Louisiana Undertaking Co. v. Louisiana State Board of Embalmers

58 So. 2d 303, 1952 La. App. LEXIS 565
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedApril 14, 1952
DocketNo. 19927
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 58 So. 2d 303 (Louisiana Undertaking Co. v. Louisiana State Board of Embalmers) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Louisiana Undertaking Co. v. Louisiana State Board of Embalmers, 58 So. 2d 303, 1952 La. App. LEXIS 565 (La. Ct. App. 1952).

Opinion

JANVIER, Judge.

Louisiana Undertaking Company, Inc., seeks to enjoin Louisiana State Board of Embalmers from trying it on certain charges of violating certain rules and regulations of the Board.

Plaintiff is a Louisiana corporation engaged in the embalming and undertaking business in New Orleans. Louisiana State Board of Embalmers was created by Act No. 66 of 1914, which was amended by Act No. 224 of 1932 and Act No. 423 of 1938. See Louisiana Statutes Annotated — Revised Statutes, 37:831 et seq.

The facts are not in dispute. Under date of February 24th, 1950, the Louisiana State Board of Embalmers addressed to the said Louisiana Undertaking Company a letter in which it advised the said corporation that, at a meeting of the Board to be held on a specified date, it, the said Embalming Company, would be given a hearing and would be tried on the following charges:

“(1) That your Company, and its agents, representatives, officers and members are guilty of violating Rule 9 of the Rules and Regulations of the Louisiana State Board of Embalmers, paragraph (c), solicitation of business by agents or persons commonly known as ‘cappers’ or ‘steerers.’
“(2) That'between October 18, 1949, approximately, and December 8, 1949, approximately, you employed certain representatives and agents, who operated at Charity Hospital, New Orleans, La., for the avowed purpose of deliberately steering business to your company, to the unfair disadvantage of other companies, your competitors, in this community; that such agents and representatives, so employed by you, for a consideration, watched the list of dangerously ill patients at the said Charity Hospital, and when said patient or patients died, said capper or steerer immediately contacted the relatives, or other interested parties, of the deceased, and solicited the business of burying said deceased persons for your account.
“(3) That on or about November 17, 1949, your agent and representative contacted you, and your manager promised to pay said representative $10.00 for every burial he steered to your company.
“(4) That, therefore, you, and each of you, are guilty of wilful malpractice, unprofessional, unethical and dishonorable conduct, incompetency and un-trustworthiness in the practice of your [304]*304profession, under the license heretofore issued by this Board.”

The said Undertaking Company, through its attorney, appeared at the specified time and place and filed with the said Board a written document in which it “urges” and “moves” the Board to decline jurisdiction and to refuse to hear or pass upon the said charges, for the reason that the Board was without authority to adopt rules and regulations, or to attempt to enforce rules and regulations controlling the actions of an embalming company, prior to its obtaining possession of a dead human body for embalming or burial.

At the meeting, the Board refused to decline jurisdiction and announced that it intended to proceed with the hearing, but it agreed that it would postpone the hearing until the said corporation should have had sufficient time to attempt to obtain from the proper court an injunction preventing the holding of such hearing. 'Accordingly, the Undertaking , Company filed this proceeding in the Civil District Court for the Parish of Orleans and, by agreement of counsel, the application for preliminary injunction and the prayer for permanent injunction were submitted at the same time and on the same evidence, and from a judgment refusing to grant the injunction and dismissing the suit, the corporation has appealed to this Court.

The sole contention of the Undertaking Company is -that the Board of Embalmers has no legal authority to control its action in the securing of business; that, because of the wording of the statute under which the Board operates, the Board may inquire into the operations of the embalming business only so far as ■ those operations iiivolve the proper care and disposition of “dead human bodies,” and that it cannot in any way control the method by which an embalming company may obtain its business. "

The Board has adopted certain rules, among them Rule 9, and, among the provisions of Rule 9, we find that the Board may, in its discretion, revoke or cancel any certificate if it be proven to the satisfaction of a majority of the Board that there has been “solicitation of business by agents or persons commonly known as 'cappers' or ‘steerers’ ”, or if there has been “unprofessional, unethical or dishonorable conduct.”

Counsel for plaintiff argues that the Board is without authority to adopt those provisions of that rule from which we have quoted and that the Board, under the statute under which it operates, may concern itself only with the actions of an embalmer in taking care of and preparing for burial the dead bodies of human beings, and that the Board cannot concern itself in any way or control the actions of an embalmer in conducting the preliminary steps for obtaining the deed human bodies for the purpose of properly preparing.and embalming them.

The portion of the statute which, counsel for the Board argues, gives the Board authority to make and to enforce this rule is section 840 of Title 37 under which the Board is authorized to:

“Adopt by-laws, rules, and regulations to regulate the practice of embalming or the business of funeral directing in connection with the care and disposition of dead human bodies in this state.”

While it is true that that section of the statute does not expressly authorize the Board to make a rule prohibiting the employment of “cappers” or “steerers”, we have not the slightest doubt that the right to make such a rule is implicit in the entire wording of that section, and that the purpose of the Legislature in enacting the statute and in creating the Board would be totally emasculated if it should be held that the Board may regulate the conduct of the embalming business only after those engaged in it have obtained the custody of the dead human bodies.

Our view is that the entire operation of the embalming business, from beginning to end, was what the Legislature intended to regulate, and this view results' from a realization of certain facts which are clearly and forcibly set forth in Pierstorff v. Board of Embalmers, Inc., 68 Ohio App. 453, 41 N.E.2d 889, 890:

“Not only from the viewpoint of sanitation but from other considerations, there are few fields of business [305]*305enterprise, profession or occupation with which the police power of the state may more appropriately extend its controlling 'and regulatory authority than that of the burial of the dead. From earliest times and among all peoples, this ceremony or rite has been attended with considerations of special dignity, decency and honor. Appellant is not here charged with ‘immoral’ conduct, as that term is generally understood and used in'legal parlance, but there are many of the finer ‘moral’ requirements inherently associated with the professional conduct of any business or profession, and particularly in this field, which control the actions of a morally and intellectually honest man without suggestion from others and without printed rule.

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Bluebook (online)
58 So. 2d 303, 1952 La. App. LEXIS 565, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/louisiana-undertaking-co-v-louisiana-state-board-of-embalmers-lactapp-1952.