Harper v. Virginia Department of Taxation

In Davis v. Michigan Dept. of Treasury, 489 U.S. 803 (1989), the Supreme Court of the United States declared that state taxation of pension income of retired federal government employees, while exempting from taxation pension income of retired state government employees, violated the doctrine of intergovernmental tax immunity embodied in the supremacy clause of the Constitution of the United States. The Supreme Court, however, did not decide whether its decision in Davis had retrospective application.

In these consolidated appeals, the appellants (collectively, Harper) are retired federal…