Title Insurance & Trust Co. v. City of Los Angeles

These are two actions in each of which the plaintiff seeks to recover an amount paid by it as a license fee demanded under the provisions of Ordinance No. 39600 (N. S.) of the city of Los Angeles. The payments were made under protest. Judgment has been entered in each case in favor of the plaintiff, and the defendant city appeals therefrom. The eases have been submitted jointly, for the reason that the questions involved in them are identical.

Section 12 of said ordinance provides for a license tax to be paid by “every person, firm or corporation conducting, managing or carrying on the business of examining, searching or investigating titles to real estate and issuing abstracts, statements or certificates, showing or purporting to show or certify to the condition or state of the title to any particular property or properties as disclosed by an examination of the public records, but which abstract, statement or certificate does not insure or purport to insure the title to real property or any interest therein.”

Section 14 of article XIII of the constitution of the state of California was adopted on the eighth day of November, 1910. It provides for taxes to be levied against…