Toole v. State

• Decision Date: 17 November 1910
• Citation: 54 So. 195,170 Ala. 41
• Parties: TOOLE v. STATE.
• Court: Alabama Supreme Court

54 So. 195

170 Ala. 41

TOOLE v. STATE.

Supreme Court of Alabama

November 17, 1910

Rehearing Denied Jan. 14, 1911.

Appeal from City Court of Montgomery; Armstead Brown, Judge.

Proceeding by the state of Alabama against W. J. Toole for the condemnation of intoxicating liquors. Judgment for the state and claimant, Toole, appeals. Affirmed.

Steiner Crum & Weil and Goodwyn & McIntyre, for appellant.

Alexander M. Garber, Atty. Gen., and Phil H. Stern, Sol., for the State.

SAYRE J.

This proceeding originated in a search and seizure warrant sworn out under section 22 of the act approved August 25, 1909 entitled "An act to further suppress the evils of intemperance, and to secure obedience to and the enforcement of, and to prevent the evasion of, the laws of the state for the promotion of temperance and for the prohibition of the manufacture of and traffic in or unlawful disposition of prohibited liquors and beverages; to provide for the abatement of liquor nuisances and the seizure and destruction of forfeited liquors and beverages, and to prescribe the procedure in such cases." Acts 1909, p. 63. The warrant was executed by seizing 114 barrels of beer. W. J. Toole interposed a claim to the beer, and thereafter the proceeding for the condemnation of the beer was conducted under the title "The State v. W. J. Toole," as the statute provides. There was, however, no charge preferred against Toole. There was not in any exact sense a criminal prosecution. The proceeding might well have begun and terminated without any disclosure of the ownership of the property or the appearance of any claimant. It was therefore a proceeding in rem against the beer for its condemnation as forfeited property. The determination being in rem, upon reasonable personal or general notice, the status of the property was to be fixed as to all the world. Black, Intox. Liq., § 352.

Appellant urges, for one thing, that the act is violative of section 45 of the Constitution of 1901, which provides that: "Each law shall contain but one subject, which shall be clearly expressed in its title." The argument is that the subject of searches and seizures, provided for in section 22 of the act, is not covered by the most general clause of the title. In its last clause the title expressly purports to provide for the seizure and destruction of forfeited liquors and beverages, and to prescribe the procedure in such cases. But if this clause is not itself referable and cognate to the more general clause of the title, under cover of which many regulations of a different character, though related to the same subject, are provided in the act, it results that the title and the body of the act as well are double. This section of the Constitution has been the subject of frequent consideration, and we presume the principles governing its interpretation are generally understood. It is no objection to an act that its subject is broadly and comprehensively expressed in its title, so long as the generality of its title is not made a cover for legislation incongruous in itself, and which by no fair intendment can be considered as having a necessary or proper connection with the one general subject expressed. State v. Street, 117 Ala. 203, 23 So. 807. The most general purpose expressed by this title is "to suppress the evils of intemperance." What follows in the title may be said to be in some sort an abstract or catalogue of the contents of the act. The additional clauses do not set forth other and distinct subjects, but are mere specifications by way of subtitle of a matter covered in a general but sufficient way in the main title. Mitchell v. State, 134 Ala. 392, 32 So. 687. The constitutional requirement is met if the act has but one general subject, and that is fairly indicated by the title. Lindsay v. U.S. Savings Ass'n, 120 Ala. 156, 24 So. 171, 42 L. R. A. 783. We do not doubt that writs for the search of places where intoxicating liquors may be kept for unlawful purposes, and for the seizure and destruction of liquors so kept, constitute apt means for the suppression of the evils of intemperance, and that the act under consideration is valid as for the objection here taken. Search and seizure warrants have been long used without question by state and federal governments as a proper and lawful means of dealing with the liquor traffic where it is forbidden.

Another question was raised when Toole propounded his claim to the property seized. In the first paragraph he stated that he was "interested in the property seized." In succeeding paragraphs he showed the manner of his interest to be that divers persons had ordered the beer for their personal use from corporations doing business in other states, that the orders had been accepted, and the beer consigned to him for delivery to the purchasers, and that he held it as the agent of the foreign vendors for the purpose of delivery wherefore, he concluded, the property was in course of interstate shipment and not subject to seizure. To this answer, or those answers, demurrers were sustained. Section 23 of the act provides that it shall be unlawful for any person, firm, association, or corporation to receive for storage, distribution, or on consignment for another prohibited liquors and beverages, or any of them, or to have or maintain any warehouse or other place for the receiving, storing, or distribution of liquors for another, and any person violating this section shall be guilty of a misdemeanor. No question arises as to the right of persons in this state to import and keep liquors and intoxicating beverages for their own use. That right is to be conceded. Vance v. Vandercook Company, 170 U.S. 438, 18 S.Ct. 674, 42 L.Ed. 1100. The defendant's dealing with the shipment of beer fell within the letter and the spirit of this enactment. But whatever may be the purpose and intent of the statute, it can have no operation as a regulation of interstate commerce (Heyman v. Southern Ry. Co., 203 U.S. 270, 27 S.Ct. 104, 51 L.Ed. 178), except to the limited extent permitted by the act of Congress commonly referred to as the Wilson act (Act Aug. 8, 1890, c. 728, 26 Stat. 313 [U. S. Comp. St. 1901, p. 3177]). The provision of that act is "that all fermented, distilled, or other intoxicating liquors or liquids transported into any state or territory, or remaining therein for use, consumption, sale or storage therein, shall upon arrival in such state or territory, be subject to the operation and effect of the law of such state or territory enacted in the exercise of its police powers, to the same extent and in the same manner as though such liquors or liquids had been produced in such state or territory, and shall not be exempt therefrom by reason of being introduced therein in original packages or otherwise." In Rhodes v. Iowa, 170 U.S. 412, 18 S.Ct. 664, 42 L.Ed. 1088, the Supreme Court of the United States, having this act under consideration, said: "This language makes it impossible in reason to hold that the law intended that the word 'arrival' should mean at the state line, since it presupposes the coming of the goods into the state for 'use, consumption, sale or storage.' The fair inference from the enumeration of these conditions, which are all-embracing, is that the time when they could arise was made the test by which to determine the period when the operation of the state law should attach to goods brought into the state." It was further said that the fundamental right which the previous decision of that court in Bowman v. Chicago & Northwestern Railway, 125 U.S. 465, 8 S.Ct. 689, 1062, 31 L.Ed. 700, held to be "protected from the operation of state laws by the Constitution of the United States was the continuity of shipment of goods coming from one state into another from the point of transmission to the point of consignment, and the accomplishment there of the delivery covered by the contract." And the ruling was that, "interpreting the statute by the light of all its provisions, it was not intended to and did not cause the power of the state to attach to an interstate commerce shipment, whilst the merchandise was in transit under such shipment, and until its arrival at the point of destination and delivery there to the consignee." There is nothing to distinguish the case at hand from the case just quoted except the fact that the consignee here was the agent of the consignor. In effect the consignor and consignee were one. Proceeding upon the premise that the nonresident sellers had a right to the complete execution of their contracts by delivery to the resident buyers, the argument for the appellant seems to assume that in a case...