East & Mount Houston Independent School District v. South Texas Lumber Co.

Our petitioner, East and Mount Houston Independent School District, sought as plaintiff to collect ad valorem taxes on mineral interests of the defendant-respondent, South Texas Lumber Company, and has lost in both the trial court and Court of Civil Appeals. 269 S.W.2d 692.

The respondent’s defense was that the valuations underlying the taxes in question, which were several times the more or less nominal values rendered by the respondent, were based, not on market values, but on an arbitrary formula, applied alike to all producing oil properties and consisting of the estimated daily production…