State v. Bemis Bro. Bag Co.

• Decision Date: 08 June 1914
• Docket Number: 20185
• Citation: 65 So. 554,135 La. 397
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
• Parties: STATE v. BEMIS BRO. BAG CO

65 So. 554

135 La. 397

STATE v. BEMIS BRO. BAG CO

No. 20185

Supreme Court of Louisiana

June 8, 1914

Appeal from Civil District Court, Parish of Orleans; Porter Parker Judge. Action by the State against the Bemis Bro. Bag Company. Judgment for defendant, and the State appeals.

Affirmed.

SYLLABUS

(Syllabus by the Court.)

Licenses (§ 19*) -- License Tax -- "Manufacturer."

A manufacturing company with a large capital, extensive buildings, much machinery, employing many hands, and making bags out of burlap in large quantities, is a manufacturer of bags, and exempt from license taxation under article 229 of the Constitution.

[Ed. Note. -- For other cases, see Licenses, Cent. Dig. §§ 48-54; Dec. Dig. § 19.*

For other definitions, see Words and Phrases, vol. 5, pp. 4346-4358.]

W. W. Westerfield, of New Orleans, for the State.

Carroll, Henderson & Carroll, of New Orleans, for appellee.

OPINION

SOMMERVILLE, J.

Plaintiff sues the defendant company for additional licenses for the years 1909 to 1912, inclusive, as a wholesale dealer. The evidence shows that defendant paid licenses as a wholesale dealer during the years mentioned, based on its gross annual receipts for each year, excluding the proceeds of the sale of bags manufactured by it, and the proceeds of the sales of imported bales of bagging which were sold in the original and unbroken packages. The state has abandoned its claim for additional licenses on the sale of the imported articles, and it is here insisting upon the reversal of a judgment against it, which holds that the defendant is a manufacturer of bags, and exempt from the payment of license taxes on sales of bags manufactured by it under article 229 of the Constitution.

The article referred to provides that the General Assembly may levy a license tax upon those persons, etc. --

"except clerks, laborers, clergymen, school teachers, those engaged in mechanical, agricultural, horticultural, and mining pursuits, and manufacturers, other than those of distilled, alcoholic or malt liquors, tobacco, cigars, and cotton seed oil."

Plaintiff alleges that the defendant is a wholesale dealer, and contends that it is not a manufacturer; and is not, therefore, exempt under the article of the Constitution.

Mr. Brande defines "manufacture" as a term employed to designate the changes or modifications made by art or industry in the form or substance of material articles with a view of rendering them capable of satisfying some want or desire of man, and "manufacturing industry" to consist in the application of art, science, or labor to bring about certain changes or modifications of already existing materials. He includes under the term "manufacturer" all branches of industry with the exceptions of fishing, hunting, mining, and such industries as have for their object to obtain possession of material products in the state in which they are formed by nature. He says that the term is generally applied only to those departments of industry in which the raw material is fashioned into desirable articles by art or labor without the aid of the soil, but that there is no real good reason for such limitation, and that is obvious from slightest consideration that agriculture is nothing but a manufacture, for the business of agriculturalist is to dispose of the soil, seed, manure, or other materials, that they may supply him with other and more desirable products. Brande's Enc., tit. "Manufacture."

The Century Dictionary defines "manufacture" as the operation of making goods or wares of any kind; the production of articles for use from raw or prepared materials, by giving to the materials new forms, quality, or combination, whether by hand, labor, or by machinery; used more especially of production in a large way by machinery, or by many hands working co-operatively.

In the case of State v. American Sugar Refining Co., 108 La. 603, 32 So. 965, where the state was claiming a license tax from defendant as a refiner of sugar, under the act which provided for the payment of such license tax, and where the defendant contended it was a manufacturer of sugar, and exempt under the Constitution, we discussed fully the definition of the word "manufacturer," and we applied the constitutional exemption, and held that defendant was a manufacturer, and exempt from the license tax claimed by the plaintiff. We there enumerated, at length, different kinds of businesses which had been declared to be manufactories; but the manufacturer of bags was not among them. We made another enumeration of manufacturers in our opinion in the more recent case of Henderson v. Shreveport Gas, Electric Light & Power Co., 134 La. 39, 63 So. 616.

Tested by the definitions in the text and reference books, and by the previous rulings of ...