## Facts

- The City of Pittsburgh imposed a 1.125% wage tax on city residents.
- Pittsburgh sought to impose the same 1.125% rate on nonresidents who worked within the city.
- State law limited a municipality’s wage/income tax on nonresidents to a maximum of 1%, while permitting a higher resident rate.
- The City and its Mayor filed an action seeking declaratory relief that the statutory nonresident cap violated the Pennsylvania Constitution’s Uniformity Clause and the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.
- The Commonwealth and state officials filed preliminary objections in the nature of a demurrer, including objections that the City could not invoke constitutional protections against the Commonwealth and could not assert residents’ rights.
- The Commonwealth Court sustained the preliminary objections and dismissed the petition; the City and Mayor appealed directly to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

## Issues

1. Whether a municipal corporation may invoke the Pennsylvania Constitution’s Uniformity Clause or the federal Equal Protection Clause against the Commonwealth to challenge a state tax scheme.
2. Whether the City and its Mayor have standing to assert, on behalf of residents, constitutional objections to the statutory cap on nonresident wage taxes.
3. Whether the resident/nonresident wage-tax rate classification is unconstitutional under state uniformity or federal equal protection principles.

## Decision

- The Pennsylvania Supreme Court affirmed the order sustaining preliminary objections and dismissing the petition.
- The Court held that the City, as a political subdivision created by the Commonwealth, could not assert state or federal constitutional protections against the Commonwealth.
- The Court held that the City and Mayor lacked standing to litigate residents’ constitutional claims.
- Because standing was absent, the Court did not reach a full merits determination on the constitutionality of the resident/nonresident tax-rate distinction.

## Legal Principles

- Municipal corporations, as creatures of the state, generally lack standing to assert constitutional claims intended to protect individuals against governmental action when the claims are directed against the creating state.
- A party seeking to litigate another person’s constitutional rights must satisfy standing requirements; a city’s institutional or fiscal interest ordinarily does not establish a sufficient basis to litigate taxpayers’ individual constitutional claims.
- When a court resolves a case on standing grounds at the preliminary-objection stage, it may decline to decide the underlying constitutional merits.

## Conclusion

The court rejected Pittsburgh’s attempt to challenge the statutory cap on nonresident wage taxes because neither the City nor its Mayor had standing to assert constitutional claims against the Commonwealth or to press residents’ constitutional rights, leaving any merits challenge to be brought by affected taxpayers.


City of Pittsburgh v. Commonwealth, 559 A.2d 513 (Pa. 1989)