John Marshall Harlan II

“ This is particularly so in that Opelika places no comparable flat-sum tax on local merchants. Wholesale grocers whose deliveries originate in Opelika, instead of paying $250 annually, are taxed a sum graduated according to their gross receipts. Such an Opelika wholesaler would have to gross the sum of $280,000 in sales in one year before his tax would reach the flat $250 amount imposed on all foreign grocers before they may set foot in the City. [3] The Commerce Clause forbids any such discrimination against the free flow of trade over state boundaries. ”

“ Section 130 (a) , of Ordinance No. 101-53 of the City of Opelika, as amended by Ordinance No. 103-53, provides that an annual privilege tax of $250 must be paid by any firm engaged in the wholesale grocery business which delivers, at wholesale, groceries in the City from points without the city. [1] Appellant is a Georgia corporation engaged in the wholesale grocery business in West Point, Georgia. It solicits business in the City of Opelika through salesmen ”

“ Thus a local wholesale grocer grossing $280,000 in one year would pay a sum of $75.00, plus 1/16 of one percent of his sales, that is, $175.00-a total of $250.00.
This work is in the public domain in the United States because it is a work of the United States federal government (see 17 U.S.C. 105) . ”