International Cotton-Seed Oil Co. v. Wheelock

• Decision Date: 30 January 1900
• Citation: 27 So. 517,124 Ala. 367
• Parties: INTERNATIONAL COTTON-SEED OIL CO. v. WHEELOCK.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

27 So. 517

124 Ala. 367

INTERNATIONAL COTTON-SEED OIL CO. v. WHEELOCK.

Supreme Court of Alabama

January 30, 1900

Appeal from city court of Birmingham; William W. Wilkerson, Judge.

Action by C. F. Wheelock against the International Cotton-Seed Oil Company. From a judgment for plaintiff, defendant appeals. Reversed and dismissed.

The appellee, who resided in Birmingham, Ala., brought suit in assumpsit against the appellant, who is a corporation located at Selma, Ala., to recover an alleged claim of $188 for services rendered as broker by appellee. The summons and complaint were filed in the city court of Birmingham January 21, 1898. On February 12, 1898, the appellant filed its plea to the jurisdiction; therein averring, among other things that at the commencement of the suit the appellant was a corporation chartered under the laws of Alabama, having its residence, domicile, and place of business in Dallas county Ala., and had not done business, nor at the commencement of the suit was it doing business, in Jefferson county, Ala nor within any county in the state other than said Dallas county. This plea was duly verified, and was filed in the cause February 15, 1898. On April 8, 1898, the court, without the intervention of jury, tried the issue on appellant's plea to the jurisdiction, and set down the cause for trial on its merits for April 13, 1898. The evidence on the trial of issue of jurisdiction was, in brief: That at the commencement of this suit and prior thereto, the defendant (appellant) was a corporation. That its principal and only place of business was at Selma, Dallas county, ala., and that it had never had an agent in Jefferson county. Defendant is a domestic corporation engaged in manufacturing and selling cotton-seed oil and other products manufactured from cotton seed. That defendant made shipments of cotton-seed hulls to Birmingham during the spring of 1897 and December, 1897, and in January and February, 1898. Such shipments were made on sales or orders from brokers in Birmingham, in this manner: Defendant accepted satisfactory orders from any broker in Birmingham (defendant usually, but not always, paying the broker commissions, each transaction standing on its own basis, and the broker's connection with defendant being limited to that particular transaction or sale negotiated), and all orders by brokers in Birmingham were submitted to the approval of the defendant, in Selma, and accepted or rejected in the Selma office, and, until accepted by the defendant in Selma, were not binding on it. It was the custom of the defendant to receive offers from brokers at a figure named or to furnish, upon request, quotations to any broker in Birmingham. All negotiations or offers were communicated to defendant, at Selma, subject to confirmation or rejection at Selma. The goods sold were generally shipped direct to the purchaser, billed to him, with sight draft attached to the bill of lading against the purchaser; the draft being sold by defendant to, or discounted by, a Selma bank. Occasionally defendant shipped direct to brokers, the brokers reselling to their customers. When shipments were rejected, defendant had the Birmingham broker take charge of the goods and sell same for account of appellant. Plaintiff introduced as a witness R. L. Dangerfield, who testified that in the latter part of January, 1898, he negotiated and procured a shipment of cotton-seed hulls for the defendant, to be shipped to Birmingham. Upon this evidence the court found issues in favor of the plaintiff on the plea of abatement to the jurisdiction of the court. The cause was then tried on the merits, and judgment was rendered in favor of the plaintiff. The defendant appeals, and assigns as error, among other rulings of the trial court, the rendering of judgment in favor of the plaintiff on the plea in abatement.

H. F. Reese and Mallory, McLeod & Mallory, for appellant.

Vassar L. Allen, for appellee.

SHARPE J.

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