Mountain States Telephone & Telegraph Co. v. Salt Lake County

I dissent because, in my view, the Legislature has clearly conferred upon counties the power to impose a franchise tax for revenue purposes. Utah Code Ann., 1953, section 17-5-27, provides that a county “may license for purpose of regulation and revenue all and every kind of business not prohibited by law....” Similar language in the Utah Code dealing with the powers of cities and towns has been uniformly construed to permit cities and towns to impose a license or franchise tax for revenue purposes only. E.g., Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Co. v. Ogden City, 26 Utah 2d 190, 487 P.2d…