Thompson v. Kentucky

Citations

• 209 U.S. 340
• 28 S. Ct. 533
• 52 L. Ed. 822
• 1908 U.S. LEXIS 1708

Syllabus

<p>Due process of law does not assure to taxpayers that the court will sustain the interpretation given to a statute by executive officers or relief from the consequences of misinterpretation by either such officers or the court; one acting under a statute must take his chances that such action will be in accord with the final decision as to its proper interpretation; this is a hazard under every law from which there is no security.</p> <p>It is within the power of the State to tax spirits in bonded warehouses and require the warehouseman to pay the same with interest after the taxes due to the United States. Government have been paid; and if the warehouseman is given a lien on the spirits for the taxes and interest paid by him he is not deprived of his property without due process of law.</p> <p>The fact that a warehouseman paid taxes without interest on spirits in bond under a mistaken interpretation of the statute by the state officers and subsequently permitted the spirits to be withdrawn' does not estop the State to recover from the warehouseman interest due on such taxes under the statute, and a judgment therefor does not deprive the warehouseman of his property without due process of law within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment, and so held as to the tax statutes of Kentucky. A classification of distilled spirits in bond, as distinct from other property in regard to payment of interest on taxes does not constitute a discrimination amounting to a denial of equal protection of the laws within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment.</p>