Cite as: 507 U. S. 60 (1993)
Opinion of the Court
tainer Conventions. See infra, at 70-71. And, in any event, the Government's pre-emption argument in Japan Line does not conflict with its present interpretation that the Container Conventions themselves are violated only by a tax assessed upon the importation of containers.
Tennessee's sales tax is imposed upon the "transfer of title or possession, or both, exchange, barter, lease or rental, conditional, or otherwise, in any manner or by any means whatsoever of tangible personal property for a consideration." Tenn. Code Ann. § 67-6-102(23)(A) (Supp. 1992). It is a sales tax of general application that does not discriminate against imported products either in its purpose or effect. Indeed, its assessment bears no relation to importation whatsoever. The tax is not pre-empted by the 1972 or 1956 Container Convention.
III
Itel next argues that the application of Tennessee's sales tax to its container leases is pre-empted because it would frustrate the federal objectives underlying the Container Conventions and the laws and regulations granting favored status to international containers, in particular 19 U. S. C. § 1322 and 19 CFR § 10.41a (1992). See Hines v. Davidowitz, 312 U. S. 52, 67 (1941) (state law pre-empted when it "stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full purposes and objectives of Congress"). The federal regulatory scheme for cargo containers, it claims, parallels the regulatory scheme creating customs bonded warehouses which we have found to pre-empt most state taxes on warehoused goods. R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. v. Durham County, 479 U. S. 130 (1986); Xerox Corp. v. County of Harris, 459 U. S. 145 (1982); McGoldrick v. Gulf Oil Corp., supra.
Itel's reliance on these decisions is misplaced. In McGold-rick and its progeny, we stated that Congress created a system for bonded warehouses where imports could be stored free of federal customs duties while under the continuous
69
Page: Index Previous 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007