Closkey v. Tobin
| Citation | 252 U.S. 107,64 L.Ed. 481,40 S.Ct. 306 |
| Decision Date | 01 March 1920 |
| Docket Number | No. 79,79 |
| Parties | McCLOSKEY v. TOBIN, Sheriff |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Mr. R. H. Ward, of Wichita Falls, Tex., for plaintiff in error.
Messrs. Luther Nickels, of Eastland, Tex., and B. F. Looney, of Greenville, Tex., for defendant in error.
Article 421 of the Penal Code of Texas defined, with much detail, the offense of barratry. In McCloskey v. San Antonio Traction Co. (Tex. Civ. App.) 192 S. W. 1116, a decree for an injunction restraining the plaintiff in error from pursuing the practice of fomenting and adjusting claims was reversed on the ground that this section had superseded the common law offense of barratry and that by the Code 'only an attorney at law is forbidden to solicit employment in any suit himself or by an agent.' Article 421 was then amended (Act March 29, 1917, c. 133 [Vernon's Ann. Pen. Code Supp. Tex. 1918, art. 421]) so as to apply to any person who 'shall seek to obtain employment in any claim, to prosecute, defend, present or collect the same by means of personal solicitation of such employment. * * *' Thereafter McCloskey was arrested on an information which charged him with soliciting employment to collect two claims, one for personal injuries, the other for painting a buggy. He applied for a writ of habeas corpus, which was denied both by the county court and the Court of Criminal Appeals. The case comes here under section 237 of the Judicial Code (Comp. St. § 1214); McCloskey having claimed below, as here, that the act under which he was arrested violates rights guaranteed him by the Fourteenth Amendment.
The contention is that, since the state had made causes of action in tort as well as in contract assignable (Railway v. Ginther, 96 Tex. 295, 72 S. W. 166), they had become an article of commerce; that the business of obtaining adjustment of claims is not inherently evil; and that therefore, while regulation was permissible, prohibition of the business violates rights of liberty and propery and denies equal protection of the laws. The contention may be answered briefly. To prohibit solicitation is to regulate the business, not to prohibit it. Compare Brazee v. Michigan, 241 U. S. 340, 36 Sup. Ct. 561, 60 L. Ed. 1034, Ann. Cas. 1917C, 522. The evil against which the regulation is directed is one from which the English law has long sought to protect the community through proceedings for barratry and champerty....
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NATIONAL ASS'N FOR ADVANCE. OF COLORED PEOPLE v. Patty
...to bring the conduct of the business in harmony with the ethical practices of the legal profession is reasonable. McCloskey v. Tobin, 252 U.S. 107, 40 S.Ct. 306, 64 L.Ed. 481. Independent of statute, it is contrary to public policy for a corporation to practice law, directly or indirectly, ......
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Nebbia v. People of State of New York, 531
...v. Kansas, 123 U.S. 623, 8 S.Ct. 273, 31 L.Ed. 205; the business of soliciting claims by one not an attorney McCloskey v. Tobin, 252 U.S. 107, 40 S.Ct. 306, 64 L.Ed. 481; manufacture or sale of oleomargarine, Powell v. Pennsylvania, 127 U.S. 678, 8 S.Ct. 992, 1257, 32 L.Ed. 253; hawking and......
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General Outdoor Advertising Co., Inc. v. Department of Public Works
... ... Kansas, 123 U.S. 623, 8 S.Ct. 273, 31 L.Ed. 205; the ... business of soliciting claims by one not an attorney, ... McCloskey v. Tobin, 252 U.S. 107, 40 S.Ct. 306, 64 ... L.Ed. 481; manufacture or sale of oleomargarine, Powell ... v. Pennsylvania, 127 U.S. 678, 8 S.Ct. 992, ... ...
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Quarles v. State of Texas
...(1950); (the first amendment does not protect speech and association incident to the crime of barratry); McClosky v. Tobin, 252 U.S. 107, 40 S. Ct. 306, 64 L.Ed. 481 (1920) (where the predecessor to the present Texas Barratry Statute, Tex. Penal Code Art. 421 (1917), was held not to interfe......