Court Opinion

ID: 9680163
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 07:22:28.835316+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:26.343475
License: Public Domain

OPINION
MORRISON, Judge.
The offense is sale of merchandise on city sidewalks in violation of Section 41-10, Houston City Ordinances; the punishment, a fine of $150,00.
The record reflects that on November 23, 1973, appellant sold jewelry on a sidewalk in a downtown area of Houston. In this appeal, appellant contends that he was authorized to sell merchandise on *712the Houston streets and sidewalks under Section 22-1, Houston City Ordinances, as an itinerant vendor. Section 22-1 provides, in part:
“Itinerant Vendor. The term ‘itinerant vendor’ means and includes, and shall be construed to mean and include, all persons as well as their agents and employees, who engage in temporary or transient business in the city of selling or offering for sale any goods or merchandise, or exhibiting the same for sale, or exhibiting the same for the purpose of taking orders for the sale thereof, and who, for the purpose of carrying on such business or conducting such exhibits thereof, display, exhibit, sell or offer for sale such goods or merchandise upon or from a truck or other vehicle on the streets. of the city, or who hire, rent, lease or occupy any room or space in any building, structure, other enclosure, vacant lot or any other property whatever in the city in, through or from which any goods or merchandise may be sold, offered for sale, exhibited for sale or exhibited for the purpose of taking orders for the sale thereof, or who shall sell or offer for sale any goods or merchandise while upon the property of another, without the express written consent of the owner or occupant thereof. Provided, however, the term ‘itinerant vendor’ as defined herein shall not include or be construed to include anyone engaged in interstate commerce or anyone upon whom the provisions of the following sections would impose a direct and unlawful burden on interstate commerce.”
Section 22-1, Houston City Ordinances, is expressly limited to persons who sell merchandise from a “truck or other vehicle on the streets of the city, or who hire, rent, lease, or occupy any room or space in any building, structure, or other enclosure, vacant lot or any other property whatever in the city.” We conclude that Section 22-1 does not authorize the sale of merchandise on sidewalks of the city.
In his next ground of error appellant contends that Section 41-10, Houston City Ordinances, violates the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. He urges that there is no rational justification for the exemption of flower and ice cream vendors from the prohibition against sidewalk sales of merchandise under Sections 41-10 and 41-10.1, Houston City Ordinances ; Section 41-10 provides:
“It shall be unlawful for any person to expose for sale or to sell on any sidewalk, street, parkway, esplanade or any other property open or devoted to public use in the city any fruits, vegetables, nuts, candies, cigars, tobacco, soda water, or any foodstuffs of any nature whatsoever, or any other goods, wares, or merchandise, either exposed or enclosed in boxes, crates, barrels, baskets or any other container. It shall further be unlawful to erect, construct, build, maintain or occupy any booth, stand or other structure, either permanent or temporary, upon any sidewalk, street, parkway, esplanade or other property open or devoted to public use for the purpose of carrying on or furthering any private business, enterprise, calling, vocation or profession. This provision shall not apply to any person selling frozen desserts from sanitary vehicles approved by the director of public health under section 19-550 of this Code, . .”
Section 41-10.1, Houston City Ordinances, provides:
“(a). Section 41-10 hereof shall not apply to any person who has obtained a license for the sidewalk sale of flowers to pedestrians and who complies with the provisions of this section regulating the sale of such flowers.”
Viewing these ordinances together, we are confronted with a statutory scheme which makes selling of all goods upon the *713sidewalk unlawful except the sale of flowers and ice cream. We must here determine if the city is authorized under its police power to exempt these two items of merchandise without violating the equal rights of those who wish to sell anything else.
Section 22-1 of the Houston City Ordinances does not totally prohibit the carrying on of legitimate trade by itinerant vendors. It simply provides that they must obtain a license and that the merchandise must be sold from a truck or other vehicle on the streets or from an enclosure or vacant lot. The prohibition goes only to selling directly from the sidewalk.
At the outset we observe that a sidewalk is part of the street and subject primarily to the control of the city rather than the abutting property owners. Richardson v. Walsh, Tex.Civ.App., 292 S.W.2d 855.
Pursuant to its police power, a city is authorized to enact ordinances tending to promote the general welfare of the public in the use of the streets and sidewalks. Since the basic purpose of a sidewalk is to afford a way to public pedestrian traffic, it is in the interest of the public welfare for obstacles and impediments to this traffic to be reasonably limited.
The legislative body has a right to make a classification or create a class for the purpose of serving legitimate aims if the limits of the class are not unreasonable or arbitrary. Ex parte George, 152 Tex. Cr.R. 465, 215 S.W.2d 170. The Court in B & B Vending Company v. City of El Paso, 408 S.W.2d 545, stated:
“An ordinance may establish a classification so long as the classification is reasonable and applies equally to all persons who fall within the class.”
We cannot bring ourselves to conclude that the exemption of the sellers of flowers and ice cream is so unreasonable as to authorize this Court to strike down the legislation. Neither flowers nor ice cream are commodities within the same class as the articles which appellant was offering for sale.
In City of Chicago v. Rhine, 363 Ill. 619, 2 N.E.2d 905, the Illinois Supreme Court was confronted with an ordinance which prohibited sales of any articles except daily newspapers within a certain area of the city. The defendant in that case was a magazine vendor. The court noted that no one had an inherent right to operate his business in the streets of the city. They further stated: “[The fact] that someone else is given the privilege of selling newspapers (a commodity not within the same class as the article the defendant was exposing and offering for sale) did not constitute an unconstitutional discrimination against him.”
As written, the ordinance in the case at bar affects all people engaged in the same business (all itinerant vendors not engaged in flower or ice cream sales) equally under like conditions.
In addressing the problem of reasonableness of classification of street vendors as to the type of products which they might be licensed to sell, the Supreme Court of Washington in McKnight v. Hodge, 55 Wash. 289, 104 P. 504, said:
“Reasons quite satisfactory to some minds could be advanced for exempting peddlers of farm products from the license law, and the same can be said of vendors of books, periodicals, and newspapers; while on the other hand, there may be room for argument to the contrary. We refer to reasons and argument relating to some legitimate purpose of the law. The very fact that there is room for honest difference of opinion in this respect shows that it is a question of policy and not of power in the Legislature to pass the law. We are of the opinion that a license law such as this, whether its object is regulation or reve*714nue, is «not a grant of privileges or immunities to a class of citizens which, upon the same terms, do not equally belong to all, because it classifies peddlers with reference to the different kind of goods they sell.”
The city apparently had legitimate aims in the creation of classifications to determine which businesses could operate on the sidewalks, such as limitation of obstructions to pedestrian traffic. After reviewing the record, it is apparent that the appellant in the case at bar has not met his burden of proving that an improper basis for discrimination was utilized or that the classifications as made were arbitrary or unreasonable in light of the purposes to be served by them. City of Clute v. Lins-comb, Tex.Civ.App., 446 S.W.2d 377.
Finding no reversible error, the judgment is affirmed.