United States Supreme Court Cases & Opinions

U.S. Supreme Court

Kidd, Dater & Price Co. v. Musselman Grocer Co., 217 U.S. 461 (1910)

Kidd, Dater and Price Company v.

Musselman Grocer Company

No. 149

Argued April 13, 14, 1910

Decided May 16, 1910

217 U.S. 461

Syllabus

Where this Court has held a state statute constitutional, it will follow that decision in a case involving the constitutionality of a statute of another state which fundamentally is similar and which is attacked on the same ground by persons similarly situated, and so held that the Michigan Sales-in-Bulk Act of 1905, which is fundamentally similar to the Sales-in-Bulk Act of Connecticut, sustained in Lemieu v. Young, 211 U. S. 489, is not unconstitutional under the due process or equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.

It is within the police power of the state to require tradesmen making sales in bulk of their stock in trade to give notice to their creditors and also to prescribe how such notice shall be given, and unless the provisions as to such notice are unreasonable and arbitrary, a statute to that effect does not amount to deprivation of property, abridge liberty of contract, or deny equal protection of the law within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment, nor is the requirement in the Michigan Sales-in-Bulk Act of 1905 that such notice be either personal or by registered mail unreasonable or arbitrary.

151 Mich. 478 affirmed.

The facts, which involve the constitutionality of the Sales-in-Bulk Act of 1905 of Michigan, are stated in the opinion.

Page 217 U. S. 469