LAW
I practice corporate
and technology law in Charlotte, North Carolina with
The Business Law
Advisors. (more)
There are many questions about which a lawyer can be quick
or be sure, but is unlikely to be both.
– Ed Williams, "I know the cell phone
is wonderful, but...." The Charlotte Observer, March
23, 2008
Friday,
April 20, 2007 - The Other Branch of Government.
The law is something of a mystery to most people. In
fact, it's apparently a mystery to a good many North
Carolina state lawmakers. North Carolina's legislative
branch of government (the General Assembly), with the
apparent acquiescence of the executive branch (headed by the
Governor), has historically been a little tight in
allocating funds to the judicial branch. Consequently,
the judicial branch is heavily burdened and
lacks the resources to provide North Carolina citizens with
the level of service the citizens should be able to expect.
Every time the General Assembly or the Governor grandstands
on a law enforcement issue (i.e., uses public policy hot
buttons to pander for your vote) and
enacts a new law, the burden to enforce the new law falls not
just on the police but also on the courts. The police
have a hard enough time getting the funding they need to
properly enforce existing law; the courts inevitably end up
with what is called an "unfunded mandate."
But unfunded mandates are the least of the problems for the
judicial branch.
(more)
Tuesday,
March 13, 2007 -
Property Taxes (civic pneumonia).
A while back, I received a tax notice from the Catawba County Tax
Collector for the boat I keep on Lake Norman in Catawba Country. A
few weeks later, I received a tax notice from the Mecklenburg County Tax
Collector for the same boat, which, as I said, is kept on Lake Norman in
Catawba County. As it turns out, Mecklenburg Country uses database
software to identify taxable property owned by Mecklenburg County
residents but kept outside Mecklenburg Country. I understand that
I do not have to pay the Mecklenburg County tax if I can show
that I paid taxes on the property in the country in which the property
is kept. Sounds fair, right? I'm not so sure. As far
as Mecklenburg County is concerned, the presumption is that the tax
payer did not pay property taxes in another county, and the
burden is on the tax payer to rebut the presumption with proof of
payment elsewhere. Since the
instructions that come with the tax notice do not clearly explain how a
taxpayer is supposed to contest the County's assertion that the property
is subject to Mecklenburg Country taxes, I suspect many bewildered
or worn out taxpayers end up paying taxes in two jurisdictions.
This tax policy
feels a little like a brazen attempt by Mecklenburg County to get a bite
at tax revenue that it is not entitled to. So, maybe it's
not so fair after all.
"It is revolting to have no better
reason for a rule of law than that so it was laid down in
the time of Henry IV. It is still more revolting if the
grounds upon which it was laid down have vanished long
since, and the rule simply persists from blind imitation of
the past."
– from “The Path of the Law,”
by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.,
10 Harvard Law Review 457 (1897)
Copyright
© 2005 Ashe
Lockhart. All rights reserved.
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