Case Name: Foster Burnett v. Ballund & Sarzedas
Court: Constitutional Court of South Carolina
Jurisdiction: South Carolina
Decision Date: 1820-05
Citations: 2 Nott & McC. 435
Docket Number: 
Parties: Foster Burnett v. Ballund & Sarzedas.
Judges: Bay, Nott, and Hugeb, JJ., concurred.
Reporter: South Carolina Law Reports
Volume: 11
Pages: 635–636

Head Matter:
Foster Burnett v. Ballund & Sarzedas.
The Act of 1815, with regard to vendne masters, is not unconstitutional.
The Act of 1815 embraces debts due on account of sales made since the passing of the Act.
To render a firm liable as vendue masters, it is not necessary that they should have taken out a license in their joint character as partners.
A motion in arrest of judgment will prevail, only where error is apparent on the face of the record.
This case was tried in the Inferior City Court, at March Term, 1820, where a verdict was found for the plaintiff.
*On a motion in arrest of judgment, and for a new trial, made in this Court, the case made by the report of the honorable the Recorder, was L substantially as follows :
The defendants had severally obtained licenses as vendue masters, and after-wards entered into a copartnership in that business, and this was an action against them as vendue masters, founded on the Act of the Legislature of 1815, to recover money due by them to the plaintiff, arising from sales made on account of the plaintiffs.
There was no dispute about the legality or correctness of the plaintiff’s demand. But his recovery in this action was resisted on the ground, that the Act of 1815, usually called the Yendue Act, was unconstitutional and void. If not, that defendants, although each had a license as vendue master in his own name, were not liable as a firm in the character of vendue masters, without a license had been granted to them as a firm.
These objections were overruled, and the grounds stated in the brief as the basis of the motion, were :
1. That the Act under which the action was brought, is contrary to the spirit and letter of the Constitution of the State.
2. That to render the defendants liable as vendue masters, it should have been proved, as well as alleged, that the defendants acted under a license in their joint character as partners.
3. That the Act only relates to debts due by vendue masters, on account of sales made before the passing of the Act, and not subsequently; and as this sale took place subsequently, the defendants could not be sued under it, so as to deprive them of the benefit of the Insolvent Debtor’s Act!
Grafts and Eclchard, for the motion.
6 Stat. 3.

Opinion:
The opinion of the Court was delivered by
JOHNSON, J.
This case has been submitted without argument, and it *, oho is sufficient to remark, so far as relates to the ^motion in arrest of J judgment, that it can only prevail in cases where error is apparent on the record, and none has been pointed out or alluded to in this case. It is presumable, therefore, that it found its way into the brief by mistake.
We are equally in the dark on the question made as to the constitutionality of the Act, and its application only to debts due at the time it was passed, and not to those which accrued afterwards.
The Act provides, that "from and immediately after its passage, the owners of property placed in the hands of vendue masters, or auctioneers, either for public or private sale, are hereby authorized and empowered to recover from the said vendue masters in the most summary manner," &e. And that the same may be recovered with the least possible delay, the Court is authorized to make such summary rules and orders as may be agreeable to justice, and tend to expedite such causes; and takes away from them the benefit of the Act for the Relief of Insolvent Debtors. I am unable to conceive any idea on which to found an argument, that any of these provisions are at variance with the Constitution. A speedy and adequate remedy for a wrong done, is nowhere prohibited. On the contrary, the "law's delay," is justly and deservedly regarded as an evil to be borne, only because it cannot be remedied, and I find the same difficulty in applying it only to debts then due.
The only ground to be considered, then, is whether the defendants are liable as vendue masters, not having a license in their joint character as a firm.
When any individual or company take upon them a character, upon the faith of which they gain employment or derive a benefit, whether they be legally entitled to it or not, they will not be permitted, when called on to answer in that character, to allege, as an excuse, that it was only assumed, *4381 for no man will be allowed to take advantage of his own wrong. ^ The motion is dismissed.
Bay, Nott, and Hugeb, JJ., concurred.