-76-
Commissioner’s determination are “returns” within the meaning of
former sec. 233). Contrary to respondent’s assertion that the
Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and the Board construed
the statute to impose a timely filing requirement, those
tribunals, in referencing the word “timely”, were adopting a
judicial limitation based on (1) the statute’s requirement that a
foreign corporation file a tax return in order to deduct its
expenses and (2) their conclusion that a foreign corporation
could not file such a return if a return had already been
prepared for it by the Commissioner.
D. Natl. Cable
In the recent case of Natl. Cable & Telecomm. Association v.
Brand X Internet Servs., 545 U.S. , 125 S. Ct. 2688 (2005),
the Supreme Court decided the validity of a regulation that
construed a statute inconsistently with a prior judicial
interpretation. The Court held that “A court’s prior judicial
construction of a statute trumps an agency construction otherwise
entitled to Chevron deference only if the prior court decision
holds that its construction follows from the unambiguous terms of
the statute and thus leaves no room for agency discretion.” Id.
at 2700. The Court stated: “Only a judicial precedent holding
that the statute unambiguously forecloses the agency’s
interpretation, and therefore contains no gap for the agency to
fill, displaces a conflicting agency construction.” Id. at 2700.
Page: Previous 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 NextLast modified: May 25, 2011