# Davidson v. Commissioner > United States Board of Tax Appeals · May 8, 1936 · 34 B.T.A. 555 URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/4496104 ## Case - **Full name:** JAMES E. DAVIDSON, v. COMMISSIONER OF INTERNAL REVENUE - **Court:** United States Board of Tax Appeals - **Decided:** May 8, 1936 - **Citations:** 34 B.T.A. 555; 1936 BTA LEXIS 683 - **Precedential status:** Published - **Opinion:** Concurrence by Murdock - **Judges:** McMahon, Smith, Mellott, Arundell, Fossan, Agree, Murdock - **Cited by:** 0 later opinions in the Frix Law Library ## Citator (automated) - No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases. - Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/4496104 ## Opinion text Murdock, concurring: The author of the prevailing opinion attempts to distinguish the present case from the Miller and McCarter cases on the ground that in the latter cases the delivery of the wrong certificate was made-by the taxpayer’s broker, while in the present case the wrong delivery was made either by the taxpayer himself to the broker or by a bank to the broker. I do not agree that the difference in the facts is a sound basis for distinguishing the cases. A broker, just like a bank, is merely the agent of the seller, and where it appears, as it did in the Miller and McCarter cases, that the certificate actually delivered was identifiable as that pertaining to a different lot of stock from the one which the taxpayer designated for sale, there is just as good reason for holding the seller to the basis applicable to the shares represented by the certificate actually *566 delivered as there is in the present case. I agree with the result reached in the present case because I think that identification by certificates is a better method of identification than identification by designation to the broker. See William W. Miller, 31 B. T. A. 192, and my dissent in Estate of Uzal H. McCarter, 34 B. T. A. 535. McMahon and Turner agree with the above. --- Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/4496104. Public record. Not legal advice.