City of Fayetteville v. Carter

• Decision Date: 07 December 1889
• Citation: 12 S.W. 573,52 Ark. 301
• Parties: CITY OF FAYETTEVILLE v. CARTER
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

12 S.W. 573

52 Ark. 301

CITY OF FAYETTEVILLE v. CARTER

Supreme Court of Arkansas

December 7, 1889

APPEAL from Washington Circuit Court, J. M. PITTMAN, Judge.

Judgment reversed and remanded.

C. R Buckner, for appellant.

The ordinance was not void. Since the decision in 34 Ark. 553 power to regulate and license hotel drummers has been granted cities by Mansfield's Digest, sec. 751. There was no proof that the fee was excessive or unreasonable. 43 Ark. 82. The fee was reasonable compensation for keeping the record issuing the license and municipal supervision. Ib.

T. M. Gunter, for appellee.

Twelve dollars and fifty cents was shown to be excessive and unreasonable. The ordinance was intended as a means of raising revenue and void. The right to regulate does not carry the right to tax.

OPINION

BATTLE, J.

Section 751 of Mansfield's Digest provides that all municipal corporations shall have power "to regulate drumming or soliciting persons who arrive on trains or otherwise, for hotels, boarding houses, bath houses or doctors," and to license such drummers, and to provide that each drummer shall wear a badge plainly exposed to view, showing for whom and for what he is drumming or soliciting patronage, and to punish by fine any violation of such provision. In pursuance of this section the council of the City of Fayetteville passed an ordinance forbidding all persons to drum or solicit patronage from persons who arrive on trains or other wise, for any hotel or boarding house, without having first obtained a license to do so, and paid therefor the sum of $ 12.50, and making a violation thereof an offense punishable by fine. In a prosecution against appellee this ordinance, without any evidence of its invalidity except the ordinance itself, was held void, because the $ 12.50 was an unreasonable fee for the license.

The authority of a municipal corporation to pass an ordinance requiring solicitors of patronage for hotels and boarding houses to take out license and pay a reasonable fee therefor is conceded by both parties. The only question presented for our consideration is, is the fee fixed by the ordinance in question reasonable?

The power to license and regulate granted by the statute was conferred solely for police purposes; and municipal corporations have no right to use it as a means of increasing their revenues. They can require a reasonable fee to be paid for a license. The amount they have a right to demand for such fee depends upon the extent and expense of the municipal supervision made necessary by the business in the city or town where it is licensed. A fee sufficient to cover the expense of issuing the license, and to pay the expenses which may be incurred in the enforcement of such police inspections or superintendence as may be lawfully exercised over the business, may be required. It is obvious that the actual amount necessary to meet such expenses cannot, in...