TRINOVA CORPORATION, PETITIONER v. MICHIGAN DEPARTMENT OF TREASURY

No. 89-1106

[ February 19, 1991]

Justice Scalia, concurring in the judgment.

As the Court notes, ante, at 24, the Michigan single business tax is not facially discriminatory. Since I am of the view that this suffices to comply with the requirements of the Commerce Clause, see Amerada Hess Corp. v. Director, Div. of Taxation, N.J. Dept. of Treasury, 490 U.S. 66, 80 (1989) (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment); Tyler Pipe Industries Inc. v. Washington State Dept. of Revenue, 483 U.S. 232, 265 (1987) (Scalia, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part), I would forgo the additional Commerce Clause analysis articulated in Complete Auto Transit, Inc. v. Brady, 430 U.S. 274, 279 (1977). Some elements of that analysis, however, are relevant to the quite separate question whether the tax complies with the requirements of the Due Process Clause, see Mobil Oil Corp. v. Commissioner of Taxes of Vt., 445 U.S. 425, 436-437 (1980); Amerada Hess Corp., supra, at 80-81 (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment).

Trinova concedes that there is a minimal connection between its interstate activities and the taxing State, see Mobil, supra; ante, at 12. The only issue, then, is whether the tax violates the Due Process Clause by taxing extraterritorial values. For the reasons stated in Parts III-A and III-B of the Court's opinion, I agree that it does not.