Mokestinės prievolės savitumas

Abstract

The object of this article is the power to levy taxes and separation characteristics of the burden of taxation from other personal monetary duties based on jurisprudence of Lithuania Constitutional court and legal theory. It is stated that tax burden is unique in comparison to other duties. Based on the famous thesis of John Marshall, it is stated that only the power to tax involves the power to destroy - the burden of taxation remains legitimate, even though the taxes could be seen as the extortion of property if done by a private person, not the state. The article aims to answer the issue why the state has such a power to destroy. One of the conclusions of this article is that the power to tax is inherited attribute of sovereignty of each state and sovereignty itself is an explanatory answer to the origin of the power to destroy. Hence, we can find a new problem of the sovereign immunity, since the state is immune from other state jurisdiction, the issue remains with the state immunity not only from jurisdiction but from the foreign state taxation. The issue becomes more problematic since taxation could relate not only to public functions of the state but also to commercial actions of state governmental agencies and public companies held by the state government. The article states that even though the limited immunity doctrine is accepted worldwide, there is no unified position for immunity against the taxation of income or property related to commercial state activity.