Ross Construction Co. v. UM & M. CREDIT CORP.

214 So. 2d 822, 1968 Miss. LEXIS 1336
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedOctober 21, 1968
Docket45000
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 214 So. 2d 822 (Ross Construction Co. v. UM & M. CREDIT CORP.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ross Construction Co. v. UM & M. CREDIT CORP., 214 So. 2d 822, 1968 Miss. LEXIS 1336 (Mich. 1968).

Opinion

214 So.2d 822 (1968)

ROSS CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, Inc.
v.
U.M. & M. CREDIT CORPORATION.

No. 45000.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

October 21, 1968.

*823 Ellis & Ellis, Vicksburg, for appellant.

Prewitt, Bullard, Braddock & Vance, Vicksburg, for appellee.

RODGERS, Justice:

This is a replevin suit to recover certain heavy road building equipment. It was filed by the U.M. & M. Credit Corporation of New York against Ross Construction Company, Inc. in the Circuit Court of Warren County, Mississippi, and resulted in a judgment in favor of the appellee.

The facts giving rise to this litigation came about under the following circumstances. The Ross Construction Company purchased several items of heavy road building equipment from Carter Equipment Company, Inc. of Jackson, Mississippi and gave its title retention note covering the property here in litigation for the total sum of $41,586, payable in twenty-four monthly installments. The Carter Equipment Company transferred the note to U.M. & M. Credit Corporation. The appellant paid several payments, and at the time the suit was filed a balance of $22,525.75 was due.

When the appellant failed to pay the installments, the assignee of the title retention note brought this suit to recover the equipment, resulting in the judgment above mentioned. The appellant filed a demurrer to the declaration in replevin, but it was overruled by the trial court. Appellant then pleaded not guilty in answer to the declaration. During the trial, the appellant sought to introduce testimony based upon its affirmative contention that the appellee, U.M. & M. Credit Corporation, was a foreign corporation doing business in Mississippi, but was not qualified to do business in this state according to the requirements of Mississippi Code 1942 Annotated section 9346 (1956) and Mississippi Code 1942 Annotated section 5309-239 (Supp. 1966). It was then contended that this foreign corporation therefore could not use the courts of Mississippi to collect its indebtedness. The credit company objected to the introduction of this testimony upon the ground *824 that the defendant, Ross Construction Company, Inc., had not pleaded this affirmative defense, whereupon, the court permitted the defendant construction company to amend its "plea of not guilty" to include the affirmative plea that the plaintiff was a nonresident corporation doing business in Mississippi.

The appellee argues here that the court erred in allowing the defendant to amend its "plea of not guilty," and contends that the issue of whether or not the credit company was doing business in this state should not have been considered by the trial court and that this question therefore is not a proper issue for determination in this Court.

We are of the opinion, however, that the amendment was properly allowed by the trial judge. Carruth v. Easterling, 247 Miss. 364, 150 So.2d 852 (1963); 46 Am.Jur. Replevin § 109 (1943); 41 Am. Jur. Pleading § 288 (1942).

The real issue, and the only defense which appellant has presented to the suit, is the contention that the credit corporation is a foreign corporation doing business in Mississippi without having first qualified to "transact business" in this state as required by Mississippi Code 1942 Annotated section 5309-221 (Supp. 1966). Appellee, it is said, is precluded from maintaining this suit of replevin against the defendant, Ross Construction Company, Inc., in the courts of this state, under the penalty prescribed by Mississippi Code 1942 Annotated section 5309-239 (Supp. 1966).

In 1962 the Mississippi Legislature rewrote the corporation laws of Mississippi, and in so doing adopted some of the previous corporation statutes. It also repealed some of the laws and in some instances added new corporation statutes to the body of the law. Mississippi General Laws, ch. 235 (1962).

Two of these sections of the Code, as amended, are Mississippi Code 1942 Annotated sections 5309-221 and 5309-239 (Supp. 1966). These sections are in the following language:

§ 5309-221. Admission of foreign corporation.
"No foreign business corporation for profit shall have the right to transact business in this state until it shall have procured a certificate of authority so to do from the Secretary of State. No foreign corporation shall be entitled to procure a certificate of authority under this Act to transact in this state any business which a corporation organized under this Act is not permitted to transact. A foreign business corporation for profit shall not be denied a certificate of authority by reason of the fact that the laws of the state or country under which such corporation is organized governing its organization and internal affairs differ from the laws of this state, and nothing in this Act contained shall be construed to authorize this state to regulate the organization or the internal affairs of such corporation. No foreign non-profit non-share or non-profit or non-share corporation shall be entitled to procure a certificate of authority under this Act.
"Without excluding other activities which may not constitute transacting business in this state, a foreign corporation shall not be considered to be transacting business in this state, for the purposes of this Act, by reason of carrying on in this state any one or more of the following activities:
"(a) Maintaining or defending any action or suit or any administrative or arbitration proceeding, or effecting the settlement thereof or the settlement of claims or disputes.
"(b) Maintaining bank accounts.
"(c) Maintaining offices or agencies for the transfer, exchange and registration of its securities, or appointing and maintaining trustees or depositaries with relation to its securities.
*825 "(d) Soliciting or procuring orders, whether by mail or through employees or agents or otherwise, where such orders require acceptance without this state before becoming binding contracts.
"(e) Transacting any business in interstate commerce.
"(f) Conducting an isolated transaction completed within a period of thirty (30) days and not in the course of a number of repeated transactions of like nature.
"(g) Investing in or acquiring, in transactions outside of Mississippi, royalties and other non-operating mineral interests, and the execution of division orders, contracts of sale and other instruments incidental to the ownership of such non-operating mineral interests."
§ 5309-239. Transacting business without certificate of authority.
"No foreign corporation transacting business in this state without a certificate of authority shall be permitted to maintain any action, suit or proceeding in any court of this state. Nor shall any action, suit or proceeding be maintained in any court of this state by any successor or assignee of such corporation on any right, claim or demand arising out of the transaction of business by such corporation in this state.
"The failure of a foreign corporation to obtain a certificate of authority to transact business in this state shall not impair the validity of any contract or act of such corporation, and shall not prevent such corporation from defending any action, suit or proceeding in any court of this state.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
214 So. 2d 822, 1968 Miss. LEXIS 1336, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ross-construction-co-v-um-m-credit-corp-miss-1968.