Morgan Adams, Inc. v. County of Los Angeles

Appeal by defendant County of Los

Angeles from a judgment rendered against it upon its declination to answer plaintiff’s complaint, following the overruling of demurrer thereto.

The action ivas one to recover under Political Code, section 3819, a certain item of $19,416.91, paid under protest as taxes levied by said defendant for the year 1926 upon a certain piece of real property in said county upon which was located a ten-story class A concrete building of the assessed value of $501,730. Said building, together with the ground thereunder necessary for its use, was at the time in question leased by plaintiff to the Southern California Telephone Company, a public utility corporation, and was used exclusively by the latter corporation for office quarters for its various departments. It is conceded that the said building and ground thereunder were at all times legitimately used by said telephone company as a part of its operative property. Respondent states the sole question involved in the following language:

This identical question, involving this same telephone company, has, since the institution of this present action, been passed upon and determined by the Supreme Court of…