Alex. Sprunt & Sons v. May
Alex. Sprunt & Sons v. May
Opinion of the Court
after stating the case: ¥e have held, in Rodgers v. Bell, ante, 378, in reference to our statute as to gaming contracts, Revisal of 1905, ch. 36, that the words now appearing at the end of section 1689, to wit, “This section shall not be construed so as to apply to any person, firm, corporation, or his or their agent, engaged in the business of manufacturing or wholesale merchandising, in the purchase or sale of the necessary commodities required in the ordinary course of their business,” by correct construction, should appear and only affect section 1691 of said chapter — the section relating to the burden of proof — and that, by reason of this clause, so placed, a bona fide wholesale dealer in spot cotton, who purchased the same in the ordinary course of his business, is not affected by said section, but is entitled to have his cause tried and determined under the rule, which generally obtains, that one who asserts
On the facts in evidence it appears that plaintiffs and their predecessors, under the style of Alex. Sprunt & Sons, from 1866, have been engaged in the cotton business, and since 1880 they have exported cotton in large quantities, supplying mills and dealers abroad, and, in the ordinary course of their business, they buy annually on an average 400,000 bales of cotton. They are, therefore, if the evidence is accepted by the jury, well within the clause withdrawing their case from the provision of section 1691, and, on another trial, the same will be submitted under the ordinary rules of evidence obtaining in such cases.
Objections were chiefly made to the validity of the trial for alleged error in a portion of his Honor’s charge, as follows: “So, therefore, if you find as a fact that Alexander Sprunt & Sons were engaged in the wholesale cotton business here, buying cotton and shipping it to Europe, and that they had not been engaged and were not engaged in gambling contracts or futures with the expectation of taking margins or the difference between the contract price and the price at the time of the delivery, and that they did not authorize Brock to make any such contracts, but simply authorized him to make a contract for the actual delivery of the 'cotton, then you will find the first issue ‘Yes.’ ”
As we understand it, the charge could only mean, and was intended, by his Honor, to mean that if plaintiffs were bona fide wholesale dealers in cotton, and only authorized Brock to make, a contract for actual delivery, plaintiffs could recover for breach of a contract made by Brock, although in the negotiations and making of the contract there was an understanding between Brock and the other party that actual delivery was not intended and would not be required — a position that cannot be sustained.
If plaintiffs were seeking to avoid this contract and its effect, they might, under certain conditions and circumstances, be
In Corbett v. Clute, supra, plaintiff sued to foreclose a mortgage ; there was allegation, with evidence, on part of defendant, tending to show that tbe agent of plaintiff bad wrongfully procured tbe note and mortgage by falsely representing that tbe son of tbe mortgagor, an old, feeble, inexperienced woman, bad been guilty of a criminal offense, and that unless mortgage was executed her son would be prosecuted and sent to tbe penitentiary. It was claimed by plaintiffs, and tbis was very well established, that they bad not authorized tbe conduct of tbeir agent; but tbe position was not allowed to affect tbe question, tbe Court saying: “It will not be contended that tbe plaintiff is not bound by tbe statements of bis agent. He is here, now, asserting bis claims under tbe note and mortgage obtained for him by this transaction, and if be claims tbe benefits, be must accept tbe responsibility,” citing Black v. Baylees and Harris v. Delamar, supra. In Manufacturing Co. v. Cotton & Long, supra, it was beld “that when a principal accepts an order for goods, obtained by agent, be is bound by tbe agent’s acts in obtaining it, although be violated tbe principal’s instructions.” Tbe principle is very generally recognized, and further citation of authority is not required.
Nor can it be contended, for a moment, that there was no testimony tending to show an understanding and agreement-between defendant and plaintiff’s agent, Brock, forbidden by tbe statute. Revisal, sec. 1689. Speaking to tbis question, tbe defendant testified as follows:
Q. Who had? A. He and I, too, and several others. He says, “If you can sell this for 12 cents, you can take this and pay the difference in that 10-cent cotton.”
Q. What was the agreement between you and him in reference to the actual delivery of the cotton? A. He told me it would not be expected, and we could settle on the difference.
Q. Did you intend to deliver any cotton under that contract? A. No, sir.
Q. Did you have any cotton to deliver? A. No, sir.
Q. Did you own any cotton? A. No, sir. ■
Q. Did Mr. Brock know that you were not farming? A. Yes, sir.
And the agent Brock testified:
You say you told Mr. May that the cotton was not expected to be delivered? A. Yes, sir; I told him I didn’t think they would require the delivery of the cotton. I asked Mr. May did he want to sell some cotton for 12 cents; he said he had already sold some cotton, and as far as everything said in the conversation, I don’t know about that — I can’t remember that; we were talking over what they were intending to do about it — that they could take the difference in one and pay the difference in the other; and that was the way the contract-was made.
Q. What was it Mr. May said to you before you signed the contract in reference to having sold some contract cotton? A. He said he had already sold some contract cotton, and in the general discussion of the contract cotton,, and if he would sell more, he would take the difference in one way and fay the difference in the other; that’s exactly what was said about it.
Q. What did you say to him at the time of the execution of this contract in reference to the delivery of the actual cotton? A. I told him I didn’t think the actual delivery of the cotton was expected at all; if I was wrong in it, that was what I told him.
New trial.
Dissenting Opinion
dissenting: I regret always to differ from my brethren; but when an important and valuable right of tbe citizen, which, in my opinion, is recognized by tbe law, is abridged or impaired by a decision of tbis Court, it is my clear duty to enter my dissent, and, when required, as is tbe case here, to give my reasons therefor. I cannot agree to tbe proposition which seems to form tbe basis of tbe Court’s opinion, tbat tbe exception in tbe statute, Revisal, secs. 1689, 1690, as to purchases or sales by manufacturers and wholesale merchants of tbe necessary commodities used in their, business, is restricted to tbe burden of proof or to tbe clause of tbe statute raising a prima facie case of illegality in tbe transaction upon tbe proof of certain facts; nor do I think tbat it was so decided in S. v. McGinnis, 138 N. C., 724, or S. v. Clayton, ibid., 132. An extract from tbe opinion of tbe Chief Justice in tbe former case will show tbe contrary: “Tbat no other businesses or persons are mentioned as authorized to deal bona fide for tbe purchase of commodities on ‘margin’ is not an implied restriction upon others to do an act not forbidden by any statute. Section 1 does not confer any exclusive_ right or privilege ujion manufacturers or wholesale merchants. It does not authorize them to engage in any business prohibited by tbe act of 1889. It does not authorize them to speculate in cotton or other commodities. It simply provides that the courts •shall not construe the act of 1905 to have the effect of preventing them from buying and selling for future delivery the necessary commodities required in their ordinary business.” It is true that the court, in that case, when considering the burden
It is thus conceded that the mere fact that such a dealer buys “on a margin” does not make the transaction unlawful under the statute, but is clearly authorized. The statute covers the whole subject and provides a general scheme of legislation to prevent the vicious practice of dealing, for the purpose of speculation, in “futures,” which have a well-known and definite meaning, being regarded by the law as a cover for gambling, and therefore denounced by it as illegal. Such purchases and sales by manufacturers and wholesale dealers or merchants, being lawful, the Legislature, by section 1689, which declared “future contracts” unlawful, excepted such manufacturers and
I understood, at the time they were decided, that McGinnis’s case and Clayton’s case were in accord with this view, and I believe that they were intended to be; but if they are not, or were not so intended to be, I cannot longer give my assent to them.
The defendants in those two cases were indicted for conducting and maintaining bucket shops, which was plainly unlawful. They were not manufacturers or merchants, in the sense of those terms as used in the statute, and the question now presented was not necessarily involved in those decisions, although the Court, I think, recognized the law to be as I now contend it is. .
Alex. Sprunt & Sons are engaged in a perfectly legitimate business, that of buying spot cotton for export, and_ are not dealing in what are known as “futures” for the purpose of speculation. They are wholesale dealers in the cotton itself, and buy it for resale or to fill orders, and in no view are they gambling in the article. When they buy “on a margin,” it is merely for the purpose of protecting themselves against losses which may arise from the rise or fall in prices in the cotton market, and only to that extent; and this is precisely what they are authorized to do by the last provision in Revisal, sec. 1689.
But it is said that the exception to be found at the end of that section (1689) should be bodily taken therefrom and transferred to sections 1690 and 1691, which relate to. the burden of proof, and the prima, facie case made against the plaintiff by the plea of the defendant that the contract sued on is illegal, it being a gambling contract, for the purchase or sale of cotton “on margins,” to be settled merely by paying the difference in the price of the commodity at a given time, which is determined by the rise or fall of the price in the market, and, therefore, purely speculative.
“1. Tbe common law, of course, gives way to tbe statute which is inconsistent with it. 2. When a statute is designed to be a revision, consolidation, or codification of tbe whole body of tbe law, applicable to a given subject, it supersedes and supplants tbe common law, so far as it applies to tbe subject, and leaves no part of it in force.” Black’s Inter, of Law, p. 236; Hannon v. Madden, 10 Bush, 664; Kramer v. Rebman, 9 Iowa, 114; Com. v. Cooley, 10 Pick., 37; S. v. Witson, 43 N. H., 415.
Tbe courts whose reports I have cited are of very high repute, and could not well go astray upon such a simple proposition. Tbe theory and practical operation of this rule are so well explained and clearly illustrated by tbe Supreme Court of Alabama, in tbe case of Barker v. Bell, 46 Ala., 216, that no room is left for doubt that our statute (Revisal, sec. 1689) takes the place of tbe common law, and is tbe one and only mile upon tbe subject with which it deals. That Court, which is held in high esteem by all courts for its juridical learning and ability, said in tbe case just cited: Tbe Revisal “is intended to contain all tbe statute laws of tbe State of a public nature, designed to operate upon all tbe people of tbe State, up to tbe date of its adoption, unless otherwise directed in tbe code. This law is not merely cumulative of tbe common law, and made to perfect tbe deficiencies of that system, but it is designed to create a new and independent system, applicable to our own institutions and government. In such case, where a statute dis
Even if the statute introduces a new rule, it repeals immemorial custom - and the common law, provided the enactment introduces a new principle or rule sufficient in itself. Black, p. 236; Delaplane v. Crenshaw, 15 Grattan, 457. So we see it is not necessary that a statute should be in direct conflict with the common law in order to repeal it, but it is quite sufficient if the statute introduces into the law a new principle and a new rule sufficient of itself to create or answer for a full provision upon the subject. The Kevisal, sec. 1689, is of this character, and it takes the place of the common law as much so as if there had been an express clause of repeal of that law in it. The exception, therefore, applies to the law as declared in that section, and there is no common law upon the subject left to operate, it having been repealed, and the statute furnishes the only rule.
After careful deliberation, my conclusion is that the charge of the court was correct, regardless of what occurred between the defendant, C. C. May, and the plaintiff’s agent, F. Brock. His Honor appears to have entertained the same views as those herein expressed, and for that reason instructed the jury as he did.
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