Hagerty v. General Motors Corp.

This case, like many others, involves problems that stem from the relationship between Illinois’ basic “sales” tax — the Retailers’ Occupation Tax Act — and other taxes designed to protect that basic tax from erosion. The complexity of this portion of the tax structure of the State of Illinois is due in large part to the view of the Constitution of 1870 that was expressed in a dictum in Bachrach v. Nelson (1932), 349 Ill. 579. (See Turner v. Wright (1957), 11 Ill.2d 161, and Thorpe v. Mahin (1969), 43 Ill.2d 36.) The complexity continues although the necessity for it no longer exists.

This…