United States v. Nye County
Opinion
Lead Opinion
Kozinski, J.
After getting off to a memorable start in M’Culloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.) 316 , 4 L.Ed. 579 (1819) 1 the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity has deteriorated into a morass of “inconsistent decisions and excessively delicate distinctions,” United States v. New Mexico, 455 U.S. 720, 730 , 102 S.Ct. 1373 , 71 L.Ed.2d 580 (1982). 2 We venture into the bog yet again to evaluate Nevada’s latest effort to squeeze some tax revenue from the activities of its largest landowner, the United States Government.
When these parties last came to visit, we held that Nevada’s tax on federal property used by government contractors violated the Supremacy Clause. See United States v. Nye County Nev., 938 F.2d 1040, 1041 (9th Cir.1991). Learning from its mistakes, the Nevada legislature modified its law to tax federal contractors’ beneficial use of federal property, rather than the property itself. See Nev. Rev. Stat § 361.157 (1997) (real property); id. § 361.159 (personal property). The United States and various of its contractors returned to district court, claiming that such linguistic acrobatics cannot save the Nevada statutes from constitutional infirmity.