State ex rel. Grigsby v. Buechler County Treasurer

Citations

• 10 S.D. 156
• 72 N.W. 114
• 1897 S.D. LEXIS 31

Syllabus

<p>1. Laws 1897, Chap. 72, provides for an annual license fee of §400, beginning July 1st, to be paid in advance to the county treasurer by retail liquor dealers, or a pro'rata sum in case application is made after July 1st, all licenses expiring the following June 30th. It requires each applicant to file an approved bond with the county treasurer, and allows the authorities of a city, organized town, or township to levy and collect an additional license, which must be paid before the applicant can engage in the traffic. Such authorities may refuse to grant a license if they deem the applicant unfit, and in that event the money paid to the county treasurer shall be returned to the applicant on the warrant of the board of county commissioners. Section 7 provides that all such moneys recoived by a county treasurer shall by him be placed to the credit of the general fund of the county, and, on each license granted, he “shall transmit the sum of S150 to the state treasurer,” which shall be placed to the, credit of the general fund of the state. Held, that the statute is’ a police regulation, and the license fee is not therefore a tax, within Const. Art. 11, requiring uniformity of taxation.</p> <p>2. The statute is not invalid because it gives the state three-eighths of the fees without requiring it no pay a portion of the public expenses incident to the enforcement of the statute, since such obligation is discharged by the state’s contributions to the expense of the judiciary and the maintenance of charitable, penal and reformatory institutions.</p> <p>8. The state, being entitled to 871 per cent of the fee for the full year, is entitled to a proportionate part of licenses paid for a fraction of a year; such money to be transmitted without reduction as soon as the applicant has become fully vested with lawful authority to engage in the business.</p> <p>4. In the statute providing that, in case a license is denied, the money paid to the county treasurer shall be returne