tax law

tax law, body of rules under which a public authority has a claim on taxpayers, requiring them to transfer to the authority part of their income or property. The power to impose taxes is generally recognized as a right of governments. The tax law of a nation is usually unique to it, although there are similarities and common elements in the laws of various countries.

In general, tax law is concerned only with the legal aspects of taxation, not with its financial, economic, or other aspects. The making of decisions as to the merits of various kinds of taxes, the general level of taxation, and the rates of specific taxes, for example, does not fall into the domain of tax law; it is a political, not a legal, process.

Tax law falls within the domain of public law—i.e., the rules that determine and limit the activities and reciprocal interests of the political community and the members composing it—as distinguished from relationships between individuals (the sphere of private law). International tax law is concerned with the problems arising when an individual or corporation is taxed in several countries. Tax law can also be divided into material tax law, which is the analysis of the legal provisions giving rise to the charging of a tax; and formal tax law, which concerns the rules laid down in the law as to assessment, enforcement, procedure, coercive measures, administrative and judicial appeal, and other such matters.

The development of tax law as a comprehensive, general system is a recent phenomenon. One reason for this is that no general system of taxation existed in any country before the middle of the 19th century. In traditional, essentially agrarian, societies, government revenues were drawn either from nontax sources (such as tribute, income from the royal domains, and land rent) or, to a lesser extent, from taxes on various objects (land taxes, tolls, customs, and excises). Levies on income or capital were not considered an ordinary means for financing government. They appeared first as emergency measures. The British system of income taxation, for example, one of the oldest in the world, originated in the act of 1799 as a temporary means for meeting the increasing financial burden of the Napoleonic Wars. Another reason for the relatively recent development of tax law is that the burden of taxation—and the problem of definite limits to the taxing power of public authority—became substantial only with the broadening in the concept of the proper sphere of government that has accompanied the growing intervention of modern states in economic, social, cultural, and other matters.

The limits to the right of the public authority to impose taxes are set by the power that is qualified to do so under constitutional law. In a democratic system this power is the legislature, not the executive or the judiciary. The constitutions of some countries may allow the executive to impose temporary quasi-legislative measures in time of emergency, however, and under certain circumstances the executive may be given power to alter provisions within limits set by the legislature. The legality of taxation has been asserted by constitutional texts in many countries, including the United States, France, Brazil, and Sweden. In Great Britain, which has no written constitution, taxation is also a prerogative of the legislature.

The historical origins of this principle are identical with those of political liberty and representative government—the right of the citizens

to take cognizance, either personally or through their representatives, of the need for the public contributions, to agree to it freely, to follow its use and to determine its proportion, basis, collection and duration

(in the words of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen proclaimed in the first days of the French Revolution, August 1789). Other precedents may be found in the English Bill of Rights of 1689 and the rule “no taxation without consent” laid down in the Declaration of Independence of the United States.

Under this principle all that is necessary is that the rights of the tax administration and the corresponding obligations of the taxpayer be specified in the law; that is, in the text adopted by the people’s representatives. The implementation of the tax laws is generally regulated by the executive power (the government or the tax bureau).

There have been many encroachments on the principle of the legality of taxation: Sometimes the base or the rate of taxation is determined by government decree rather than by law. The encroachment of the executive power on the territory reserved to the legislature in matters of taxation is generally explained by the need to make tax policy more flexible; urgent amendments may be required by sudden changes in the economic situation, changes so sudden that recourse to relatively slow parliamentary procedure would take too long. A compromise may be reached between the orthodox doctrine of the legality of taxes and the need, under special circumstances, to amend texts on taxation almost immediately, by modifying the text through a decree or an order of the executive (treasury) and ratifying it by the legislative power as soon as possible thereafter.

Restraints on the taxing power are generally imposed by tradition, custom, and political considerations; in many countries there are also constitutional limitations. Certain limitations on the taxing power of the legislature are self-evident. As a practical matter, as well as a matter of (constitutional) law, there must be a minimum connection between the subject of taxation and the taxing power. The extent of income-tax jurisdiction, for example, is essentially determined by two main criteria: the residence (or nationality) of the taxpayer and his source of income. (The application of both criteria together in cases where the taxpayer’s residence and his source of income are in different countries often results in burdensome double taxation, although the problem can be avoided or restricted by international treaties.) Taxes other than income taxes—such as retail-sales taxes, turnover taxes, inheritance taxes, registration fees, and stamp duties—are imposed by the authority (national or local) on whose territory the goods are delivered or the taxable assets are located.

Another self-evident limitation on the taxing power of the public authority is that the same authority cannot impose the same tax twice on the same person on the same ground.

Taxes are generally not levied retroactively, except in special circumstances. One example of retroactive taxation was the taxation of wartime benefits in some European countries by legislation enacted in 1945 when the war and enemy occupation were over.

A common limitation on the taxing power is the requirement that all citizens be treated alike. This requirement is specified in the U.S. Constitution. A similar provision in other constitutions is that all citizens are equal and that no privileges can be granted in tax matters. The rule is often violated through the influence of pressure groups, however; it is also difficult to enforce and to interpret unambiguously. In countries in which local governments are under the control of the national government, a local tax can be nullified by the central authority on the ground that it violates the national constitution if it transgresses the rule of uniformity and equality of taxpayers.

Aside from the foregoing constitutional, traditional, or political limitations, there is no restraint on the taxing power of the legislative body. Once enacted by the legislature, a tax cannot be judicially restrained. There is no way of mounting a legal attack upon a tax law on the ground that it is arbitrary or unjust, but the application of the law must be correct.