Dale Bumpers: “Senator Graham and I are going to offer this amendment, if we get a chance, on this bill. What brought all of this…”

“Senator Graham and I are going to offer this amendment, if we get a chance, on this bill. What brought all of this about? Well, first of all, it was about 1967, the Supreme Court, in a decision commonly referred to as the National Bellas Hess case, a big mail-order house. I forget where they are located. The Supreme Court said: You States, you cities, and you counties may not charge a use tax on mail-order sales coming into your State from another State unless that mail-order house has a physical presence in your State. Eddie Bauer used to be just a mail-order house. Now Eddie Bauer has outlets in just about every State in the Nation. For example, if you order something out of the Eddie Bauer catalog and you are a Maryland resident, they will charge you sales tax. You can't buy it without paying the sales tax because they have a physical presence in Maryland. But most of these people like Lands' End and L.L. Bean don't have a physical presence in your State and they don't collect sales taxes. But the Supreme Court said in the National Bellas Hess case, you can't charge sales tax or use tax on mail-order sales because it violates the due process clause, and it is a violation of the interstate commerce clause.”