Opinion
Decided June, 1898.
Where owners of lumber commit the custody thereof to one of their number, who may chance to be a tradesman in lumber, to be sold by him for their joint benefit, the common property is taxable at its full value, under P. S., c. 56, s. 16, and not as stock in trade.
PETITION, for abatement of taxes for 1896, filed February 1, 1897, — the taxes having been paid by the plaintiff under protest. Trial by the court. The plaintiff is a farmer, and has been wood and lumber dealer in Mason for several years. On the first day of April, 1896, he had $1,800 worth of lumber on hand in Mason, for which the selectmen taxed him at its full value. The plaintiff contends that the tax should have been assessed upon the average value of his lumber during the year, which he returned as $586.
It appeared from the evidence that the plaintiff had been in the lumber business for more than twenty years, carrying it on with his farming. He has sometimes bought timber and lumber standing, and sometimes bought the land with the lumber and wood on it. His sales have averaged upwards of $2,000 a year for the last ten years. The lumber is generally cut and manufactured in the winter, and the sales are made in the summer. The lumber in question was cut on land in Mason owned by the plaintiff, his brother, and another party, and belonged to them on April 1, 1896, although it was in the plaintiff's custody. The most of it was cut and sawed into boards and planks on the lot during the two preceding months.
The court found that the plaintiff was a dealer in lumber, wood, and timber and might be regarded as a tradesman in the same, and that the tax should be abated; and the defendants excepted.
David Cross, for the plaintiff.
George B. French, for the defendants.
Whether, upon the facts appearing in the case, the plaintiff may properly be regarded as a tradesman in lumber within the statutory sense of the term as used in the Public Statutes, c. 55, s. 7, par. VI, it is not necessary to determine; for however this may be, as to the particular lumber in question he cannot be so regarded. A single, independent transaction in lumber like the one here disclosed does not make the parties engaged in it tradesmen in the statutory or any other just sense; and if they commit the custody of the common property to one of their number, who may chance to be such a tradesman, merely for the purpose of being marketed by him for their joint benefit, it will stand no differently in respect of valuation for taxation than it would if it had been committed to the other owners, or either of them, for the like purpose. In each case alike, the statute, as well as manifest justice, requires its taxation, not as stock in trade but at "its full value." P. S., c. 56, s. 16; Ib., c. 58, s. 1. Exception sustained.
Petition dismissed.
CLARK, C. J., did not sit: the others concurred.