Duluth, South Shore & Atlantic Railway Co. v. Wilson

167 N.W. 55, 200 Mich. 313, 1918 Mich. LEXIS 837
CourtMichigan Supreme Court
DecidedMarch 21, 1918
DocketDocket No. 171
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 167 N.W. 55 (Duluth, South Shore & Atlantic Railway Co. v. Wilson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Michigan Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Duluth, South Shore & Atlantic Railway Co. v. Wilson, 167 N.W. 55, 200 Mich. 313, 1918 Mich. LEXIS 837 (Mich. 1918).

Opinion

Stone, J.

Action to recover the amount which defendant had retained of fees as customs broker, while in plaintiff’s employment as chief clerk at Sault Ste. Marie.

The declaration consisted of the common counts in assumpsit, and the plea was the general issue with a notice of set-off. The facts were stipulated, and counsel for the respective parties agreed, in open court, that there being no question of fact to submit to the jury, the trial court should direct a verdict and judgment to be entered, as might be determined. Briefly stated, the facts as stipulated were as follows;

The plaintiff maintains a local freight agent at Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, and a freight office jointly with the Minneapolis, St. Paul & Sault Ste. Marie Railway Company, in which defendant was employed as chief clerk for many years prior to January 15, 1915. On February 21, 1907, plaintiff’s local freight and passenger agent at Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, (Col. Frank E. Ketchum) died, and thereafter the positions of local freight and passenger agents were separated, and Garret Gilbert was appointed the freight agent and yardmaster in charge of the plaintiff’s freight business at this point. Large quantities of freight are daily received by the plaintiff over the [316]*316Canadian Pacific lines and across the International bridge from Canada for transportation to various points in the United States over the lines of said two railway companies; and it has been the custom of plaintiff, to a very large extent, to facilitate such shipments, to have its local freight agent or chief clerk act as customs broker.

Up to the time of the death of Col. Ketchum he performed this service, and as part of the compensation paid him he was to, and did retain the fees therefor. The defendant was at this time clerk in the plaintiff’s freight office at Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, and was paid a fixed and certain salary for his services. He was also recognized as the customs broker from and after February 12, 1907; turning over the fees collected for this service to Col. Ketchum from time to time. On the appointment of Mr. Gilbert as local freight agent of the plaintiff, on March 1, 1907, following the death of Col. Ketchum, the defendant continued to act as customs broker-, and the fees for such services were collected and remitted from time to time, with a record of the entries made, to the treasurer of the plaintiff at Marquette, Michigan, and report of the same was sent by defendant to plaintiff’s auditor.

Gilbert chose to accept a fixed and certain salary of $175 per month for his services, and thereafter all fees collected were to be remitted to the plaintiff’s treasurer, these remittances to be made, from time to time, in the name of Garret Gilbert, per Edmund Wilson, to which the defendant agreed under the circumstances hereinafter set forth.

• Up to and including November, 1914, monthly statements- purporting to show all entries made and fees collected therefor were sent to the plaintiff’s auditor at Marquette, Michigan, and remittances for each of such monthly statements were sent to the plaintiff’s treasurer at Marquette.

[317]*317The necessary blanks for the conduct of such business were purchased by the defendant from the collector of customs of the district and the cost deducted from remittances to plaintiff’s treasurer, and the reports to plaintiff’s auditor show the number of blanks and the cost of each, excepting in two instances where there was a shortage of blanks in the collector’s office and the defendant procured two orders for blanks, amounting to $18, from a local printing company, no charge being made to the plaintiff and no deduction being made from the fees collected. Later, and during the year 1914, blanks were furnished on requisitions from the defendant.

At the time the local freight agent, Mr. Gilbert, was appointed, Mr. Fitch, who was then president of the plaintiff company, and Mr. Gilbert went to the freight office where defendant was employed, and defendant was advised by Mr. Fitch that all the customs brokerage work formerly done by Frank E. Ketchum would, in the future, be the work of the defendant; and, because Garret Gilbert was getting a fixed salary for his work, the fees for such customs brokerage work would be remitted to the railway company. These remittances were to be made by the defendant in the name of Garret Gilbert, the local freight agent, and were to be remitted as received, and defendant promised to remit such fees as were earned by him as customs broker, and this agreement has never been changed.

The defendant Wilson was appointed chief clerk and cashier of the plaintiff company on January 6, 1907, at a salary of $90 per month. In February, 1907; he was relieved of the position of cashier, C. E. Barney being appointed to that position, and the defendant continued to act as chief clerk at $90 per month..

A short time later the defendant applied to Mr. Gilbert for an increase in salary, because the duties of Mr. Gilbert as yardmaster took so much of his time [318]*318away from the office that it necessitated much additional work for the defendant, and Mr. Gilbert, the local freight agent, recommended to Mr. Fitch, who was. then president of the plaintiff, that defendant’s salary be increased to $100 per month, owing to the fact that, together with his ordinary and usual duties, he was required to work longer hours than if he were not compelled to do this work and defendant’s, salary was raised to $100 per month, and continued at this figure for some years, being subsequently raised so that at the time he ceased to be an employee of the plaintiff his salary was $105 per month.

The government did not exact a fee for licensing brokers, and there was no fee or other charge under the act of congress of 1894, and defendant was first appointed customs broker on February 12, 1907, because of the illness of the local freight agent, and defendant had been for some little time making entries and signing the name of Col. Ketchum to the same, and the customs officials at said port refused to longer accept entries of this character.

After the act of 1910 providing for licensing of customs brokers, defendant was, on August 10, 1910, licensed by the United States government as customs broker and continued said work. Under this act no fee was exacted by the government for customs brokers.

The act of October 22, 1914, provides that on and after November 1, 1914, customs brokers shall pay an annual tax of $10. This tax, amounting to $6.70 from November 1, 1914, to July 1, 1915, was paid by the defendant and charged to the plaintiff by deducting the amount from his statement of fees collected for November, 1914.

The total amount of the shortage up. to the time the defendant ceased to be in the employ of plaintiff was $560.60, which sum is made up of the fees collected as [319]*319customs broker by defendant from and after December 1, 1914, and the amount the defendant from time to time'kept out of his remittances prior thereto, when he was reporting smaller amounts than actually collected. Up to and including June, 1913, defendant remitted the actual amounts received from such fees.

Defendant was in the employ of the plaintiff as clerk at the transfer station and freight office about 21 years, resigning his position about the middle 'of January, 1915. At the time he left the company’s service it refused to pay him his last month’s salary, amounting to $105.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Agassiz & Odessa Mutual Fire Insurance v. Magnusson
136 N.W.2d 861 (Supreme Court of Minnesota, 1965)
Union Brokerage Co. v. Jensen
9 N.W.2d 721 (Supreme Court of Minnesota, 1943)
McFall v. Commissioner
34 B.T.A. 108 (Board of Tax Appeals, 1936)
Ford Motor Co. v. City of Detroit
255 N.W. 272 (Michigan Supreme Court, 1934)
Federal Gravel Co. v. Detroit & MacKinac Railway Co.
248 N.W. 831 (Michigan Supreme Court, 1933)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
167 N.W. 55, 200 Mich. 313, 1918 Mich. LEXIS 837, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/duluth-south-shore-atlantic-railway-co-v-wilson-mich-1918.