State v. City of Orange

• Citation: 50 N.J.L. 389,13 A. 240
• Court: United States State Supreme Court (New Jersey)
• Decision Date: 16 March 1888
• Parties: STATE (MORGAN, Prosecutor) v. CITY OF ORANGE.

13 A. 240

50 N.J.L. 389

STATE (MORGAN, Prosecutor)

v. CITY OF ORANGE.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

March 16, 1888.

(Syllabus by the Court.)

On certiorari to annul an ordinance of the common council of the city of Orange, entitled "An ordinance to license and regulate hawkers and peddlers," passed and approved September 15, 1887.

E. F. Randolph and W. Brinkerhoff, for prosecutor. C. F. Lighthipe, for defendant.

SCUDDER, J. The charter of this city, approved March 27, 1871, (Laws, 217,) § 15, gives the common council the power, among other things, to pass ordinances to license and regulate hawkers, peddlers, etc. The prosecutor, a citizen of West Orange, objects to this ordinance for several reasons, formally assigned. Before considering them, it will be necessary to decide a preliminary motion to dismiss the writ, because the prosecutor has no standing in court, not being a citizen of Orange, or in any way affected by the ordinance. The affidavits taken show that he has for several years followed the business of hawking and peddling for a livelihood; and, in conducting said business, traveled with a horse and wagon through the city of Orange and other adjoining places prior to the passage of this ordinance. After the ordinance was in force, he applied to the collector of taxes, to whom the license fee was required to be paid, and offered him the sum of $10 for a license; but was told that, being not an actual resident of the city of Orange, he must pay a fee of $25 before license would be granted. He declined to pay that sum, on legal ground, hereinafter considered, and since that time has ceased to peddle in the city of Orange, at a loss to him in business, as he estimates it, of $250. He has not been convicted and subjected to any penalty or punishment for violating this ordinance, but has suffered from the interruption of his business, and consequent pecuniary loss and damage peculiar to himself, by its enforcement in the refusal to license him; hence he is, by the authority of cases in our court, entitled to the writ. State v. Paterson, 34 N. J. Law, 163; State v. Jersey City, Id. 390; State v. Washington, 44 N, J. Law, 605; State v. Trenton, 36 N. J. Law, 79.

The special objection is made to section 2 of the ordinance, which, among other things, ordains that "for each hawker or peddler who is not an actual resident of said city, twenty-five dollars [license fee] for each cart or wagon so employed or used;" while in the former part of the section $10 license fee is charged to an actual resident of the city; and it is further ordained, in the last clause...