home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Shareware Overload Trio 2
/
Shareware Overload Trio Volume 2 (Chestnut CD-ROM).ISO
/
dir33
/
cwru_ct.zip
/
90-1912.ZS
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1993-11-06
|
5KB
|
90 lines
NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is
being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.
The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been
prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.
See United States v. Detroit Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
NORDLINGER v. HAHN, IN HIS CAPACITY AS TAX
ASSESSOR FOR LOS ANGELES COUNTY, et al.
certiorari to the court of appeal of california,
second appellate district
No. 90-1912. Argued February 25, 1992-Decided June 18, 1992
In response to rapidly rising real property taxes, California voters
approved a statewide ballot initiative, Proposition 13, which added
Article XIIIA to the State Constitution. Among other things, Article
XIIIA embodies an ``acquisition value'' system of taxation, whereby
property is reassessed up to current appraised value upon new
construction or a change in ownership. Exemptions from this reas-
sessment provision exist for two types of transfers: exchanges of
principal residences by persons over the age of 55 and transfers
between parents and children. Over time, the acquisition-value
system has created dramatic disparities in the taxes paid by persons
owning similar pieces of property. Longer-term owners pay lower
taxes reflecting historic property values, while newer owners pay
higher taxes reflecting more recent values. Faced with such a
disparity, petitioner, a former Los Angeles apartment renter who had
recently purchased a house in Los Angeles County, filed suit against
respondents, the county and its tax assessor, claiming that Article
XIIIA's reassessment scheme violates the Equal Protection Clause of
the Fourteenth Amendment. The County Superior Court dismissed
the complaint without leave to amend, and the State Court of Appeal
affirmed.
Held:Article XIIIA's acquisition-value assessment scheme does not
violate the Equal Protection Clause. Pp.7-15.
(a)Unless a state-imposed classification warrants some form of
heightened review because it jeopardizes exercise of a fundamental
right or categorizes on the basis of an inherently suspect characteris-
tic, the Equal Protection Clause requires only that the classification
rationally further a legitimate state interest. Pp.7-8.
(b)Petitioner may not assert the constitutional right to travel as
a basis for heightened review of Article XIIIA. Her complaint does
not allege that she herself has been impeded from traveling or from
settling in California because, before purchasing her home, she
already lived in Los Angeles. Prudential standing principles prohibit-
ing a litigant's raising another person's legal rights may not be
overlooked in this case, since petitioner has not identified any
obstacle preventing others who wish to travel or settle in California
from asserting claims on their own, nor shown any special relation-
ship with those whose rights she seeks to assert. P.8.
(c)In permitting longer-term owners to pay less in taxes than
newer owners of comparable property, Article XIIIA's assessment
scheme rationally furthers at least two legitimate state interests.
First, because the State has a legitimate interest in local neighbor-
hood preservation, continuity, and stability, it legitimately can decide
to structure its tax system to discourage rapid turnover in ownership
of homes and businesses. Second, the State legitimately can conclude
that a new owner, at the point of purchasing his property, does not
have the same reliance interest warranting protection against higher
taxes as does an existing owner, who is already saddled with his
purchase and does not have the option of deciding not to buy his
home if taxes become prohibitively high. Pp.8-12.
(d)Allegheny Pittsburgh Coal Co. v. Webster, 488 U.S. 336, is not
controlling here, since the facts of that case precluded any plausible
inference that the purpose of the tax assessment practice there
invalidated was to achieve the benefits of an acquisition-value tax
scheme. Pp.12-14.
(e)Article XIIIA's two reassessment exemptions rationally further
legitimate purposes. The people of California reasonably could have
concluded that older persons in general should not be discouraged
from exchanging their residences for ones more suitable to their
changing family sizes or incomes, and that the interests of family and
neighborhood continuity and stability are furthered by and warrant
an exemption for transfers between parents and children. Pp.14-15.
(f)Because Article XIIIA is not palpably arbitrary, this Court must
decline petitioner's request to invalidate it, even if it may appear to
be improvident and unwise yet unlikely ever to be reconsidered or
repealed by ordinary democratic processes. P.15.
225 Cal. App. 3d 1259, 275 Cal. Rptr. 684, affirmed.
Blackmun, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehn-
quist, C. J., and White, O'Connor, Scalia, Kennedy, and Souter,
JJ., joined, and in which Thomas, J., joined as to Part II-A. Thomas,
J., filed an opinion concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
Stevens, J., filed a dissenting opinion.