Statistik und Verwaltung mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der preussischen Verwaltungsreform

Das System der Rentengüter und seine Anwendung in Ungarn

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 1008917265

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-19129

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Flückiger, Otto http://d-nb.info/gnd/117736708

Title:: Die Schweiz

Edition:: Zweite Auflage

Place of publication:: Zürich

Publisher:: Druck und Verlag von Schultheß & Co.

Year of publication:: 1914

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (VI, 243 Seiten)

Digitisation:: 2017

Collection:: Economics Books

Usage license:: Get license information via the feedback formular.

Chapter

Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: Einzelbeschreibung

Collection:: Economics Books

STOCK DIVIDENDS 45 statute, not its constitutionality. It argues that if such a stock dividend is not income within the meaning of the Constitution it is not income within the intent of the statute, and hence that the meaning of the sixteenth amendment is not an immediate issue, and is important only as throwing light on the construction of the act. But it is not necessarily true that income means the same thing in the Constitution and the act. A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged, 1t is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content aceord- ing to the circumstances and the time in which it is used. (Lamar ». United States 240 U. 8. 60, 65.) Whatever the meaning of the Constitution, the Government had applied its force to the plaintiff, on the assertion that the statute authorized it to do so, before the suit was brought, and the court below has sanctioned its course. The plaintiff says that the statute as it is construed and administered is unconstitutional. He is not to be defeated by the reply that the Government does not adhere to the construction by virtue of which alone it has taken and keeps the plaintiff’s money, if this court should think that the construction would make the act unconstitutional. While it keeps the money it opens the question whether the act construed as it has construed it can be maintained. The motion to dismiss is overruled. (Billings ». United States, 232 U. S. 261, 276; Altman & Co. ». United States, 224 U. S. 583, 596, 597.) i The case being properly here, however, the construction of the act is open, as well as its constitutionality if construed as the Government has construed it by its conduct. (Billings ». United States, ubi supra.) Notwithstanding the thoughtful discussion that the case received below, we can not doubt that the dividend was capital as well for the purposes of the income tax law as for dis- tribution between tenant for life and remainderman. What was said by this court upon the latter question is equally true for the former. ‘A stock dividend really takes nothing from the property of the corporation, and adds nothing to the interest of the shareholders. Its property is not diminished, and their inter- ests are not increased. * * * The proportional interest of each shareholder remains the same. The only change is in the evidence which represents that interest, the new shares and the original shares together representing the same proportional interest that the original shares represented before the issue of the new ones.” (Gibbons ». Mahon, 136 U. 8. 549, 559, 560.) In short, the cor- poration is no poorer and the stockholder is no richer than they were before. (Logan County ». United States, 169 U. 8. 255, 261.) If the plaintiff gained any small advantage by the change, it certainly was not an advantage of $417,450, the sum upon which he was taxed. It is alleged and admitted that he receives no more in the way of dividends and that his old and new certificates together are worth only what the old ones were worth before. If the sum had been carried from surplus to capital account without a corresponding issue of stock certificates, which there was nothing in the nature of things to prevent, we do not suppose that any one would contend that the plaintiff had received an accession to his income. Presumably his certificate would have the same value as before. Again, if certificates for $1,000 par were split up into 10 certificates each, for $100, we presume that no one would call the new certificates income. . What has hap- pened is that the plaintifi’s old certificates have been split up in effect and have diminished in value to the extent of the value of the new. Judgment reversed. Mr. Justice McKenna concurs in the result.

Access restriction

Copyright

fullscreen: Das System der Rentengüter und seine Anwendung in Ungarn

Monograph

Chapter

Table of contents

Download

Monograph

Chapter

This page

Image fragment

Citation links

Citation recommendation