Florida Dep\u2019t of Revenue v. Seminole Tribe of Florida, 4D10-456
\nJune 22, 2011<\/p>\n
The issue of the taxability of gasoline sales to the Seminole Tribe made off the reservation was presented to the Fourth District Court of Appeal.\u00a0 The trial court granted the Seminole Tribe\u2019s motion for summary judgment while denying the Department of Revenue\u2019s (\u201cDOR\u201d) motion for summary judgment.\u00a0 The trial court held that the Indian Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution prohibited the State of Florida from taxing any fuel consumed by the tribe on the reservation.
\nThe Fourth DCA performed a de novo review of the matter and held that the Seminole Tribe was not entitled to a refund for taxes on gasoline purchased off the reservation, regardless of where or how it was used. The Court relied on Wagnon v. Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation, 546 U.S. 95 (2005), where the Supreme Court upheld a motor-fuel tax imposed on non-Indian distributers who purchased the fuel off the reservation but ultimately delivered it to gas stations owned by the tribe and located on tribal lands.\u00a0 In contrast, this case dealt with the purchase of gasoline outside of tribal lands by members of the Seminole Tribe. The Fourth DCA noted that it would be impossible to track the usage of the fuel.\u00a0 Also, the Court acknowledged that because the tribe reaps the benefit of untaxed gasoline purchased on the reservation regardless of where it is used, common sense would suggest that fuel purchased off the reservation should be subject to the fuel tax, regardless of where it is used.\u00a0 As a result, the Court reversed the trial court\u2019s grant of summary judgment in favor of the Seminole Tribe and held that \u201coff-reservation transactions, even by tribal members, are susceptible of taxation without running afoul of the Indian Commerce Clause.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Florida Dep\u2019t of Revenue v. Seminole Tribe of Florida, 4D10-456 June 22, 2011 The issue of the taxability of gasoline sales to the Seminole Tribe made off the reservation was presented to the Fourth District Court of Appeal.\u00a0 The trial court granted the Seminole Tribe\u2019s motion for summary judgment while denying the Department of Revenue\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1811,1819],"tags":[2004,2005,2006,2007,1932,2008,2009,2010,2011,2012,2013,2014,2015,2016,2017,2018,2019,2020,1926,2021,1885,2022,2023,2024,1912,2025,2026,2027],"class_list":["post-2213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-4th-dca-rulings","category-taxation","tag-de-novo-review","tag-department-of-revenue","tag-distributors","tag-florida-department-of-revenue","tag-fourth-dca","tag-fourth-district-court-of-appeal","tag-fuel-tax","tag-gas-stations","tag-gasoline-sales","tag-indian-commerce-clause","tag-indian-lands","tag-motion-for-summary-judgment","tag-motor-fuel-tax","tag-prohibited","tag-refund","tag-reservation","tag-seminole-tribe","tag-seminole-tribe-of-florida","tag-state-of-florida","tag-state-taxation","tag-summary-judgment","tag-supreme-court","tag-taxing","tag-triabal-lands","tag-trial-court","tag-u-s-constitution","tag-united-states-constitution","tag-wagnon-v-prairie-band-potawatomi-nation"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2213\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssrga.com\/appellate\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}