Williams v. Fears

• Decision Date: 11 April 1900
• Citation: 35 S.E. 699,110 Ga. 584
• Parties: WILLIAMS v. FEARS, Sheriff, et al.
• Court: Georgia Supreme Court

35 S.E. 699

110 Ga. 584

WILLIAMS v. FEARS, Sheriff, et al.

Supreme Court of Georgia

April 11, 1900

Syllabus by the Court.

1. The term "emigrant agent," in the general tax act of 1898, means a person engaged in hiring laborers in this state, to be employed beyond the limits of the same.

2. The imposition of a tax upon such a person is not a regulation of interstate commerce.

3. A law imposing a tax upon such a person is not such a restriction upon the right of a citizen to move from one state to another as that it abridges the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, within the meaning of the fourteenth amendment to the constitution of the United States. Nor is such a law a discrimination of favor of persons hiring laborers to be employed within the limits of the state, so as to amount to a denial of the equal protection of the laws, within the meaning of that amendment. The case of Shepperd v. Commissioners, 59 Ga. 535 upon a review thereof, is affirmed.

4. Nor is such a law violative of any provision of the constitution of this state.

Error from superior court, Morgan county; John C. Hart, Judge.

Application of R. A. Williams for writ of habeas corpus directed to Edgar Fears, sheriff, and others. From a judgment denying the writ petitioner brings error. Affirmed.

Jas Davison and R. J. Jordan, for plaintiff in error.

H. G. Lewis, Sol. Gen., and E. W. Butler, Sol. County Court, for defendants in error.

COBB J.

Williams was arrested upon a warrant charging him with "the offense of acting as emigrant agent without a license." He made application to the judge of the superior court of the Ocmulgee circuit for a writ of habeas corpus, alleging that the warrant under which he was arrested charged him with a violation of that provision of the general tax act of 1898 which imposed "upon each emigrant agent, or employer or employé of such agents, doing business in this state, the sum of five hundred dollars for each county in which such business is conducted." Acts 1898, p. 24. He further alleged that the law which he was charged with having violated was in conflict with certain provisions of the constitutions of the United States and of the state of Georgia, enumerating in the application the various clauses of which the act was alleged to be violative. The writ of habeas corpus was issued, and on the day fixed for the hearing the officer having the accused in custody appeared, produced the prisoner, and answered that he had him in custody under a warrant of the character alleged. No evidence was offered, and the judge, after hearing argument upon the application and answer, remanded the prisoner to the custody of the officer having him in charge, to be held by him until discharged by due process of law. To this ruling the accused excepted.

1. The tax act of 1898, which embraces the tax in the language above quoted, provides that before any person shall be authorized to carry on the business of an emigrant agent he shall go before the ordinary of each county in which such agent proposes to do business, and register his name and place of business, and at the same time pay the tax to the tax collector. If he fails to register with the ordinary, he is guilty of a misdemeanor, or if, having registered, he fails to pay the tax, he is likewise guilty of a misdemeanor. Acts 1898, pp. 24, 27. The warrant was issued upon an affidavit charging the accused with having violated the above-quoted provision of the tax act. It does not distinctly appear whether he is charged with having done business without registering, or whether, having registered, he carried on the business without paying the tax. As an affidavit to authorize the issuance of a warrant need not set forth the offense with the same particularity required in indictments, the charge in the affidavit, although general in its nature and to some extent indefinite, would be sufficient to authorize the issuance of a warrant, under the laws of this state. Williams v. State, 107 Ga. 693, 33 S.E. 641; Brown v. State (Ga.) 34 S.E. 1031. It is immaterial to a consideration of the questions involved in the present case whether the accused was charged with having carried on the business of an emigrant agent without having registered, or without having paid the tax, for the reason that, if the provision of the tax act imposing the tax is unconstitutional, he cannot be punished for a failure to do either.

It becomes necessary at the outset to determine what is meant by the term "emigrant agent," as used in the above-quoted provision of the tax act. An "emigrant" is defined to be "one who emigrates or quits one country or region to settle in another." Webst. Int. Dict. "An 'emigrant' is one who quits his country for any lawful reason, with a design to settle elsewhere, and takes his family and property with him." 10 Am. & Eng. Enc. Law (2d Ed.) 1042. To "emigrate" is "to remove from one country or state to another, for the purpose of residence." Webst. Int. Dict. In the absence of a contrary reason to be found in the legislation of this state, the word "emigrant" would be given its ordinary meaning; and therefore an emigrant agent doing business in this state would be held to be one engaged in the business of removing, or inducing or assisting to remove, persons domiciled in this state to another country or state for the purpose of acquiring there a new residence. Is there anything in the legislation of this state requiring that the term "emigrant agent" should be given a different meaning? The term appears for the first time in an act passed in 1876 (Acts 1876, p. 17), which declared that any person carrying on the business of an emigrant agent in this state, without having first obtained a license therefor from the ordinary, for which he should pay the sum of $500, should be guilty of a misdemeanor. The term "emigrant agent" was by this act defined to be "any person engaged in hiring laborers in this state, to be employed beyond the limits of the same." In 1877 (Acts 1877, p. 120), an act was passed which declared that "it shall not be lawful for any emigrant agent or agents to solicit or procure emigrants to leave the state, or to act in the capacity of emigrant agents for said purpose," without procuring a license from the tax collector in each county in which such agent proposed to do business, for which he should pay the sum of $500. It is unnecessary in the present case to determine whether either or both of the acts last referred to are still of force, as the provision of the tax act of 1898 is the only subject of attack. We look to these acts, therefore, merely for the purpose of ascertaining the meaning to be given to the term "emigrant agent" as used in the act of 1898. The term was defined in the act of 1876, and this definition has never been changed. The act of 1877 imposed a tax upon emigrant agents,--that is, persons engaged in hiring laborers to go beyond the limits of the state,--who should solicit or procure emigrants--that is, persons leaving the state for the purpose of changing their residence--to leave the state. In other words, the act of 1876 imposed a tax upon persons who should be engaged in the business of hiring laborers to leave the state, and the act of 1877 simply imposed an additional tax upon such persons if they should also be engaged in soliciting or procuring persons to change their residence from his state to another. In the light of the definition, given in the act of 1876, and of the fact that the act of 1877 did not in any way undertake to change this definition, no other construction than the one above indicated can properly be given to the latter act. When, therefore, in subsequent legislation, the general assembly used the term "emigrant agent," with nothing to indicate what was meant by the term, it will be presumed that it had in mind the definition theretofore given to the term. In all of the general tax acts passed after the act of 1877, language similar to that above quoted from the act of 1898 was employed, and it will be held that in those acts the legislature intended, by the use of the words "emigrant agent," to impose a tax upon persons engaged in the business of "hiring laborers in this state, to be employed beyond the limits of the same."

The act of 1877 was carried into the Code of 1882, and, notwithstanding the act of 1876 was omitted from that Code, the definition of "emigrant agent," as contained in the latter act, was therein embraced. Code 1882, § 4598 (a-c). It was evidently the opinion of the codifiers that the act of 1877 repealed the act of 1876, except so far as the definition of "emigrant agent" was concerned. Both the act of 1876 and the act of 1877 were omitted from the Code of 1895; the only reference to either act being contained in section 601 of the Penal Code, which provides that "any person who shall solicit or procure emigrants, or shall attempt to do so, without first procuring a license as required by law, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor." This section was taken from the act of 1877, but the words "any person" were substituted for the words "any emigrant agent," used in that act. It is, however, unnecessary in this case to determine what effect is to be given to this section.

2. This brings us down to that provision of the general tax act of 1898, above referred to, the validity of which is assailed in the present case. It is to be noted that the acts of 1876 and 1877 provided for a license, while the tax acts provide for a tax upon occupation, these acts describing the tax imposed upon emigrant agents as a specific tax, and that occupation being embraced in the act along with other occupations of various character; and the act distinctly recites that it is passed for the purpose...