Case ID: law-times-ns_1/html/0167-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Hand, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

COMMON PLEAS OF LACKAWANNA CO.
    APPEAL OF A. J. VON STORCH FROM MERCANTILE APPRAISEMENT.
    A butcher who sells meat at a place other than the place of slaughter, is a merchant subject to the payment ofa mercantile tax. ' ‘ •
    Appeal from mercantile appraisement.
    A. J. Von Storeh was a butcher who kept a slaughter house, and also a shop where the meat was cut up and sold at-retail. He was assessed with a mercantile tax, from which he appealed, alleging that he was erroneously assessed.
   Opinion by

Hand, J.

The assessment in this case is sustained and the appeal overruled.

. Thé question raised 'is whether, a. butcher who buys cattle, slaughters them at a slaughter house,, and sells the meat at a shop and from wagons, is liable to the tax. imposed on:vendors of merchandise under the Act of Assembly relating thereto.

A dealer is not one who. buys to keep or makes to sell, but. one who buys to sell, again: Morris Bros. vs. The Commonwealth, 3 C. 494.

A manufacturer, selling away from his manufactory, is liable for the wares he manufactures.

Persons purchasing material in the rough., and after the .bestowal of skill and labor upon, the same, to make it merchantable,, selling the manufactured articled, is a dealer; and if he sells at another place than his manufactory, is liable tor the tax: 1 Phil. Rep. 147, and Com. vs. Campbell, 9 C. 385.

A butcher is a dealer in goods, wares,and merchandise, within the meaning of the Act of Assembly'; and if he could be held to be only.a manufacturer, he must sell at his slaughter house alone, to exclude him from the • provisions of the law.

It may be interesting to lawyers to learn the source of that hackneyed line.jp “Pinafore,” “And so do his. sisters, and his cousins, and lj,is aunts.” The exact collocation of these relationships may be found in Blackstone’s chapter on Coparcenery, and as Mr. Gilbert, the author of the libretto, is a lawyer, there ean: be no doubt that he has been consciously or unconsciously pilfering from Sir William. .