National Railroad Passenger Corp. v. United States

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge TATEL.

TATEL, Circuit Judge.

In this case, we must decide whether a statute imposing a tax on telephone calls for which the toll charge “varies in amount with the distance and elapsed transmission time of each individual communication” covers long-distance telephone charges varying by time but not by distance. The district court concluded that the statute does not cover such charges, and we agree.

I

Section 4251 of the Internal Revenue Code imposes a tax on “toll telephone service,” defined in section 4252(b) as(1) a telephonic quality communication…