Administration of tax laws

The second phase in levying taxes is the calculation of the amount to be paid. In the American self-assessment method, the liability for income tax is primarily established by the taxpayer himself. Under this method, as a rule, the tax liability reported on the return forms the basis of the assessment record. If the tax administration discovers that additional tax is due, a deficiency statement is issued. Virtually all countries that levy income taxes require withholding on wages and salaries. In some cases the withheld tax discharges the taxpayer’s liability and there is no obligation (and sometimes no opportunity) to file a tax return. Many countries provide for prepayment of the withholding tax on dividends and other income from personal property and have set up a “pay-as-you-go” system for professional income. Such provisional payments are calculated by the taxpayer. Advance payment of all or part of the income tax (on a voluntary or compulsory basis) before the return is filed, on the basis of expected income or of the taxable income of the previous year, is also provided for in some countries. In general, however, the final computation of taxes levied on income, on inherited property, or on the transfer of property is made by the tax administration. Sales taxes and value-added taxes are calculated by the taxpayers.

If the taxpayer fails to pay within the legally prescribed period, or within a very short time afterward, the competent tax office undertakes to collect the amount due. In proceedings against the taxpayer, the tax administration is not in the position of an ordinary creditor suing an ordinary debtor. The law confers a privileged position on the tax administration among the creditors of the taxpayer.

In addition to interest charges on the amount due, various kinds of coercive measures are available to ensure payment. Civil penalties consist generally of a fine added by the collecting agent when the violation is the result of negligence rather than of willful neglect or bad faith. Examples of negligence are the failure to file a required return on time and understatement or underpayment of the tax liability without intent to mislead. Civil penalties are fixed by assessment, so that the procedural remedies of the taxpayer are identical with those provided for the assessment of the tax itself.

Criminal tax fraud is severely punished in some countries; in others failure to fulfill one’s fiscal obligations is seen as no different from failure to meet other financial obligations. Certain tax crimes are classed as misdemeanours (such as willful failure to pay certain taxes, to file certain returns, to keep proper records, and to supply proper information); these are punishable by fines or imprisonment or both. Heavier punishment is provided for crimes classed as felonies (such as the making of false statements and, in the United States, tax evasion). In most countries the criminal penalties can be combined with the civil penalties.

Criminal penalties cannot be imposed by the tax administration. Offenses against tax law, whether misdemeanours or felonies, must be tried by courts. The procedure in criminal tax cases is almost identical with that in other criminal cases. The accused is deemed to be innocent until proved guilty; the burden of the proof inevitably rests upon the prosecutor and not upon the taxpayer-defendant.

The taxpayer has a guarantee against unfairness or error in the application of taxes in the right to appeal to competent, impartial authorities when he disagrees with the determination of the assessing officer.

In some countries disputes between taxpayers and the tax administration are settled by special commissions consisting of high-ranking civil servants (and also of members of various occupational organizations). In others, the decision is the privilege of the judiciary power. In the vast majority of countries, however, a combination of both systems prevails. “Out-of-court” jurisdictions—commissions composed of tax officials and laymen—frequently act as preliminary settlement committees that decide factual questions, leaving the interpretation of the tax law to the courts. In general, when a taxpayer disagrees with the amounts of the tax as calculated by the administration, or thinks he has paid too much, he files a petition with a tribunal, which may be either a specialized court or the ordinary court competent for civil litigation. Even if he must exhaust the administrative processes before he may take a dispute with the tax authorities to court, he can still invoke the jurisdiction of a judicial court to reexamine the case, in respect both of the facts and of the legal arguments.

In almost all countries, the judiciary is headed by a supreme court whose jurisdiction is limited to questions of law. The supreme court is generally competent in tax matters, but an appeal to the court must be based solely on an alleged misapplication of law; should it appear that questions of fact or mixed questions of law and fact are involved, the claim, under most judicial systems, is dismissed. (The U.S. Supreme Court can also decide on the constitutionality of an act of the legislative power.) The judiciary thus has final authority to interpret the tax statute. This interpretation is binding only in the matter submitted to the tribunal. But, in any legal system, reference to interpretative decisions of the courts in comparable cases, especially of the supreme court, is obviously the best argument in a litigation about a disputed point of tax law.

When a legal text—in tax law or in other law—requires interpretation because there is a reasonable doubt as to its meaning or scope, the first step is to determine the meaning of the words used, according to the rules of grammar and syntax, not in isolation but in their context and taking into account the subject discussed. As stated by U.S. Treasury tax lawyer Randolph E. Paul, “the meaning of a sentence may be more than that of the separate words, as a melody is more than the notes” (Taxation in the United States, 1954). This is the necessary “literal” interpretation of the law: when the current sense of a term is its wide sense, then it must be accepted in its wide sense in a tax law as in any other, unless it can be shown that the legislature used the term in a narrower sense. If the meaning of the text cannot be determined with certainty by the literal method, then the interpreter, in seeking the legislature’s intention, will resort to the “historical” method (the study both of the preparatory work and of the place occupied by the text in successive laws on a specific matter) and to the “systematic” or “teleological” interpretation (the position occupied by a legal provision in a legal system as a whole, and the object pursued by the legislature in producing that system).

In addition to these general principles common to the interpretation of all legal texts, some special rules apply to the interpretation of tax laws. One rule is the autonomy of tax law, meaning that tax laws pursue aims that are different from those of other bodies of law. The tax claim is a claim under public law. Its cause lies not in a contractual obligation but in an expression of unilateral will, a decision by the public authority. The function of taxes in the organization of the budget is incompatible with the principles of the law of contracts; such principles apply only to relationships under private law and, therefore, cannot be invoked to interpret provisions of tax law.

Other special rules of interpretation of tax laws derive from the nature of the tax obligation. In a democratic system, a tax can only be imposed by law. Thus the courts or the administration do not have a “creative power” to make things or operations taxable through an analogic interpretation of the text, in cases where it is not proved that the legislature wished them to be taxable. On the other hand, the rule of legality of taxation does not always operate in favour of the taxpayer: the person or body entrusted with the task of applying or interpreting the law cannot introduce any attenuation or relaxation of its effect, even though this might be more than amply justified by circumstances, except in cases where the legislature has authorized the judge or the administration to apply the rules of equity within certain legally prescribed limits.

Among legal publications specializing in taxation are The Tax Lawyer (quarterly); and Taxes (monthly). Proposals for tax reform and legislative, judicial, and regulatory developments in the United States are reported in Tax Notes (weekly).