V-1 Oil Company v. State Tax Commission

This action was commenced by the plaintiff appellants, V-1 Oil Company, a gasoline retail dealer, and Blair Dean, Inc., a gasoline wholesale dealer, against the defendant respondent State Tax Commission for the recovery of motor fuel excise taxes which V-1 and Blair Dean allege to have paid pursuant to the requirements of a statute which they contend was ineffective for a three month period during which the statute was enforced by the Tax Commission. The controversy arose because 1972 I.S.L., ch. 209, which was approved on March 22, 1972, amended then existing I.C. § 49-1210 (which has since been repealed) by raising the motor fuel excise tax from 7 cents per gallon to 8 1/2 cents per gallon and provided that the act should be in full force and effect on and after April 1, 1972. However, the act did not include an emergency clause, i. e., a declaration that an emergency existed and that because of the emergency the act would become effective earlier than it would become effective in the absence of an emergency. Because chapter 209 provided that its effective date was April 1, 1972, which was only seven days after March 25, 1972, the date the legislature adjourned, chapter 209 was obviously in conflict with Art. 3, § 22, of the Idaho Constitution, which provides: