Michigan Central Railroad v. Powers

Citations

• 201 U.S. 245
• 26 S. Ct. 459
• 50 L. Ed. 744
• 1906 U.S. LEXIS 1789

Syllabus

<p>A state statute may be unconstitutional because conflicting.with the constitution of the State or with that of the United States, but all objections ' to its validity whether state or Federal may be presented in a single suit and call for consideration and determination; .and as a Federal court has the jurisdiction it may be its duty, when the question is properly presented, to pass upon an alleged conflict between a state statute and the state constitution even before the question has been considered by the state tribunals. It will'however be reluctant to do so especially when the statute is one affecting public revenues of the State.</p> <p>There is no general supervision by the Nation over state taxation, in regard to which the State has, generally speaking, the freedom of a sovereign both as to objects and methods.</p> <p>While there is always a possibility of misconduct on the part of officials, legislation may. proceed on the assumption of their properly discharging their duties.</p> <p>Where a legislature enacts a specific rule for fixing a rate of taxation, by which rule the rate is mathematically deduced from facts and events occurring within the year,-and created without reference to the matter of that rate, there is no abdication of the legislative function, but on the contrary there is a direct legislative determination of that rate.</p> <p>Unless there is some specific provision in the state constitution compelling other action a State may treat its entire territory as composing but a single taxing district, and deal.with all property as within the district and subject it to taxation accordingly.</p> <p>This court may in a case of this nature take judicial notice of the fact that the State of Michigan is traversed in almost every direction by railroads and that the county in which there are no railroads, if any there be, is an exception.</p> <p>Nothing in the Federal Constitution prevents a State from separating a particular class of property and sub