Posted on 08/27/2010 10:40:26 AM PDT by Drango
The Onondaga Nation will likely stop selling national-brand cigarettes next month and rely solely on Indian-made brands at its smoke shop south of Syracuse, a nation attorney said Thursday.
“Unless something changes, as of Sept. 1 we won’t be able to sell major brands that are untaxed,” said lawyer Joe Heath. “It doesn’t make that much sense to sell them at the same price as people can get them at the convenience store across the street.”
The Onondagas sold 1.2 million cartons of cigarettes last year tax-free. On Wednesday, the state will require wholesalers who supply Indian reservation stores to pay the $4.35 per-pack tax upfront and then collect it from the tribes.
Tribes say they won’t pay any New York taxes and will sell their own brands instead. The Oneida Indian Nation announced Wednesday it will move its cigarette manufacturing plant from Erie County to Oneida. The move will avoid the long arm of the state tax department, Oneida nation officials said.
Heath said the Onondaga will continue to sell brands made by Indian tribes and might launch its own cigarette-making operation in a building erected two years ago near the smoke shop on Route 11.
State tax officials would not speculate how they will handle trucks operated by sovereign Indian tribes transporting cigarettes on state roads from one reservation to another. Two weeks ago, tax agents stopped a truck carrying cigarettes from one Seneca reservation, where they were made, to another, then gave back the truck and cargo without pressing any charges.
On Thursday, Gov. David Paterson said the state won’t interfere with cigarettes made and sold on Indian reservations.
“They can make their own cigarettes and they can sell the cigarettes on the reservation as they are entitled to by federal law,” Paterson said on WOR-AM, in response to a question about the movement of the Oneida nation factory. “Once they come off, or anyone else comes off, of their sacred land with cigarettes that are not being taxed by New York state, we are going to address that issue.”
Paterson did not elaborate, and his spokesman did not respond to an e-mail seeking clarification.
Tribes have refused to collect the tax, citing their sovereignty and treaties dating to 1794. The last time the state tried to collect the tax, in 1997, protests erupted and tires were burned on the Thruway, shutting down a 30-mile stretch.
Paterson said he has been warned there might be violence again, but vowed the state will proceed.
“There will be quite an uprising and protest to this, but I am going to maintain this policy,” Paterson said. “The state police tell us over and over again that there could be violence and death as a result of some of the measures we’re taking.”
Seneca Indian President Barry Snyder has said that “violence is not on our agenda,” but the nation’s leadership acknowledges that some of the tribe’s more than 7,000 members might disagree.
The tax enforcement action might be postponed if a judge rules today in favor of the Seneca Nation of Indians, one of two tribes that have challenged the law in federal court. The Seneca and the St. Regis Mohawk Tribe argue that the law infringes on their sovereign rights and turns them into tax-collecting agencies for the state of New York.
The price break Indian retailers can offer has grown dramatically since 2008 as the state Legislature nearly tripled the cigarette tax, from $1.50 to $4.35 a pack. Name-brand cigarettes at non-Indian stores now sell for $8 to $10 a pack, while the tribes sell their own brands for about $4 per pack.
Indians are allowed to buy tax-free cigarettes from Indian retailers, but non-Indians must pay tax. The Seneca and Mohawk lawsuits focus on the state’s formula that would allot a certain amount of tax-free cigarettes to tribal members. The formula would allow the tribes to sell about 84 tax-free packs per tribal member per year.
The Onondaga Nation, with a population of 2,866, would get 242,400 packs a year. The tribe sold about 12 million packs last year.
Tribes can get more tax-free packs for their members under an alternative coupon system. The lawsuits say this is a time-consuming, expensive process that would force the tribes to do the state tax department’s work.
Tribes can also sign an agreement with the state and avoid having to charge their customers taxes at all. Heath said the Onondaga Nation is talking with the state, but declined to reveal details.
Other states have signed what are called “tax parity” agreements with tribes, which require the tribe to charge its own tax comparable to the state tax. While the state gets none of that money, advocates say it levels the playing field for non-Indian merchants by taking away the price advantage tribes enjoy with untaxed cigarettes.
“Come, Uncle Paterson, I will caress you...”
Supposedly, David Patterson said it yesterday on WOR. I didn’t catch it, but the quote in the post is from the Syracuse Post Standard, which references the WOR statement.
I have tried to find it on WOR’s website. No luck so far, but I’m not really good at that anyway. Maybe someone else can find it and “preserve” it before it gets washed away.
I was thinking the same thing just before seeing your entry.
I think it would be possible for the Oneida’s to shut down rt 90(the NY state Truway)and the Onandaga’s to shut down rt 81. I believe both of these highways cross the respective reservations.
No more than two hours ago at lunch I told somebody that all tax collection, is at its very heart, an act of violence. The person I was telling this to said I was crazy.
Yes, for purchases in the U.S. According to NY State Sales Tax law, if you travel to another state, purchase an item or items, and bring them back to your NY State residence for use, you are required to pay sales tax on those items. In the NY State tax forms instructions, they cite a person's purchasing a book in New Hampshire and taking it back to your home in NY State, as an example of when you would owe sales tax.
As well, if you purchase an item in another NY State county, and took it to your home county to use, you may be responsible to pay additional sales tax if the county you reside in has a higher tax rate than the county you bought it in.
Then of course there's the tax you owe for online, catalog or phone orders purchased from other states.
I buy a lot of used books online. So far I haven't had to pay sales tax on them, but how long that will last is anybody's guess.
“Next Wednesday could be interesting.”
And if the Indians put out a call for re-enforcements Big Government Chief “No-Seeum” Patterson may be in for a big surprise at who and how many answer the call.
I can't say if a treaty provision is involved as the Tribes's have never shown that clause...but the SC has ruled it's constitutional.
........................................................
In this action for declaratory and injunctive relief, the issue is whether the State Department of Taxation and Finance may require plaintiff, an enrolled member of the Seneca Nation, to collect and remit sales, use and excise taxes on sales of cigarettes and motor fuel to non-Indian consumers at plaintiff's retail business on the Cattaraugus Reservation. Because the issue is directly governed by controlling precedent, we affirm the order of the Appellate Division dismissing plaintiff's complaint.
The United States Supreme Court has clearly established that State tax statutes requiring Indian retailers to collect and remit taxes on sales to non-Indian purchasers, and to keep the records necessary to ensure compliance, violate neither the Commerce Clause nor the constitutional proscription against direct taxation of Indians absent explicit Congressional consent (see, Oklahoma Tax Commn. v Citizen Band Potawatomi Indian Tribe of Oklahoma, 498 US 505; Washington v Confederated Tribes of the Colville Indian Reservation, 447 US 134; Moe v Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes, 425 US 463). To the extent plaintiff contends that the State tax statutes at issue violate either the Supremacy Clause or New York law, his arguments are unpreserved and cannot be considered on this appeal. Plaintiff's complaint asserted only violations of the Commerce Clause and "the Laws of the United States enacted pursuant thereto".
http://www.law.cornell.edu/nyctap/search/display.html?terms=tribes&url=/nyctap/I94_0195.htm
The same is true for Tennessee. If I call my supplier in Atlanta for items not for resale I have to pay tax. If I go across the close by Virginia state line for Cigarettes ( I don’t smoke but consider exporting to NY) I pay the excess tobacco tax and the sales tax. I must pay sales tax fir a vehicle bought elsewhere before it can be registered.
Ping
Thank God I live in Florida!..........These other states are crazy!.............
FAIL!
1993 NY Appellate court rejecting the treaty argument.
http://www.upstate-citizens.org/snyder-wetzler-193AD2d329.pdf
I live in Schenectady and work in Syracuse. There are signs all over I-81 in Onondaga reservation so I know that runs right through that, but not on I-90 in Oneida territory as they have a big casino and several golf course right next to I-90. However, I don’t know if I-90 is the northern border of their reservation or not. I do know they definitely took over part if I-90 during the 1997 protests.
>>Heath said the Onondaga will continue to sell brands made by Indian tribes<<
I wonder if there could be a huge jump in the sale of those brands.
I buy virtually all of my non-food items via Craigslist, garage sales and estate sales.
It’s my small contribution to starving the beast.
Two Arrested for Connection to Attempted Train Derailment
By WKBW News
August 27, 2010
CATTARAUGUS COUNTY (WKBW) Officials are calling the July 5th attempted train derailment a crime of terrorism and attempted murder. Now, two people have been arrested for interfering with a federal investigation, lying to federal agents, and attempting to intimidate a witness who was cooperating with the investigation.
The original crime happened last July, when an Amtrak train carrying 354 people was nearly derailed by railroad ties placed on the tracks. This happened on the Seneca Indian Territory in Cattaraugus County. James Phillips and Christine Seneca have been arrested for allegedly attempting to intimidate and interfere with a witness who was cooperating with the federal investigation into the attempted derailment.
U.S. Attorney William Hochul said that it is still unclear whether the attempted derailment had anything to do with a nearby sign saying “NO MAIL NO RAIL” referring to a federal law that bans the shipment of cigarettes through the mail.
“We’re not going to rest until we find who attempted to kill all those people on the Amtrak train,” Hochul said Friday, “if along the way of our investigation we find that there are witnesses who have withheld information or lied about what they saw or know, our office stands ready to use all the tools that Congress have given to us.”
The two individuals arrested could face charges of obstruction of justice and lying to federal agents, carrying a possible penalty of eight to twenty years in jail.
Officials are calling for help from the public, and asking anyone with information to confidentially call the FBI. There is also a reward of $20,000 for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the person or people who tried to derail the train.
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