Page:Washington Department of Licensing v. Cougar Den, Inc..pdf/1

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The State of Washington taxes “motor vehicle fuel importer[s]” who bring large quantities of fuel into the State by “ground transportation.” Wash. Rev. Code §§82.36.010(4), (12), (16). Respondent Cougar Den, Inc., a wholesale fuel importer owned by a member of the Yakama Nation, imports fuel from Oregon over Washington’s public highways to the Yakama Reservation to sell to Yakama-owned retail gas stations located within the reservation. In 2013, the Washington State Department of Licensing assessed Cougar Den $3.6 million in taxes, penalties, and licensing fees for importing motor vehicle fuel into the State. Cougar Den appealed, arguing that the Washington tax, as applied to its activities, is pre-empted by an 1855 treaty between the United States and the Yakama Nation that, among other things, reserves the Yakamas’ “right, in common with citizens of the United States, to travel upon all public highways,” 12 Stat. 953. A Washington Superior Court held that the tax was pre-empted, and the Washington Supreme Court affirmed.

Held: The judgment is affirmed.

188 Wash. 2d 55, 392 P. 3d 1014, affirmed.
 * , joined by and, concluded that the 1855 treaty between the United States and the Yakama Nation pre-empts the State of Washington’s fuel tax as applied to Cougar Den’s importation of fuel by public highway. Pp. 4–18.
 * (a) The Washington statute at issue here taxes the importation of fuel by public highway. The Washington Supreme Court construed the statute that way in the decision below. That court wrote that the statute “taxes the importation of fuel, which is the transportation of