Lots of cases left, and we're close to the end, so today could be very exciting, but it could also be one of those fizzles. We'll find out soon.
MORE: The first case is a tax case — a 16th Amendment case — Moore v. United States. Thomas and Gorsuch dissent, Barrett and Alito concur. As SCOTUSblog puts it: "Because the couple in the case here never actually received the investment gains that were subject to the tax, Thomas contends, they cannot be taxed as 'income' under the Sixteenth Amendment." In Thomas's words: "Sixteenth Amendment 'income' is only realized income. We should not have hesitated to say so in this case."
AND: "We have the second opinion. It is Chiaverini v. City of Napoleon. It is by Justice Kagan and the vote is 6-3. Thomas dissents, joined by Alito; Gorsuch has his own dissent." From the syllabus of the opinion: "The presence of probable cause for one charge in a criminal proceeding does not categorically defeat a Fourth Amendment malicious-prosecution claim relating to another, baseless charge."
FINALLY: Gonzales v. Trevino: "The per curiam opinion agrees with Gonzalez, the woman who was arrested, that the court of appeals took a view of Nieves that was too narrow. Requiring her to provide examples of people who also mishandled a government petition but were not arrested 'goes too far,' the court holds."
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61 comments:
Cities anxiously awaiting Grants Pass ruling...
I mean Missoula is kicking around urban camping restrictions but I'm sure they're just running out the clock until the Grants Pass opinion comes down.
"Thomas contends, they cannot be taxed as 'income' under the Sixteenth Amendment." In Thomas's words: "Sixteenth Amendment 'income' is only realized income. We should not have hesitated to say so in this case."
Haha now do property tax assessments on real estate value estimations that are 'unrealized'. Also while they're at it, individual state's attempts to tax unrealized dividends on investment income...I'm looking in your direction Newsolini.
That should be fun. Orville Redenbacher smiles.
So Kavanaugh wrote the lead opinion authorizing the next democrat administration to enact a wealth tax. Perfect.
Other than Gorsuch, Trump's court picks blow goats. We get 20-30 years of Barrett and Kavanaugh as the new O'Connor and Kennedy. Thanks, Don!
Wake me up when the Trump case comes.
Kind of a fizzle. But Thomas's words seem important here: "Sixteenth Amendment 'income' is only realized income. We should not have hesitated to say so in this case." It's important because Biden has proposed taxing "unrealized income" on Tech Millionaires* as part of his second term tax proposals. That is one reason those same Tech Donors who helped elect Barack and Joe are now raising money for Trump.
*We all know how this game works too. They propose a tax on "millionaires" that when implemented somehow gets applied to anyone who earns capital gains on stock. The fluffy word "tech" was just used to browbeat a certain segment of society that Joe saw as insufficiently eager to help him censor Americans who disagree with The Narrative. As with "millionaire" the term is fungible when it comes to actual tax policy.
D.D. Driver
A wealth tax would be a tax on unrealized gains and as such would be unconstitutional according to this opinion.
I like the idea of property taxes being declared unconstitutional.
RideSpaceMountain said...Haha now do property tax assessments on real estate value estimations that are 'unrealized'.
Agreed. Valuations based on anything other than the sale of the house are speculative and it can't be legitimate to tax people's imagined wealth.
Similarly, every March the stock market will crash due to people selling stock to cover the wealth tax. But that tax will be determined at Dec 31 stock prices--which will be higher than the March 31 sale price. People will be taxed not just on unrealized gains, but on never-realized gains. It will be economic chaos.
D.D. Driver
A wealth tax would be a tax on unrealized gains and as such would be unconstitutional according to this opinion.
Actually, according to the opinion: "Nor does this decision attempt to resolve the parties’ disagreement over whether realization is a constitutional requirement for an income tax."
Property taxes are state and local. Up until now, the feds have only been able to tax "income" under the language of the 16th amendment. So the question is: is "unrealized income" an oxymoron or taxable. The writing seems to be on the wall.
whichever clerk kavanaugh should go back to rudiments of tax law or something
yes it was a paul ryan special, but unrealized income should not be taxed it removes the incentive of repatriation,
What was the vote in the Moore case? 7-2? 5-4? Is “concur” always assumed to mean with majority opinion?
Unrealized income. Unrealized benefits (e.g. education). Will New York use a scalpel or machete to recover lost revenue?
the former, its just bad reasoning, some robertian logic, which will not end well,
Got it - scotusblog has 7-2.
I only took one con law from a declared lefty, but unlike say lawrence tribe, he actually knew the law,
"Similarly, every March the stock market will crash due to people selling stock to cover the wealth tax. But that tax will be determined at Dec 31 stock prices--which will be higher than the March 31 sale price. People will be taxed not just on unrealized gains, but on never-realized gains. It will be economic chaos."
Yep. "Sell in May and go away" will become "Sell in March or you'll get torched!" It will completely roil risk appetite and will turn every investor - across the globe - defensive on wealth preservation. Furthermore, it will make offshoring gains essentially mandatory if you want to preserve any wealth at all from these fucking vultures.
"Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery!”
- Calvin Coolidge
Preach Calvin, preach.
i don't get how mishandling a government petition really qualifies as a criminal offense, at all,
this is why tax collectors were in poor regard in jesus day, and their sin was manifest
From the opinion:
“Congress generally taxes the income of American business entities in one
of two ways. Some entities, such as S corporations and partnerships,
are taxed on a pass-through basis, where the entity itself does not pay
taxes. 26 U. S. C. §§1361–1362. Instead, the entity’s income is
attributed to the shareholders or partners, who then pay taxes on that
income even if the entity has not distributed any money or property to
them.”
The MRT applied to particular (foreign) pass-through cases. Is Thomas really saying pass-through taxation in general, all cases, is unconstitutional?
"this is why tax collectors were in poor regard in jesus day, and their sin was manifest"
It's also why the feds essentially made your employer (with a FEIN) your tax collector. The Supreme Court declared income taxes unconstitutional in 1895, which they were and still are and they know and we know and everyone knows that any system pre-1953 IRS and pre-1943 "pay-as-you-go" would result in almost 100% tax evasion.
Virtually no one in this country agrees with the direction the country is headed, regardless of your personal politics, but they've essentially found a way to collect your money anyway. London on the Potomac will get your money with or without representation, and almost all our representatives are in on it anyway.
We have been getting screwed for 130 years.
Agree with Thomas on the tax case, disagree with him on Chiaverini.
So if an invalid charge causes a detention to start or continue, then the Fourth Amendment is violated. Bringing the invalid charge alongside a valid one does not categorically preclude this possibility. As the starkest possible example, consider a person detained on a drug offense supported by probable cause and a gun offense that is not. If the prosecutor drops the gun charge, leaving the person in jail on the drug charge alone, then the baseless charge has caused a constitutional violation by unreasonably extending the detention. The person should not be categorically barred from bringing a Fourth Amendment malicious-prosecution claim just because the baseless charge was brought along with a good one.
Yes, bingo. It goes well with Gonzalez, which was per curiam
Gonzalez’s survey is a permissible type of evidence because the fact that no one has ever been arrested for engaging in a certain kind of conduct—especially when the criminal prohibition is longstanding and the conduct at issue is not novel—makes it more likely that an officer has declined to arrest someone for engaging in such conduct in the past.
The Diaz link is not working.
D.D. Driver said...
So Kavanaugh wrote the lead opinion authorizing the next democrat administration to enact a wealth tax. Perfect.
Oh, DD, some day you might learn how to read:
(d) The Court’s holding is narrow and limited to entities treated as pass-throughs. Nothing in this opinion should be read to authorize any hypothetical congressional effort to tax both an entity and its shareholders or partners on the same undistributed income realized by the entity.
Josh Blackmun has an interesting speculation on Gonzalez v. Trevino:
Today the Supreme Court decided Gonzalez v. Trevino. The case was argued in March. One would expect that the Court would issue a regular signed opinion that notes the authorship of the majority opinion. But the Court did something different. It issued a five page per curiam opinion, reversing the Fifth Circuit. The upshot of a PC opinion is that we do not know for sure who joined it. Justice Alito wrote a sixteen-page concurrence, Justice Kavanaugh wrote a two-page concurrence, and Justice Jackson wrote a two-page concurrence joined by Justice Sotomayor. For sure, Alito, Kavanaugh, Jackson, and Sotomayor joined the majority. But who was the fifth vote? It was not Justice Thomas, since he dissented.
We do not know how Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Kagan, Gorsuch, and Barrett voted.
Why is this a per curiam opinion? It is possible that Justice Alito was assigned the majority opinion, but lost it, and the Chief came in to salvage the majority with a narrow per curiam. At present, Alito does not have any assignments from the March sitting.
Here, DD
For their part, the dissent and the opinion concurring in the judgment focus primarily on the realization issue— namely, whether realization is required for an income tax. We do not decide that question today. When they reach the attribution question that we do decide, the separate opinions disagree with our reading of some of the Court’s precedents. We respect their views. But as we thoroughly explained above, we read the Court’s precedents differently.
That said, we emphasize that our holding today is narrow. It is limited to: (i) taxation of the shareholders of an entity, (ii) on the undistributed income realized by the entity, (iii) which has been attributed to the shareholders, (iv) when the entity itself has not been taxed on that income. In other words, our holding applies when Congress treats the entity as a pass-through.
To be clear, as we indicated earlier, the Due Process Clause proscribes arbitrary attribution. See supra, at 14, n. 4. And nothing in this opinion should be read to authorize any hypothetical congressional effort to tax both an entity and its shareholders or partners on the same undistributed income realized by the entity. In such a scenario, the entity would not simply be a traditional pass-through.
Oh, and so long as Roberts remains on the Court,, you really dont' get to bitch about Trump's SCOTUS picks. Esp compared to Souter and Kennedy
JUSTICE BARRETT, with whom JUSTICE ALITO joins, concurring in the judgment:
This case comes down to two questions. Have the Moores realized income from their KisanKraft shares? And if they have not, may Congress attribute KisanKraft’s income to the Moores?
Our precedent already decides the first question: Shareholders receive income when they sell their shares or when a corporation distributes profits back to its investors by declaring a dividend. Notwithstanding this precedent, the Government asserts its power to tax without apportionment all economic gains, including appreciation in property value. The Court does not address this issue. It focuses on the second instead, and, casting our precedent as well settled, holds that Congress can attribute KisanKraft’s income to the Moores. As I explain below, I think the issue is more complex than the Court lets on. But whatever my disagreement with the Court’s reasoning, it bears emphasis that the Moores’ case involves the Mandatory Repatriation Tax (MRT), which is a specific tax imposed upon the American shareholders of a closely held foreign corporation. A different tax—for example, a tax on shareholders of a widely held or domestic corporation—would present a different case.
I
The question on which we granted review is “[w]hether the Sixteenth Amendment authorizes Congress to tax unrealized sums without apportionment among the states.” Pet. for Cert. i. The answer is straightforward: No.
Like I said in my first post on this, I think the majority got it wrong.
But not as wrong as DD got it, when he claimed this decision creates a precedent for a wealth tax. That's the commentary of an uniformed buffoon,
Which fits DD to a T
Breezy said...
The MRT applied to particular (foreign) pass-through cases. Is Thomas really saying pass-through taxation in general, all cases, is unconstitutional?
JUSTICE THOMAS, with whom JUSTICE GORSUCH joins, dissenting.
Charles and Kathleen Moore paid $14,729 in taxes on an investment that never yielded them a penny. They challenge that tax—the Mandatory Repatriation Tax (MRT)—as unconstitutional. As relevant, they argue that a tax on unrealized investment gains is not a tax on “incomes” within the meaning of the Sixteenth Amendment, and it therefore cannot be imposed “without apportionment among the several States.”
The Moores are correct. Sixteenth Amendment “incomes” include only income realized by the taxpayer
So, possibly yes.
"I like the idea of property taxes being declared unconstitutional."
They are unconstitutional, as well as a European holdover from the feudal system. If you have to remit anything for owning property, you are renting it, not owning it.
The worst property taxes are those on vehicles. To put it in perspective, did any of our ancestors pay taxes for owning a horse? Depending on where you are, you are paying sales tax on the vehicle IN ADDITION TO property tax just for owning it.
Outrageous.
narciso said...
i don't get how mishandling a government petition really qualifies as a criminal offense, at all,
Within a month, a private attorney tasked with leading the investigation concluded that Gonzalez had likely violated a Texas anti-tampering statute that, among other things, prohibits a person from intentionally “remov[ing] . . . a governmental record.”
They claimed that she took it home with her, which counted as "removing it"
@RideSpaceMountain: Yep. "Sell in May and go away" will become "Sell in March or you'll get torched!" It will completely roil risk appetite and will turn every investor - across the globe - defensive on wealth preservation
Don't worry, puppet master Michael Bloomberg has it under control. Without a Bloomberg Terminal you can't trade stocks effectively, so every finance law must go through him. He'll see to it that there are massive loopholes large enough to fly a private jet through, and large enough to sail a mega yacht through. The billionaires donate and advertise and hire top-shelf lawyers and fund blackmailers like Jeffrey Epstein. They fully know how to preserve their OWN wealth, be it through friendly gifts or bullying.
The non-oligarch class and little people will shift to bartering, cash/gold, and burying assets in waterproof containers in the woods.
its really bad law, I blame the clerk, well a whole bunch of them,
We'll just have to wait and see what happens.
D.D. Driver,
You need to read the opinion- it literally does not open U.S. taxpayers to taxation on unrealized income. This Indian business was treated at a pass-through corporation which seems to be proper given the taxes it, the company, actually paid. The majority explicitly states this is the case. Now, I more or less side with Thomas on this issue, but I see the point the majority is making and it is a close call.
Now, of course, the Democrats will claim the case does exactly what you claim it will do, and shamelessly so.
who are we talking about here, read the talking point ignore the issue, those who care such things do the reverse, the game of telephone is darkly amusing,
I think Althouse covered the Gonzales v Trevino case at some point, but I can't remember when exactly. So it appears the court agreed that Gonzales can sue Trevino. I have a vague memory of supporting Gonzales' petition because it looked like a bill of attainder, smelled like a bill of attainder, and walked like a bill of attainder, and I remember being interested to see if the progressives would support Gonzales like they normally would or if they would dissent knowing the same thing was already being done to Trump in a very similar manner- literally creating new violations of laws that had never been used before in the manner they are being used. I guess the progressives decided not to fight on that hill.
I went back a year, I don't think so, but it could be, depends what talking point works best, they discovered scalias dissent in morrison, and blasted it like a marvel promotion, well may be not that effectively, wten it came to fitzgerald and mueller it was the seriousness of the charge,
American courts once ruled — probably correctly — that the US constitution didn't permit federal income tax. So congress passed and state legislatures ratified the sixteenth amendment to the constitution enabling such taxes.
If there's a need for and strong support for a wealth tax, and it can't be written in a way that fits with current constitutional powers, passing another amendment remains an option.
Kavanaugh feels like a modern judge, who despite all opposition doesn't loose sight of the forest between the trees. As opposed to Clarence Thomas who's seemingly hellbent on interpreting everything literally, consequences be damned.
the details are a little sketchy but events in the last dozen yeara have made more skeptical of claims of broad prosecutorial discretion,
And in news from another Supreme Court, the Wisconsin SC has ruled that sidewalks are not “pedestrian ways” for purposes of screwing homeowners via abuse of eminent domain.
Dare I snark that they must have received their JDs from Wisconsin Law?
https://x.com/PhilHollowayEsq/status/1803827367665967217
just another day in hazard I mean fulton county
https://x.com/PhilHollowayEsq/status/1803827367665967217
Oh, DD, some day you might learn how to read:
(d) The Court’s holding is narrow and limited to entities treated as pass-throughs. Nothing in this opinion should be read to authorize any hypothetical congressional effort to tax both an entity and its shareholders or partners on the same undistributed income realized by the entity.
Have you read Thomas's dissent? Apparently, not. This is how it goes: "The Moores are correct. Sixteenth Amendment 'incomes' include only income realized by the taxpayer."
That would have shut down the wealth tax. That is what the holding should have been. The Court had an opportunity to shut down the nascent wealth tax and they punted. And this decision will be used to argue that "unrealized income" is taxable.
Kavanaugh and Barrett suck.
just another day in hazard I mean fulton county
Public servant privilege.
h, and so long as Roberts remains on the Court,, you really dont' get to bitch about Trump's SCOTUS picks. Esp compared to Souter and Kennedy
I can bitch about whatever everything that sucks. The difference between me and you is I can bitch about Roberts and bitch about Kavanaugh and Barrett. All at the same time! Look at me go! I do not have to play act like Kavanaugh and Barrett are not big government squishes. (Technically, neither do you.)
Progressive judges exercise a liberal license to interpretation of emanations they receive from the penumbra... the twilight fringe. There are diverse precedents. Take a knee. Let us bray.
And in news from another Supreme Court, the Wisconsin SC has ruled that sidewalks are not “pedestrian ways” for purposes of screwing homeowners via abuse of eminent domain
Remember when we passed a Constitutional amendment in Wisconsin to prevent eminent domain abuse and also remember this?
The Trump "conservative" movement fucking loves eminent domain.
"I think eminent domain is wonderful" Donald Trump
“They are unconstitutional, as well as a European holdover from the feudal system. If you have to remit anything for owning property, you are renting it, not owning it.“
Land reform in England and Continental Europe in the 19 th century was done by elimination of inheritance by the first born ( and entailment, a law that family land could not be sold) and by property tax. Landed elites could not just sit there and own land anymore. They needed to marry American heiresses. This was probably better than a communist revolution, but the English were too bloodyminded to allow one anyway.
Talk about Germans, but it takes the English to make the gutters run with blood. That trait was eliminated from the population after the world wars killed the hearty, and now England is sissified.
the difference is you don't care about the law, we've established that,
one is an opinion by a developer who might have need for eminent domain, one is a generalized policy, see that terrible court opinion kelo more than a decade ago,
Greg the Class Traitor: "Like I said in my first post on this, I think the majority got it wrong.
But not as wrong as DD got it, when he claimed this decision creates a precedent for a wealth tax. That's the commentary of an uniformed buffoon,
Which fits DD to a T"
Indeed.
Which brings up the next obvious question: who, exactly, is D.D. Driver supporting in the Presidential race?
This was Trump's law validated by Trump's justices.
The federal govt does not levy property taxes. Only States do and the Sixteenth Amendment applies only to federal taxes.
no it was paul ryans law he drew up the parameters, try to be less stupid, I know its a challenge,
a repatriation tax is sound if it involves active income,
"Rich": "As opposed to Clarence Thomas who's seemingly hellbent on interpreting everything literally, consequences be damned."
Yes. I prefer SC justices to READ the Constitution, ruling on the written words, NOT making up shite that they READ INTO it. Like ObamaCare. Like Roe v. Wade. Or Kelo v. New London.
I want originalism, not "wise Latina" fiction. Heller was a refreshing change. Stop with the separation of church and state nonsense and go with the original language. Thank God for Thomas, Alito, and Scalia. Roberts is an imbecile. The DEI appointments (that the Left approved of) all suck.
"Yes. I prefer SC justices to READ the Constitution, ruling on the written words, NOT making up shite that they READ INTO it."
Leftards are really unhappy when they can't use the court to make up shit to get around what the Constitution actually says.
"Yes. I prefer SC justices to READ the Constitution, ruling on the written words, NOT making up shite that they READ INTO it."
Leftards are really unhappy when they can't use the court to make up shit to get around what the Constitution actually says.
Mason G said, "Leftards are really unhappy when they can't use the court to make up shit to get around what the Constitution actually says."
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Just like they do in other countries, which they would love to turn us into.
"Just like they do in other countries, which they would love to turn us into."
It certainly looks that way. When emanations and penumbras get you what you want, it's all good. And when "shall not be infringed" doesn't get you what you want, you just go ahead with whatever infringements you can get away with. Because reasons.
"Rich": "As opposed to Clarence Thomas who's seemingly hellbent on interpreting everything literally, consequences be damned."
Yes, moron, that is the JOB of a judge.
If the law sucks, it's teh job of the legislature to pass new, better, laws, and the executive to sign / vote them. It's NOT the job of teh executive or judicial branches to "fix" them
Yancey Ward said...
I have a vague memory of supporting Gonzales' petition because it looked like a bill of attainder, smelled like a bill of attainder, and walked like a bill of attainder, and I remember being interested to see if the progressives would support Gonzales like they normally would or if they would dissent knowing the same thing was already being done to Trump in a very similar manner- literally creating new violations of laws that had never been used before in the manner they are being used. I guess the progressives decided not to fight on that hill.
The 3 progressives on SCOTUS are all smart enough to understand that precedents can come back to bite them.
Which apparently puts them about 50 IQ points better than every other progressive in America
D.D. Driver said...
Have you read Thomas's dissent? Apparently, not. This is how it goes: "The Moores are correct. Sixteenth Amendment 'incomes' include only income realized by the taxpayer."
That would have shut down the wealth tax
Yes, it would have. Like I said, I agree with Thomas on this one.
But it's not the only way to "shut down the wealth tax".
Which you would realize, if you had a functioning brain
Kavanaugh and Barrett suck.
JUSTICE BARRETT, with whom JUSTICE ALITO joins, concurring in the judgment:
Yeah, and that pansy leftists Altio, he sucks too, right DD?
D.D. Driver said...
so long as Roberts remains on the Court, you really don't get to bitch about Trump's SCOTUS picks. Esp compared to Souter and Kennedy
I can bitch about whatever everything that sucks. The difference between me and you is I can bitch about Roberts and bitch about Kavanaugh and Barrett. All at the same time! Look at me go! I do not have to play act like Kavanaugh and Barrett are not big government squishes. (Technically, neither do you.)
Why yes, if you're an intelectually and emotionally retarded loser, you can whine about all the "bad judges".
But when yo whine that "Trump's judges aren't that good", to qualify as a person with a functioning brain you have to compare them to the alternative.
So, Trump's judges suck? Compared to what? Bush's judges? No, they suck at least as much. Biden's judges? Obama's judges? The people Hillary would have appointed?
Barrette is massively superior to RBG. Kavanaugh is massively superior to Kennedy. Gorsuch isn't as good as Scalia, but he's infinitely superior to Garland, or anyone else Obama or Hillary would have picked.
Those "big government squishes" Kavanaugh and Barrette voted for Dobbs and Bruen.
Reality check: Trump's judicial picks have saved our liberties from the depredations the Left would have engaged in if he hadn't won in 2016. Trump winning in 2024 will mean more good judicial picks, and a SCOTUS that is far more respectful of our rights than what we'll get if a Democrat wins.
If you do not favor Trump over any possible Democrat opponent, then you are neither a Republican, nor a conservative, in any meaningful sense of either word
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