Lyles-Black Co. v. Alldredge
| Decision Date | 16 June 1914 |
| Docket Number | 592 |
| Parties | LYLES-BLACK CO. v. ALLDREDGE. |
| Court | Alabama Court of Appeals |
Appeal from Circuit Court, Blount County; W.W. Haralson, Judge.
Assumpsit by the Lyles-Black Company against L.C. Alldredge. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff appeals. Reversed and remanded.
There was no dispute as to any items of the counts or credits except the last payment of $250, which defendant claimed to have paid to the salesman of plaintiff; defendant contending that it was paid to Mays, the salesman, and no receipt taken. The other items seem to have been settled by checks or by notes and paid through the bank. The other facts sufficiently appear from the opinion.
George W. Darden, of Oneonta, for appellant.
John A Lusk & Son, of Guntersville, for appellee.
It is settled in this state that a traveling salesman of merchandise making sales, or taking orders, by sample for future delivery and payment has no implied authority to collect from the purchaser the money agreed to be paid by him. Simon & Son v. Johnson, 101 Ala. 368, 13 So 491. In this case, not only was there no implied authority for the salesman to collect, but there was direct, undisputed evidence to the effect that the traveling salesman, Mays, was without authority to collect from purchasers to whom he sold goods or from whom he took orders for his principal, the appellant, who brought this suit in the court below against the appellee for merchandise sold to him through the agency of its (appellant's) traveling salesman, Mays.
The settled rule of law we have above referred to seems to have been recognized by the court below, but it allowed the defendant to testify to a payment as made by him, the purchaser, to the salesman, Mays, for his principal on the theory (as would appear from the court's rulings and the oral charge set out in the transcript) that it became binding on the principal either because the unauthorized act of the agent was subsequently ratified and sanctioned by the principal, or because a general and known custom or usage in the course of business dealings between the parties gave validity to the act of the agent in receiving the money for his principal.
The evidence set out in the bill of exceptions is wholly wanting in showing a ratification by the principal of an unauthorized act by its salesman, Mays, in receiving the payment. The evidence is also entirely unsatisfactory to establish a general and known custom or usage that would authorize the purchaser to make payment to the salesman that would bind the principal or estop it from denying the authority of Mays to make the collection testified to by the defendant.
The defendant is shown to have had continuous business dealings with the plaintiff for more than two years prior to the time he claims to have made this payment, buying goods from it through its salesman, Mays, which were shipped from the plaintiff's wholesale house in Nashville, Tenn., to the defendant's place of business in Alabama. During the entire course of these dealings throughout all this time, the defendant had never on any other occasion paid any part of the purchase money for the goods bought by him to Mays,...
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... ... Johnson, 101 Ala. 368, 13 So. 491, s. c., 105 ... Ala. 344, 16 So. 884, 53 Am. St. Rep. 125, and s. c., 108 ... Ala. 241, 19 So. 244; Lyles-Black Co. v. Alldredge, ... 10 Ala. App. 632, 65 So. 696; Dotham Gro. Co. v. White ... Bros., 14 Ala. App. 405, 69 So. 992. The last-cited ... cases are ... ...
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