Supreme Court of Alabama, 1912

Alabama Consolidated Coal & Iron Co. v. Herzberg

Supreme Court of Alabama · Decided June 25, 1912 · Anderson, Conclusion, Mayfield, McClellan, Sayre, Simpson, Somerville

177 Ala. 248; 59 So. 305; 1912 Ala. LEXIS 292

Cases that cite this one

13 later published cases cite this decision.

Rochell v. City of Florence (Ala. 1939)
Woco Pep Co. of Montgomery v. City of Montgomery (Ala. 1925)
Ex Parte Melof (Ala. 1999)
City of Birmingham v. Birmingham Business College, Inc. (Ala. 1951)
Department of Ind. Rel. v. West Boylston Mfg. Co. (Ala. 1949)
State v. Kartus (Ala. 1935)
State v. Kartus (Ala. Ct. App. 1935)
Bellingrath v. Town of Georgiana (Ala. Ct. App. 1929)
Exchange Drug Co. v. State Tax Commission (Ala. 1928)
Warrior Water Co. v. Long (Ala. 1928)
Maury v. State (Ala. 1922)
Singer Sewing Machine Co. v. Brickell (Supreme Court of the United States 1914)
Alabama Consolidated Coal & Iron Co. v. Herzberg (Ala. Ct. App. 1912)

This list shows which later cases cite this one. It does not say how they treated it, and no review of that has been done. Not a substitute for Shepard’s or KeyCite — verify before relying.

Opinion of the Court

ANDERSON, J.

Section 33a of the act of 1911, p. 181, reads as follows: “Any person, firm, or corporation who conducts a commissary or store at which their employees trade on checks, orders or other device shall pay an annual license tax as follows: When such person, firm or corporation employs less than fifty persons, thirty dollars; when more than fifty and less than one hundred are employed, fifty dollars, when more than one hundred persons are employed, one hundred dollars.”

It will be observed that this section does not impose a license tax upon persons, firms, or corporations conducting stores or commissaries, but only upon those wherein the employees trade upon checks, orders, or other devices. The tax is not, therefore, imposed upon the business, or upon all engaged in a similar business, but is based solely upon the manner in which a party may conduct the business; and the foregoing section is repugnant to the state and federal Constitutions, under the authority of City of Montgomery v. Kelly, 142 Ala. 552, 38 South. 67, 70 L. R. A. 209, 110, Am. St. Rep. *25143. This case was approvingly cited and explained in tie ease of Mefford v. City of Sheffield, 148 Ala. 543, 41 South. 970.

Since the section in question must fall, it is needless to answer the other questions certified, as they go to the construction of same.

Simpson and Mayfield, JJ., concur in the opinion. Sayre, J., concurs in the conclusion. McClellan and Somerville, JJ., dissent.

Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.