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139 F.2d 945

Docket No. 87.

Benjamin v. Hoey

Second Circuit Court of Appeals

Decided Jan. 6, 1944.

Second Circuit Court of Appeals · decided 1944-01-06

2 counsel of record

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““The argument that it is not [income] runs thus: * * * If, without partners, he had conducted the brokerage business, he would have paid the entire amount of those commissions to himself and no one would then have thought of saying that these payments constituted part of his taxble income. Because he had partners, he paid out an amount equal to 62% of the commissions. The balance, 38%, or $25,439.91, always remained his. To put it differently, that sum he paid to himself, and what one pays to one's self cannot be part of one’s income. Nothing in any statute or decisions relating to a partner’s income leads to a different conclusion * * * [ 139 F.2d at 946 .]1””

quoted by 1 later decision, including Heggestad v. Commissioner

Relies on Neuberger v. Commissioner

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1944-01-06

How this case has been cited

Cited by 15 later decisions — most recently December 1993

6 federal appellate ·

60194419501960197019801990decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1*946Wellman, Smyth, Lowenstein & Fennelly, of New York City (Melvyn Gordon Lowenstein and F. Van Siclen Parr, Jr., both of New York City, of counsel), for plaintiffs.

¶2James B. McNally, of New York City (William L. Lynch, of 'New York City, of counsel), for defendant.

¶3Before L. HAND, CHASE, and FRANK, Circuit Judges.

¶4FRANK, Circuit Judge.

¶5The question is whether 38% of the. commissions paid by Benjamin to his firm and which the firm repaid to him constitutes part of his income. The argument that it is not runs thus: The moneys Benjamin paid for commissions were capital outlays. If, without partners, he had conducted the brokerage business, he would have paid the entire amount of those commissions to himself and no one would then have thought of saying that those payments constituted part of his taxable income. Because he had partners, he paid out an amount equal to 62% of the commissions. The balance, 38%, or $25,439.91, always remained his. To put it differently, that sum he paid to himself, and what one pays to one’s self cannot be part of one’s income. Nothing in any statute or decisions relating to a partner’s income leads to a different conclusion.1 Indeed, if the statute called for a tax here, it would perhaps be unconstitutional, i.e., not authorized by the Sixteenth Amendment.

¶6 With the foregoing argument we generally agree. But it is not entirely sustained by the record. For the evidence fails to show that the net income of the partnership, 38% of which belonged to Benjamin, included 38% of the commissions he paid, It may be that the firm’s commission business was not the sole source of its gross income, that, for instance, a portion of that income derived from interest and dividends in connection with which little or no expense was incurred. We therefore reverse and remand for a new trial at which the plaintiffs may offer evidence to show what portion of the $66,947.13 net partnership income came from the commissions which Benjamin paid.

¶7Reversed and remanded.

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