Amended: June 5, 1939. The controversy in No. 449 relates to the jurisdiction of New Jersey to tax the appellant upon the full amount of its capital stock paid in and accumulated surplus. The case is here by appeal under Section 237(a) of the Judicial Code.
Chapter 236 of the Laws of 1918 is a general act for the assessment and collection of taxes. Section 202, N.J.S.A. 54: 4-1, subjects all real and personal property within the jurisdiction of New Jersey to taxation annually at its true value. By Section 301, N.J.S.A. 54:4-9, the tax on other than tangible personal property is assessed on each inhabitant in the taxing district of his residence on the first day of October in each year. Section 305, N.J.S.A. 54:4-18, deals with domestic corporations as residents of the district in which their chief office is located and renders their personal property taxable in the same manner as that of individuals, except as otherwise provided. Section 307, N.J.S.A. 54:4-22, the most vital in the case, provides:
'Every fire insurance company and every stock insurance company other than life insurance, shall be assessed in the taxing district where its office is situate, upon the full amount of its capital stock paid in and accumulated surplus. * * * No franchise tax shall be imposed upon any such fire insurance company or other stock insurance company included in this section.' The appellant is a stock fire insurance corporation organized under the laws of New Jersey which at the time of this assessment required it to locate its principal office and to conduct its general business in the state. It is stipulated that a registered office is maintained in Newark, New Jersey, together with such books as the law requires to be kept within the state. The only business carried on in this Newark office is a local or regional claim and underwriting department for Essex and three other counties. No executive officer is there and reports are sent to the New York office. The stipulation further shows that the company's 'executive officers and its executive office are located at 150 William Street, New York City. The general accounts of the company are kept in the office in New York City. The general accounting, underwriting and executive offices of the company are all located at the main office at 150 William Street, New York City. All cash and securities of the company are located there or in banks in that City or in other banks outside of the State of New Jersey, with the exception of the sum of $6,425.32 on deposit in New Jersey banks. All of the general affairs$of the company are conducted at the main office in New York City and have been so conducted there since appellant moved its main office from Newark six years ago.' No personal property tax is paid in New York. The company does pay there a franchise tax based upon premiums.
The Board of Assessment of the City of Newark made an assessment, as of October 1, 1934, upon the capital stock paid in and accumulated surplus of the appellant, with deductions for debts and exemptions allowed by law. The assessment was sustained, in succession, by the Essex County Board of Taxation, by the New Jersey State Board of Tax Appeals, now an appellee, by the Supreme Court, and by the Court of Errors and Appeals, the highest court in the state. Throughout the proceedings below the appellant resisted the jurisdiction of New Jersey to tax on the ground that its intangibles had acquired a business situs and the corporation a tax domicile in New York. Throughout, the state tribunals treated the assessment as upon personal property with a business situs in the sister state. The Supreme Court characterized the exaction as a personal property tax and discussed its validity 'in the light of the proofs * * * upon the inescapable premise that * * * the securities, the personalty involved, have become an integral part of (appellant's) business situs in New York. * * *' It held that the state of domicile may impose a personal property tax upon intangibles which have acquired a business situs in another state and added that, in the absence of a New York personal property tax, multiple taxation was impossible. The Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey, per curiam, affirmed the judgment for the reasons expressed in the opinion of the Supreme Court.
Appellant urges error in sustaining the assessment in the face of the conclusion that the tax is a property tax upon intangibles with a business situs in New York, the commercial domicile of the corporation. Such approval, it is claimed, violates the due process clause of the 14th Amendment, U.S.C.A.Const.