Tinley v. City Council of Augusta

• Decision Date: 12 January 1937
• Docket Number: 25856.
• Citation: 189 S.E. 413,55 Ga.App. 153
• Parties: TINLEY v. CITY COUNCIL OF AUGUSTA.
• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals

189 S.E. 413

55 Ga.App. 153

TINLEY v. CITY COUNCIL OF AUGUSTA.

No. 25856.

Court of Appeals of Georgia, First Division

January 12, 1937

Syllabus by the Court.

Under the agreed statement of facts, the accused did not violate the ordinance of the City of Augusta requiring "dealers in optical supplies, including lenses, spectacles eyeglasses, and general optical supplies," to pay a license fee of $50.

Error from Superior Court, Richmond County; A. L. Franklin, Judge.

J. C Tinley was convicted of offense of failing to pay license fee required by an ordinance of the City of Augusta, and he brings error.

Reversed.

BROYLES C.J., dissenting.

Sam F Garlington, of Augusta, for plaintiff in error.

C. Wisley Killebrew, of Augusta, for defendant in error.

MacINTYRE Judge.

J. C. Tinley was convicted in the recorder's court of the City of Augusta of the offense of failing to pay the license fee of $50 which an ordinance of that city requires to be paid by "dealers in optical supplies, including lenses, spectacles, eyeglasses, and general optical merchandise." The judge of the superior court affirmed the judgment of the recorder, and the exception is to that judgment.

It appears from the answer of the recorder to the writ of certiorari that the case was submitted on the following agreed statement of facts: "The defendant is a duly-licensed optometrist, and practicing such profession in the City of Augusta, Georgia; that he carries a stock of optical supplies such as he uses in his profession; that he is not selling these supplies at all except such as he uses in his profession as optometrist. He furnishes rims and lenses and he furnishes all necessary to fill prescriptions." The defendant contends that he is exempt from procuring the license from the City of Augusta by reason of the following provision in the general tax act of 1935 (Ga.Laws 1935, pp. 11, 13, § 2, par. 3): "Upon each and every practitioner of law, medicine, osteopathy chiropractic, chiropodist, dentistry, optometrist, masseur, public accountant, or embalmer, and upon every civil, mechanical, hydraulic, or electrical engineer, or architect, charging for their services as such, $15.00, and the validity of their license is made contingent upon the payment of the tax herein provided. And no municipal corporation or county authority shall levy or collect an additional tax on the professions, businesses or occupations enumerated above. Such tax to be collected as other license or occupation taxes are now collected." "'Optometry' or the practice thereof is the employment of any means, other than the use of drugs, for the measurement of the powers of vision and the adaptation of lenses for the aid of same." Code, § 84-1101 (Ga.Laws...