Commissioner of Transportation v. Lane

144 Misc. 2d 680, 544 N.Y.S.2d 925, 1989 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 491
CourtNew York Supreme Court
DecidedJuly 7, 1989
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 144 Misc. 2d 680 (Commissioner of Transportation v. Lane) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Commissioner of Transportation v. Lane, 144 Misc. 2d 680, 544 N.Y.S.2d 925, 1989 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 491 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 1989).

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

Robert A. Harlem, J.

This is a proceeding commenced pursuant to RPAPL article 7 to recover possession of certain real property conceded by the respondent to be within the bounds of New York State Route 10 in the Village of Walton, County of Delaware, New York. Petitioner moves for summary judgment and respondent requests that the same relief be granted in his favor (CPLR 3212 [bp.

Respondent is an honorably discharged veteran of overseas service in the United States Army who holds a valid license pursuant to section 32 of the General Business Law which entitles him to hawk, peddle, vend and sell, goods, wares or merchandise or solicit trade upon the streets and highways of Delaware County. He admits that in or about 1983 he went into possession of a certain strip of land adjacent to the paved portion of Route 10 (known as Delaware Street within the Village of Walton) from which he engaged in the business of selling wares consisting, in large measure, of used automobile hubcaps.

He gained considerable notoriety as The Hubcap Man when, in 1984, the Village of Walton and the State of New York attempted, unsuccessfully, to evict him from his place of business (see, Matter of Woodin v Lane, 119 AD2d 969). In 1987 he commenced an action in Federal court in an unsuccessful effort to block the State of New York from selling a portion of the parcel of land upon which he was operating his business (see, Lane v Commissioner of Transp., US Dist Ct, ND NY, 87-CV-419). After that sale was accomplished, a proceeding was instituted in this court to evict him from the portion of the parcel which had been sold, and on August 15, 1988, an order was signed on consent requiring that he vacate those premises (see, Matter of Bettiol Enters. v Lane, Delaware County, index No. 88-311). The State now seeks to evict him from the remainder of the parcel.

Respondent’s original answer asserted, as a fifth affirmative defense, that this court lacked jurisdiction by reason of defective service of the notice of petition and petition. The Assis[683]*683tant Attorney-General admitted that service was technically improper. Faced with the avowed intention of the State to begin the proceeding anew, however, respondent withdrew this defense and elected to proceed on the merits. He amended his answer and deleted the formerly pleaded defense.

The first affirmative defense in the amended answer asserts that the presence and business activities of respondent upon the premises from which it is sought to evict him have at all times been with the permission of the State. The second affirmative defense alleges that his activities were authorized by license pursuant to section 32 of the General Business Law, and the third affirmative defense argues that the State is judicially estopped from denying that the presence and activities of respondent on the premises were pursuant to permission by virtue of assertions made in prior litigation. The fourth affirmative defense alleges that the claim of the State, and all issues relating thereto, are precluded by an order of the County Court, Delaware County, which determined respondent’s appeal in Matter of Woodin v Lane, and which was in turn affirmed in the Appellate Division (119 AD2d 969, supra). The fifth affirmative defense asserts that the claim of the State, and all related issues, are precluded by the judgment of the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York in Lane v Commissioner of Transp. (supra), because these claims were not interposed as a counterclaim pursuant to rule 13 (a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

The issue of permission is obviously important because the statute under which the State is proceeding, RPAPL 713 (3), provides for summary eviction only where the respondent, or the person to whom he has succeeded, has intruded into or squatted upon the property without the permission of the person entitled to possession and the occupancy has continued without permission or permission has been revoked, and notice of the revocation given to the person to be removed. Respondent has not, however, put forth any factual basis for his claims of permissive entry or permissive use except the assertion of his attorney that respondent entered with the lawful right which all citizens have to enter upon the public highway. Suffice it to say that the right to enter does not carry with it the right to remain (see, e.g., People v Powell, 58 NY2d 1009; People v Licata, 28 NY2d 113) or the right to appropriate a portion of the public highway to a private use which excludes all other members of the public, and to [684]*684thereby frustrate and deny them the free exercise of their equally significant lawful rights.

Furthermore, even if it is assumed for the sake of argument that the initial entry by respondent was lawful and by permission, petitioner has presented unrebutted evidence that it has given him both written and oral notice that whatever permission he had, or thought he had, to occupy the premises has been revoked.

Whether the business activities of respondent on the land from which his removal is now sought are within the ambit of those authorized by section 32 of the General Business Law is not open to serious dispute. The phrase hawker and peddler, by its common meaning, denotes an itinerant individual without a fixed or permanent place of business (60 Am Jur 2d, Peddlers, Solicitors, Etc., §§ 1, 2).

The terms hawker and peddler are considered synonymous except that a hawker is a particular kind of peddler who characteristically cries out, shouts, rings bells or otherwise makes noise to advertise his goods for sale (id., § 1). The primary idea of a hawker and peddler is that of an itinerant or traveling trader, carrying goods about to sell them and selling them to purchasers, as distinguished from a trader who sells goods from a fixed location (Emert v Missouri, 156 US 296).

Peddlers travel from place to place selling the goods they carry about with them (Crenshaw v Arkansas, 227 US 389). No one may be a peddler who does not go from place to place seeking sales, locomotion being the quintessential requirement (60 Am Jur 2d, Peddlers, Solicitors, Etc., § 3).

In 1893 the New York Court of Appeals in Village of Stamford v Fisher (140 NY 187, 191) observed as follows: "Our attention is called to the definitions given by lexicographers to the term 'peddler,’ and they substantially agree that he is a peddler who travels about the country, carrying wares for sale in small quantities. The dominant idea involved in such an occupation seems to be that the individual carries his stock in trade, consisting in small wares, on foot, or in a vehicle, about the country, offering them for sale and then and there selling them.” The present General Business Law § 32 was originally enacted in 1896 (L 1896, ch 371), and the Legislature must be presumed to have known the then currently accepted meaning of the language it employed at the time the statute became effective (cf., McKinney’s Cons Laws of NY, Book 1, Statutes § 93).

[685]*685By all accounts, even that of the respondent himself, he operates, and has at all times herein relevant operated, his business from a fixed location.

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Related

Ross v. Nelson
554 P.3d 636 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2024)
Commissioner of Transportation v. Lane
178 A.D.2d 754 (Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York, 1991)
Commissioner of Transportation v. Lane
148 Misc. 2d 320 (New York County Courts, 1990)

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Bluebook (online)
144 Misc. 2d 680, 544 N.Y.S.2d 925, 1989 N.Y. Misc. LEXIS 491, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/commissioner-of-transportation-v-lane-nysupct-1989.