Tax Comm. v. Clark, Exrx.

CUSHING, J. . Jesse Clark died Sept. 25, 1921 owning 8,567 shares of capital stock in the Union Central Life Insurance Co. The par value of the stock was $20 a share. The Probate Court, acting under the inheritance tax statutes, directed the Auditor to appraise the property at its actual market value; and the Auditor found its value to be $25 per share. The Probate Court appraised the property de novo and fixed its value at $40 per share. The Hamilton Common Pleas, on appeal, found the value to be $30 a share, on the theory that the payment of cash dividends on the stock was the basis of its valuation. The Tax Commission prosecuted error to reverse this judgment and the Court of Appeals held: 1. Section 5341 GC. provides that the property is to be appraised' at its actual market value. 2. Since the stock of this Company was not for sale or offered on the market, means other than by sale would have to- be resorted to in order to determine the actual market value. 3. To appraise means to value property at what it is worth so that actual market value means actual value. 4. The cash dividends on the stock would not be the criterion by which the property should be valued for inheritance tax purposes, nor is the earning capacity of the Company the proper basis for fixing the value of the stock. 5. The actual market value will be construed to mean actual value only for the purpose of taxation; the right to succession being based upon the tax paid. 6. The ascertaining of the actual value of the capital stock is left to- the judgment of the appraisers who have a right to resort to all tests and measures of value which men ordinarily adopt for business purposes in estimating values of property. 7. The right of succession was to be based on the payment of the tax of the actual market value which value should be fixed from a consideration of the fact that stockholders own the capital stock, its surplus and franchise; and not in assuming the dividend earning capacity as the basis for fixing valuation. Judgment reversed and cause remanded.