Crall v. Commonwealth
| Decision Date | 26 January 1905 |
| Citation | 103 Va. 855,49 S.E. 638 |
| Parties | CRALL et al. v. COMMONWEALTH. |
| Court | Virginia Supreme Court |
PEDDLERS—LICENSE — PEDDLING BY CORPORATION—LIABILITY OF OFFICERS—SALES.
1. A corporation may be punished criminally for peddling through the medium of an unlicensed agent. '
2. While a peddler's license cannot issue to a corporation as such, a corporation desiring to peddle its goods may take out a license in the name of a designated agent, who may lawfully peddle the goods of the principal.
3. The vice president of a corporation, in general charge of its business in the state, may be convicted of peddling without a license because of the corporation s servants having peddled its goods without any license having been issued, as required by Acts 1902-03-04, p. 484, c. 271 §Va. Code 1904, p. 22231.
4. The manager of a store from which goads were peddled before he became manager, without any peddler's license having been issued as required by Acts 1902-03-04, p. 484, c. 271 [Va, Code 1904. p. 2223], cannot be held responsible for the unlawful peddling.
5. Where a peddler delivered goods on an understanding that title should vest in the one to whom they were delivered on payment of all the installments of "rent, " the transaction amounted to a sale within Acts 1902-03-04, p. 484, c. 271 [Va. Code 1904, p. 2223], making sales by peddlers unlawful unless a license has been issued.
Error to Corporation Court of Manchester.
One Crall and one Ostrander were convicted of peddling without a license, and they bring error. Affirmed as to appellant Crall and reversed as to Ostrander.
R. Randolph Hicks, for plaintiffs in error.
The Attorney General, for the Commonwealth.
WHITTLE, J. Plaintiffs in error were tried and convicted upon information, in the corporation court of the city of Manchester, for peddling goods, wares, and merchandise in that city without having first obtained a license as required by statute.
It appears that the L. B. Price Mercantile Company, a Missouri corporation, domiciled at Kansas City, had established storerooms or depositories for its goods in some twenty-odd states of the Union. Among them, two were located in this state—one in the city of Norfolk, and the other in the city of Richmond. The plaintiff in error Crall was the vice president of the company, in general charge of its business in the Southern States, and with headquarters at Norfolk; while the plaintiff in error Ostrander, under the supervision of Crall, was in charge of the Richmond depository.
Two theories are presented as to the company's methods of conducting its business, to sustain each of which evidence has been adduced.
The contention of plaintiffs in error is that they were doing an installment business through agents, who were supplied with samples and order books, and whose duty it was to exhibit the samples and to canvass for purchasers, turning in all orders received by them to those in charge of the company's depositories; that thereupon the orders were filled by another agent, who delivered the goods, collected a certain part of the purchase price, and took from the purchaser a written agreement providing for future payments in monthly installments, and stipulating that the goods were not to be removed from the place of delivery or sold or disposed of until fully paid for.
The opposing theory of the commonwealth is that the course of business of the company was to deliver to its agents goods, wares, and merchandise, to be carried by them from place to place, and left with the purchaser on "general leases"—that is to say, to be paid for in installments—the L. B. Price Mercantile Company retaining title until the entire purchase price was paid.
The company dealt in rugs, curtains, bed spreads, blankets, covers, dress patterns, clocks, plated ware, wringers, albums, pictures, and other wares usually sold by peddlers.
The statute upon which the prosecution is founded is as follows:
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