State v. Pensacola, St. Andrews & Gulf S.S. Co.

• Decision Date: 15 February 1917
• Docket Number: 1 Div. 967
• Citation: 75 So. 892,200 Ala. 144
• Parties: STATE v. PENSACOLA, ST. ANDREWS & GULF S.S. CO.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

75 So. 892

200 Ala. 144

STATE v. PENSACOLA, ST. ANDREWS & GULF S.S. CO.

1 Div. 967

Supreme Court of Alabama

February 15, 1917

Rehearing Denied May 31, 1917

Appeal from City Court of Mobile; O.J. Semmes, Judge.

The State of Alabama, through its authorized officer, seized and condemned 850 cases of beer found in the possession of the Pensacola, St. Andrews & Gulf Steamship Company in Mobile. On appeal to the city court from the recorder's court where the seizure was made the respondent answered, setting up that it was the common carrier by vessel, making weekly sailings between the ports of Mobile, Ala., and Pensacola, Fla.; that the packages or cases of liquor seized were delivered at Pensacola, Fla., by the shippers thereof to said steamship company to be transported to Mobile, there to be delivered to the consignees in the manner and upon the proceedings prescribed by the laws of the state of Alabama, and that when seized the liquor was being held in the warehouse of the common carrier to be delivered to said consignee; that each package contained only 48 12-ounce bottles of lager beer and nothing more; and that each of said packages was billed and consigned to a separate person or individual. The court overruled demurrers to this answer, and the State appeals. Affirmed.

W.L Martin, Atty. Gen., and Norborne R. Clarke, of Mobile, for the State.

Stevens McCorvey & McLeod, of Mobile, for appellee.

SAYRE J.

Except in the case of liquors such as are generally spoken of as prohibited, we take it there would be no disputing the proposition that a common carrier is entitled to retain possession of goods held by it for delivery to the consignee as against all persons other than the consignee or the owner of a paramount title. Code, §§ 2462, 2464. Section 22 of the act "to promote temperance," etc. (Gen.Laws 1915 p. 8 et seq.), approved January 23, 1915, provides that:

"Any person claiming any right, title or interest in the liquors and vessels seized under such warrant may interpose a verified answer controverting the allegations of the complaint upon which said warrant was issued and controverting the ground or grounds upon which the warrant was issued, and shall propound in such answer what right title or interest he claims in the liquors or vessels seized."

This language of the statute is exceedingly broad in describing the property right which will justify an intervention, and we see no reason for holding that it shall not be applied in favor of the carrier who has lawfully assumed the duty of delivering an interstate shipment of liquors. The act "to further promote temperance," etc. (Gen.Laws 1915, p. 39 et seq.), approved January 27, 1915, legalizes the interstate shipment of liquors under the conditions alleged in appellee's intervention. We are of opinion therefore, that the trial court correctly ruled against the first ground of the state's demurrer to appellee's intervention, which said demurrer, while admitting of course the facts alleged in the intervention, and hence that the shipments were not unlawful, took the point that the intervention failed to show that appellee, as carrier, had any right, title, or interest in the liquors seized such as entitled it to intervene in the premises.

It appeared on the face of appellee's intervention that the liquors in question were brought by water from Pensacola Fla., to Mobile, in this state, on May 20, 1916, and that "as a common carrier" appellee held said liquors in its possession, undelivered, until they were seized by the chief of police of the city of Mobile on May 26, 1916. The state asserted by its second ground of demurrer that, notwithstanding appellee's broad averment that it held the liquors as a common carrier, the more particular facts averred in the intervention, viz. that, in effect, appellee...