Verona v. Schenley Farms Co.

• Decision Date: 22 May 1933
• Parties: VERONA v. SCHENLEY FARMS CO.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

167 A. 317
312 Pa. 57

VERONA
v.
SCHENLEY FARMS CO.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

May 22, 1933.

Appeal No. 76, March term, 1933, from order and decree of Court of Common Pleas, Allegheny County, No. 3681, July term, 1932; William H. McNaugher, Judge.

Action in assumpsit by John J. Verona against the Schenley Farms Company to recover compensation for services performed under an oral contract. From an order refusing judgment for defendant for want of a sufficient reply to defendant's averment of new matter, defendant appeals.

Reversed, and judgment rendered for defendant.

Argued before FRAZER, C. J., and SIMPSON, KEPHART, SCHAFFER, MAXEY, DREW, and LINN, JJ.

William R. Scott and Smith, Buchanan, Scott & Gordon, all of Pittsburgh, for appellant.

Charles J. Margiotti and John E. Evans, both of Pittsburgh, for appellee.

LINN, Justice.

This appeal is from an order refusing judgment for want of a sufficient reply by plaintiff to defendant's averment of new matter.

167 A. 318

Plaintiff claims $150,000 for performance of an oral contract. Defendant denied making the contract, and also the performance alleged, and, under new matter, in substance averred that plaintiff's statement showed that, in the transaction declared on, he was a real estate broker within the terms of the Real Estate Brokers' License Act of 1929, P. L. 1216 (63 PS § 431 et seq.); that he had no license as required by section 6 (63 PS § 436); and that suit was prohibited by section 16 (63 PS § 446).

By proceedings, described in Sheets v. Armstrong, 307 Pa. 385, 161 A. 359, the county commissioners of Allegheny county agreed to purchase from Schenley Farms Company certain land for a town hall. In the present suit, Verona, the plaintiff, avers that the owner of that land, Schenley Farms Company, the present defendant, "sought the services and assistance of [plaintiff] to act as agent for the [defendant] to present to the [commissioners] the special, peculiar and particular advantages of [defendant's land] * * * to the end that said real estate might be sold to the county." He also avers that the parties "entered into an oral contract" whereby plaintiff "agreed to use his best efforts in presenting to the [commissioners] the special, particular and peculiar advantages of [defendant's land] * * * as being the most fitting, suitable and desirable location for the auditorium or 'Town Hall,' then under consideration, as compared with other properties which were being offered and considered by the said County Commissioners, to the end that the same might be sold to the said County of Allegheny for the purposes aforesaid," and that defendant agreed to pay for his services in installments to mature in circumstances which, in view of our conclusion on the principal question, need not be stated.

The Real Estate Brokers' License Act of 1929 is entitled "An Act To define real estate brokers and real estate salesmen; and providing for the licensing, regulation, and supervision of resident and nonresident real estate brokers and real estate salesmen and their business."

Briefly, it may be said, the purpose of the act was comprehensive regulation of the business of selling real estate for others. To that end, sellers were divided into two general groups, one requiring a license and the other not. Each group was subdivided into classes; the first group into two classes, (a) real estate brokers and (b) real estate salesmen. The second group was divided into a number of classes, as will appear later. The distinction between the two main groups depended on whether or not a party was engaged in the business of selling real estate for others; parties so engaged are in the first group. Parties not in the business of selling for others are in the second group. The duty of issuing licenses and otherwise administering the statute was vested in the department of public instruction.

Section 2 (63 PS § 432) defines, in paragraph (a), a real estate broker; in paragraph (b) a real estate salesman; and in paragraph (c) excepts and excludes from those definitions certain classes of real estate brokerage that might otherwise be within the general language of (a) and (b).

Section 6 (63 PS § 436) makes it "unlawful for any person * * * to engage in or carry on the business, or act...