Public-domain · open source
OpenJurist

155 Mass. 442

Commonwealth v. Vieth

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court

Decided January 11, 1892

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1892-01-11

<p>® Innkeeper—Sale of Adulterated Milk — Master and Servant.</p> <p>A hotel keeper, who sells milk to his guests to be drunk by them on his premises, may be convicted of an offence under the St. of 1886, c. 318, § 2, if the milk so sold is not of the required standard of quality.</p> <p>If a sale of milk, which is not of the required standard of quality, is made by a hotel keeper’s servant, in the ordinary course of his employment, to a guest to be drunk on the premises, the hotel keeper will be responsible therefor, under the St. of 1886, c. 318, § 2, though he was not present and did not consent to or know of the particular sale.</p>

Relies on Commonwealth v. Evans

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1892-01-11

How this case has been cited

Cited by 6 later decisions — most recently April 1923

6 state decisions

301892190019101920decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

Allen, J.

¶1By St. 1886, c. 318, § 2, whoever by himself, or by his servant or agent, sells milk not of good standard quality shall be punished by a fine; and milk containing less than *444thirteen per cent of milk solids is to be deemed to be not of good standard quality, except during the months of May and June, when milk containing less than twelve per cent of milk solids is to be deemed to be not of good standard quality. It is contended that this provision does not apply to the keeper of a hotel, who supplies' milk to his guests to be drunk by them upon his premises. The evidence tended to show a sale in the defendant’s café of a glass of milk, tó be drunk upon the premises. This was apparently a transaction by itself. We are unable to find in the letter or apparent intention of the statute any warrant for an exception applicable to such a case as the present, and the defendant must be held to see to it that the milk so sold is of the required standard of quality. Commonwealth v. Waite, 11 Allen, 264. Commonwealth v. Evans, 132 Mass. 11. The jury must have found that the sale was made by the defendant’s servant in the ordinary course of his employment; and for such sale the defendant was responsible, under the statute, though he was not present, and did not consent to or know of the particular sale. Such is the plain meaning of the statute. The request for an instruction to the jury that under such circumstances the defendant was not guilty was properly refused. The instruction given was properly adapted to the evidence in the case. There was no suggestion that the defendant’s servant was acting in violation of orders.

¶2Exceptions overruled.

/155/mass/442 · .json · Public domain