Source: http://masscases.com/cases/app/7/7massappct268.html
Timestamp: 2019-04-18 18:53:54+00:00

Document:
Present: HALE, C.J., GRANT, & DREBEN, JJ.
CIVIL ACTION commenced in the Superior Court on April 26, 1977.
F. Dale Vincent (David Burns with him) for the plaintiffs.
Richard C. Spaulding, pro se.
DREBEN, J. The trial judge ruled that the defendant Spaulding has a valid license for the sale of all alcoholic beverages and entered judgment dismissing the plaintiffs' complaint brought under G. L. c. 139, Section 16A, as appearing in St. 1973, c. 1114, Section 12. The plaintiffs, twelve voters of the town of Danvers, appeal.
The only question before us is whether the all-alcoholic license granted to the defendant under G. L. c. 138, Section 12, was lawfully issued; if not, the plaintiffs can invoke the provisions of G. L. c. 139, Section 16A, to abate, as a common nuisance, the sale of liquor at the defendant's restaurant.
Jasper v. Michael A. Dolan, Inc., 355 Mass. 17 , 18 (1968).
the premises were already "licensed for the sale of alcoholic beverages" within the meaning of Section 16C.
The plaintiffs argue that the all-alcoholic beverages license was a new license, that Section 16C applies, and that the issuance of the license over the objection of the church was in excess of the board's statutory authority. We agree.
As originally passed in 1954, [Note 7] Section 16C contained a flat prohibition against the licensing of premises for the sale of alcoholic beverages within a certain distance of a school or a church. In 1968 [Note 8] the prohibition was made inapplicable to a church assenting to the licensing, and, in 1970, by St. 1970, c. 192, Section 1, the prohibition was made applicable only to a church filing a written objection.
Section 2 of the same act also amended Section 15A to require that the notice sent to a church or school "shall indicate the necessity of a written objection to prevent the issuance or transfer of such license under the provisions of section sixteen C."
Courts, too, have recognized the difference between wine and hard liquor, particularly in zoning contexts. Thus, an all-alcoholic license was not protected as a preexisting use where the former use was pursuant to a wines and malt beverages license. Jasper v. Michael A. Dolan, Inc., 355 Mass. 17 , 24 (1968). In Salerni v. Scheuy, 140 Conn. 566, 571 (1954), cited in Jasper at 24, the court said: "As a matter of common knowledge it is also true that ordinarily a restaurant with a full liquor permit is quite a different sort of enterprise from a restaurant which sells only beer. It is a more ambitious establishment, partaking to at least some degree of the characteristics of a night club, rather than a quiet family eating place." See also Town Council of Los Gatos v. State Bd. of Equalization, 141 Cal. App. 2d 344, 349 (1956).
In reaching this conclusion we are not unmindful of Jasper v. Michael A. Dolan, Inc., 355 Mass. 17 , 20-21 (1968), where the court construed a saving clause applicable to Section 16C in a manner not fully consistent with our construction. However, we do not view Jasper as precluding the result reached here for a number of reasons, including: (1) the 1970 amendments of Sections 15A, 16A and 16C show an integral connection among those sections; (2) at the time of Jasper, Section 16C contained a flat prohibition against the granting of liquor licenses in close proximity to a church; and (3) the question before the court was not whether the issuance of a wines and malt beverages license foreclosed later objection to an application for an all-alcoholic license. It should also be noted that in that case the court, for other reasons, enjoined the selling of all alcoholic beverages as a nuisance.
[Note 1] Gregory Johnson, the owner of the premises where the defendant Spaulding (referred to in this opinion as the defendant) operates a restaurant.
[Note 2] All statutory references in this opinion, except where otherwise stated, are to G. L. c. 138, and only the section numbers will be indicated.
[Note 3] No one contends that the section is invalid, and its constitutionality has recently been upheld. Arno v. Alcoholic Beverages Control Commn., 377 Mass. 83 (1979).
[Note 4] Section 12 relates to licenses for beverages to be drunk on the premises and governs both wines and malt beverages licenses and all-alcoholic beverages licenses. The fifth paragraph of the section has not changed since its enactment by St. 1934, c. 385, Section 3, and reads in part: "The local licensing authorities may accept the surrender of a license issued under this section and may issue in place thereof to the same licensee any other form of license authorized under this section . . . Different licenses issued as aforesaid for any portion of the same license year to the same licensee shall count as one license for the purposes of section seventeen."
[Note 5] The second sentence of the ninth paragraph of Section 12 reads: "The licensing authorities may refuse to grant licenses under this section in certain geographical areas of their respective cities or towns, where the character of the neighborhood may warrant such refusal." The provision first appeared in the seventh paragraph of Section 12, as originally enacted by St. 1933, c. 376, Section 2, and has remained unchanged.
[Note 6] The requirement was inserted in Section 15A in 1939 and was continued in all subsequent amendments of that section. See St. 1939, c. 414; St. 1943, c. 542, Section 5; St. 1965, c. 400; St. 1967, c. 523; St. 1968, c. 361; St. 1970, c. 192, Section 2; St. 1971, c. 477, Section 2.
[Note 7] St. 1954, c. 569.
[Note 8] St. 1968, c. 435.
[Note 9] In its present form, the first paragraph of Section 15A provides that notice of all applications for an "original" license shall be published in the city or town where the license is intended to be exercised. The second paragraph provides in part that: "Every applicant for an original license under section twelve . . . or for a transfer of such a license from one location to another, or an applicant for a change in the description of a licensed premises . . ." shall send a copy of the published notice to the abutters, and to schools, churches and hospitals if located within a radius of five hundred feet of the premises. "The notice sent to such school, church or hospital shall indicate the necessity of a written objection to prevent the issuance or transfer of such license under the provisions of section sixteen C."
Statute 1971, c. 477, Section 2, added the requirement that the notice to hospitals in the second paragraph of Section 15A indicate the necessity of a written objection to prevent the issuance of a license under Section 16C, although hospitals are not mentioned in Section 16C and have no right to object under that section.
[Note 10] Since Sections 15A and 16C were both amended by St. 1970, c. 192, we read the sections together to mean that if notice to a church is required under Section 15A, the church has the right to object under Section 16C. But see the last paragraph of note 9, supra.
[Note 11] Both the fifth paragraph of Section 12 and Section 16A were inserted by St. 1934, c. 385. The fifth paragraph is set forth in note 4, supra; Section 16A as inserted by St. 1934, c. 385, Section 6, read in part as follows: "The holder of a license . . . who applies prior to December first in any licensing period for a license of the same class for the next succeeding licensing period shall be prima facie entitled thereto" provided that enough licenses are issuable under Section 17. "Class" was not defined.
[Note 12] The fees are also different. Section 12 prescribes a minimum fee of $250 and a maximum of $2,500 for a restaurant for an all-alcoholic beverages license and a minimum of $100 and a maximum of $1,000 for a wines and malt beverages license.
`No nation is drunken where wine is cheap; and none sober, where the dearness of wine substitutes ardent spirits as the common beverage. It is, in truth, the only antidote to the bane of whiskey. . . . Its extended use will carry health and comfort to a much enlarged circle. Every one in easy circumstances (as the bulk of our citizens are) will prefer it to the poison to which they are now driven by their government.'"
[Note 14] We are also somewhat influenced by the second sentence of Section 23. That sentence reads in part as follows: "The provisions for the issue of licenses and permits hereunder imply no intention to create rights generally for persons to engage or continue in the transaction of the business authorized by the licenses or permits respectively, but are enacted with a view only to serve the public need and in such a manner as to protect the common good . . . ."

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