Aaron Zacks and Florence Zacks v. United States

WHITAKER, Judge.

Plaintiffs sue for the recovery of an overpayment of income taxes by reason of having reported royalties received from patents as ordinary income. They allege that the amount paid was correctly computed according to the law, as interpreted by the rulings of the Internal Revenue Bureau, at the time it was paid, but that later Congress amended the Internal Revenue Code retroactively so as to provide that the amount received as royalties should be returned as capital gains rather than as ordinary income, which resulted in an overpayment.

The defendant interposes the defense that…