McIntyre v. United Five Cent & Ten Cent Stores, Inc.

• Decision Date: 02 January 1934
• Docket Number: 13741.
• Parties: McINTYRE v. UNITED FIVE CENT & TEN CENT STORES, Inc.
• Court: South Carolina Supreme Court

172 S.E. 220

171 S.C. 273

McINTYRE v. UNITED FIVE CENT & TEN CENT STORES, Inc.

No. 13741.

Supreme Court of South Carolina

January 2, 1934

Appeal from Common Pleas Circuit Court of Calhoun County; J. Henry Johnson, Judge.

Action by J. T. McIntyre against the United Five Cent & Ten Cent Stores, Inc. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant appeals.

Affirmed.

Gazan Walsh & Bernstein, of Savannah, Ga., and W. R. Symmes, of St Matthews, for appellant.

L Marion Gressette and D. S. Murph, both of St. Matthews, for respondent.

CARTER Justice.

This action, instituted in the court of common pleas for Calhoun county, by J. T. McIntyre, as plaintiff, against the defendant, United Five Cent & Ten Cent Stores, Inc., is a suit for damages, actual and punitive, for the sum of $2,500 for alleged wrongful discharge of the plaintiff, an employee of the defendant in its mercantile business. The case was tried in said court at the April, 1933, term, before Judge J. Henry Johnson and a jury, resulting in a verdict for the plaintiff in the sum of $300, actual damages, the trial judge having on motion of the defendant ordered a nonsuit as to punitive damages. From the judgment entered on the verdict, the defendant, pursuant to due notice, has appealed to this court, and asks a reversal of the judgment upon the grounds stated in the exceptions.

As we view the exceptions, it is the contention of the appellant that the trial judge erred in the following particulars: (1) In not holding that the court of Calhoun county did not have jurisdiction of the cause; (2) in refusing defendant's motion for direction of a verdict for the defendant; (3) in his charge to the jury regarding the weight that might be given the testimony of one witness in comparison with the weight to be attached to the testimony of a number of witnesses.

In answer to the contention of the appellant that the court of Calhoun county did not have jurisdiction in the cause, we deem it sufficient to call attention to section 826, Code of 1932, and the case of Elms v. Power Company, 78 S.C 323, 58 S.E. 809, which we cite in connection therewith. The defendant first appeared in the case, according to notice served, for the sole purpose of objecting to the jurisdiction of the court in Calhoun county, stating as the ground for such objection that the defendant had no employee or agent in the said county of Calhoun upon which service of the summons and complaint in the case could be made. It appears from the record that service of the summons and complaint was made upon employee and agent of the defendant in the county of Allendale where the defendant was conducting a business at the time. The defendant being a foreign corporation and sued as such, not domesticated in this state, the plaintiff had the right to institute the action in any county of the state, and, having obtained service on the defendant's agent in Allendale county,...