Mid-Northern Oil Co. v. Walker

This suit was brought by the Oil Company to enjoin the enforcement of an annual license tax imposed by a state statute (Montana Revised Codes, 1921, §§ 2397-2408) 1 upon persons producing petroleum, etc., equal to one per centum of the gross value of the oil produced during the year. The statute, as applied to the company, is assailed as invalid, upon the ground that the. company, by assignment, of the original leases, is a lessee of the United States of certain public lands entered as homesteads but not yet granted by patent, upon which it. is engaged in prospecting for and producing crude…