Scarborough v. Newsome
| Decision Date | 27 March 1942 |
| Citation | 150 Fla. 220,7 So.2d 321 |
| Parties | SCARBOROUGH, Director of State Beverage Department, v. NEWSOME. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
J. Turner Butler and A. H. Rothstein, both of Jacksonville, for petitioner.
F. B Harrell and C. A. Avriett, both of Jasper, for respondent.
On November 20 1941, the Honorable Hal W. Adams, Circuit Judge, entered an order restraining Honorable E. W. Scarborough, Director of the State Beverage Department, from selling or disposing of a 1935 Model Chevrolet Pickup Truck, property of Joe Newsome, a farmer residing in Hamilton County, Florida. The truck was seized and a forfeiture thereof to the State of Florida asserted because the same was used by Joe Newsome contrary to the several provisions of Chapter 19301, Acts of 1939, Laws of Florida.
The truck by the Director was valued at a sum less than $1,000 under the provisions of Section 13 of Chapter 19301, supra, and caused the same to be advertised for sale under and in accordance with Subsection (b) of Section 13, supra. The pertinent provision is Subsection (c) of Section 13 of Chapter 19301 viz.:
'(c) Execution Of Bond By Claimant.--Any person claiming the property so seized, within the time specified in the notice, may file with the Director a claim, stating his interest in the property seized, and may execute a bond to the State of Florida in the penal sum of $500.00, with a surety company licensed to do business in the State of Florida as surety conditioned that, in case of forfeiture of the property so seized, the obligors shall pay all the costs and expenses of the proceedings to obtain such forfeiture, including a reasonable attorneys' fee: and upon the delivery of such bond to the Director, the proceeding to enforce such forfeiture shall continue as in the where the property seized is of a value in excess of $1,000.00.'
If the respondent had elected to post a bond under the provisions of Subsection (c) supra, then a judicial proceeding would have followed as set out and detailed by Section 14 of the Act.
The pertinent provisions of Section 14 of Chapter 19301, supra, necessary for a decision of the case at bar are, viz.:
It was the view of and the lower court held that the several provisions of Subsection (c) of Section 13, supra, requiring and making it mandatory on the respondent, Joe Newsome, to execute and have approved by the Beverage Director a bond containing the various conditions appearing therein were unfair, unjust, arbitrary, discriminatory and violative of constitutional guaranties and therefore void and unenforceable, and, accordingly by an appropriate order, restrained the Beverage Director from enforcing said provisions. It follows that the restraining order here challenged must be affirmed if Subsection (c), supra, is unconstitutional, otherwise the restraining order will be reversed.
Chapter 20830, Laws of Florida, Acts of 1941, levied an excise tax on all malt and alcoholic beverages, to be paid by the manufacturer and distributor, viz.: 7 cents per gallon on malt beverages containing more than one per cent of alcohol by weight; on other beverages containing between one per cent and fourteen per cent of alcohol, 30 cents per gallon; on beverage containing between fourteen and forty-eight per cent alcohol, $1.20 per gallon; while beverages containing more than forty-eight per cent of alcohol must be taxed at $2.40 per gallon. The collection of these excise taxes is placed with the State Beverage Department.
Chapter 19301, Laws of Florida, Acts of 1939, grants to the Beverage Department of Florida broad powers for the purpose of collecting these several excise taxes. Chapter 19301 makes it unlawful: (a) to deliver beverages without payment of the excise tax; (b) for the possession of a still, or enumerated portions thereof adaptable to the manufacture of intoxicating liquors; (c) for the possession of fermented liquids capable of distillation or manufacture into intoxicating beverages; (d) the forfeiture of stills, and designated portions thereof, and fermented liquors to the State of Florida is provided; (e) seizure of vehicles, inclusive of automobiles, and horse, used in the transportation of stills, or designated portions thereof, fermented liquors, or intoxicating beverages, and the same can or may be seized and forfeited by the Director of the Beverage Department if the tax imposed is not paid; (f) the Director of the Beverage Department is authorized to seize beverage brought into Florida without payment of the excise tax; (g) provisions for the seizure of other properties are provided for and heavy penalties are imposed for a violation thereof.
These many provisions can or may be considered as the legal machinery authorized and used by the Director of the State Beverage Department for the enforcement and collection of excise taxes on all malt, alcoholic beverages or liquors. The Chevrolet truck was seized by the Beverage Director under the terms of the Act on the theory that it was being used, or had been used, by Joe Newsome, the respondent, in the transportation of alcoholic beverages upon which excise taxes by operation of law were due to the State of Florida and had not by him been paid and an effort was being made to evade the payment.
It is here contended that Subsection (c) of Section 13 of Chapter 19301, supra, being a portion of the legal machinery enacted by the Legislature for the collection of the excise taxes designated and the enforcement thereof by the terms of the Act placed with the Director of the Beverage Department, is unconstitutional and void.
This Court in construing an Act will consider its history, the evil to be corrected, the intention of the law-making body, the subject regulated, and the object to be obtained. See Curry v. Lehman, 55 Fla. 847, 47 So. 18; State v. Rose, 93 Fla. 1018, 114 So. 373; Douglass, Inc., v. McRainey, 102 Fla. 1141, 137 So. 157; Realty Bond & Share Co. v. Englar, 104 Fla. 329, 143 So. 152.
It is contended that Subsection (c) of Section 13 of Chapter 19301, supra, requiring the respondent to make bond for a return of the truck seized by the Director deprives him of the equal protection of the law contrary to Sections 4 and 12 of the Declaration of Rights to the State Constitution and as a legal corollary of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution providing that no State shall deprive any person of life, liberty or property without due process of law.
The 14th Amendment was never designed for the purpose of interfering with the police power of a state in prescribing regulations to promote the health, peace, morals, education, good order of the people, but to enact legislation to develop its resources, and add to its wealth and prosperity. See Barbier v. Connolly, 113 U.S. 27, 5 S.Ct. 357, 28 L.Ed. 923. The State may enact laws wherever the public interest demands it, and a large discretion is vested in the Legislature to determine the public interest and measures for its protection. See Kidd v. Pearson, 128 U.S. 1, 9 S.Ct. 6, 32 L.Ed. 346.
The case of McGuire v. Winslow, C.C., 26 F. 304, involved the seizure and sale of a horse by an agent of the Treasury Department of the Federal Government when engaged in the enforcement of a certain revenue measure. The Act under which the horse was seized provided for an appraisement of the animal by the officer and two competent disinterested citizens, and if the value thereof was found not to exceed $100, then the animal so seized for the nonpayment of taxes would be advertised and sold pursuant to the provisions of the Act. The Act provided that any person claiming ownership of the property seized could file with the officer a claim bond payable to the United States Government. It was the agent's duty to then transmit the claim and bond to the Federal Court for a condemnation proceeding. The question presented was...
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