said in response to contentions having the same ultimate foundation as those urged in the case at bar. The proposition was indeed considered as elemental, and as requir- ing nothing more than the illustration of cases. Th6rc may be instances where property, though within the territorial

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