~I 
ALASKA FISHERY AND FUR-SEAL INDUSTRIES, 1920. 2 
oil, amounting to $8,224, and the tax of $2 per ton on 1,037 tons of 
fish meal, amounting to $2,074, making a total tax of $10,298, for 
which judgment was asked, together with interest thereon at 8 per 
cent per annum from January 14, 1918. The second suit, for 1918 
taxes, was filed on February 17, 1919, to recover the tax of $2 per 
barrel on 2,720 barrels of fish oil, amounting to $5,440, and the tax 
of $2 per ton on 645 tons of fish meal, amounting to $1,290, making 
a total tax of $6,730, for which judgment was asked, together with 
interest thereon at 8 per cent per annum from January 15, 1919. 
Eight assignments of error were presented and based on the action 
of the trial court in sustaining demurrers, dismissing the complaints, 
denying plaintiff’s motion for judgment, and rendering judgment 
against the plaintiff, and thus upholding the constitutionality and 
validity of the act of the Territorial Legislature and the taxes im- 
posed thereby. The plaintiff company, through its attorney, filed a 
brief before the United States Supreme Court on December 2, 1920, 
setting forth at length the contention that the legislation imposing 
the tax, to avoid which this litigation was had, contravened and vio- 
lated the Constitution of the United States, particularly the fifth and 
fourteenth amendments, in that the plaintiff was denied the equal 
protection of the law and was deprived of its liberty and property 
without the process of law; that the legislative classification of plain- 
tiff’s business was so arbitrary and unreasonable as to constitute 
class legislation, and that the tax was confiscatory and prohibitive, 
and that it was not laid on other businesses or industries which were 
essentially the same as plaintiff’s business; that the legislation was a 
clear abuse of the Territory’s legislative authority, and that it ac- 
complished, by means of an intentionally arbitrary and confisca- 
tory exaction imposed under the guise of a tax, the unauthorized 
destruction and confiscation of a lawful pursuit; that the legislation 
was a clear, arbitrary discrimination against the manufacture of fish 
oil and fish meal from herring in whole or in part, although there 
was no reasonable distinction between that business and other busi- 
nesses in all essentials similar thereto carried on in Alaska upon 
which no tax whatsoever was laid; that the legislation, if deemed to 
be a police regulation, was unreasonable and unauthorized, as Con- 
gress had expressly reserved police supervision and control of the 
fisheries to itself; that the legislation was extortionate, unfair, and 
prohibitive, and so confiscatory as to result in a tax of 113.64 per cent 
of the net profits for one year; and that the legislation and the taxes 
imposed thereby violated the Alaska Organic Act in that they were 
not uniform on all occupations or businesses, nor were they uniform 
on all businesses of the same class; that the tax exceeded | per cent 
of the actual value of plaintiff’s property, and that it was not levied 
or assessed on the actual value of the property, but was purely an 
arbitrary imposition in utter violation of the constitutional limita- 
tions of the Alaska Organic Act. 
On January 31, 1921, the Supreme Court handed down a decision 
affirming the judgment of the trial court. In view of its interest 
to the fishery industry of Alaska the opinion is here quoted in full, 
as follows: 
This is an action to recover the amount of taxes levied under statutes of Alaska 
which the plaintiff alleges to be contrary to the act of Congress of August 24, 
