76
Opinion of the Court
of any such showing by respondents, that New York will underestimate the legitimate demand for tax-free cigarettes. The associated requirement that the Department preapprove deliveries of tax-exempt cigarettes in order to ensure compliance with the quotas does not render the scheme facially invalid. This procedure should not prove unduly burdensome absent wrongful withholding or delay of approval— problems that can be addressed if and when they arise. See Colville, 447 U. S., at 160 (burden of showing that tax enforcement scheme imposes excessive regulatory burdens is on challenger).
New York's requirements that wholesalers sell untaxed cigarettes only to persons who can produce valid exemption certificates and that wholesalers maintain detailed records on tax-exempt transactions likewise do not unduly interfere with Indian trading. The recordkeeping requirements and eligible buyer restrictions in the New York scheme are no more demanding than the comparable measures we approved in Colville. See n. 8, supra. Indeed, because wholesale trade typically involves a comparatively small number of large-volume sales, the transactional recordkeeping requirements imposed on Indian traders in this case are probably less onerous than those imposed on retailers in Moe and Colville. By requiring wholesalers to precollect taxes on, and affix stamps to, cigarettes destined for nonexempt consumers, New York has simply imposed on the wholesaler the same precollection obligation that, under Moe and Colville, may be imposed on reservation retailers. We therefore disagree with the Court of Appeals' conclusion that New York has in this way "impose[d] a sales tax on Indian retailers." 81 N. Y. 2d, at 427, 615 N. E. 2d, at 998 (emphasis added). Again assuming that the "probable demand" calculations leave ample room for legitimately tax-exempt sales, the pre-collection regime will not require prepayment of any tax to which New York is not entitled.
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