The Jan. 17 article Tallahassee battle lines drawn over Internet sales tax misses a number of key reasons why giving states new tax collection powers over online sales are a bad idea and perhaps, more important, why they violate the U.S. Constitution.

Legislators in Tallahassee may be feverishly debating schemes to expand the state’s tax authority on Internet transactions, but the U.S. Supreme Court already ruled on this type of taxation and interstate commerce back in 1992.

In Quill vs. North Dakota, the Court decided North Dakota couldn’t force Quill, a mail-order office supply outfit, to collect and remit sales taxes because the company wasn’t physically located in the state.

Why should this decision not be respected now — because a new technology has made the ordering system easier?

The common set of rules for all businesses is that they’re subject to in-state taxes when they’re actually located in that state. When governments are allowed to reach beyond their borders to tax, they invite others to do the same, leading to more complexity and less competition to keep rates low. Local small business owners are being pushed forward as the face of the campaign to override the Supreme Court and allow states to form a tax cartel, but behind that public face are retail behemoths that want to use government to aid their efforts to snuff out competitors.

In reality, the Internet has opened a new world of consumers to small business, not to mention online tools to manage their own operations more efficiently. The big-box stores also offer online sales, and because they have physical outlets across the country that offer Internet customers services like in-store returns, these retailers collect sales taxes in nearly all 50 states for both in-store and online purchases.

If fairness really is the issue here, why not require a firm to collect taxes on all sales — online or otherwise — for the jurisdiction where they are based, rather than for multitudes of revenue-hungry governments across the nation.

Shared misery through onerous and complicated tax rules is not the path to prosperity.

Brent Mead,

state government affairs manager,

National Taxpayers Union,

Alexandria, Va.