Case Digest (G.R. No. L-9195)
Facts:
City of Manila v. The Manila Remnant Co., Inc., G.R. No. L-9195, January 30, 1957, the Supreme Court En Banc, Montemayor, J., writing for the Court.The City of Manila (plaintiff-appellee) sued The Manila Remnant Co., Inc. (defendant-appellant), a corporation engaged in importing textiles and remnants for resale, in the Court of First Instance of Manila by complaint filed July 15, 1953, to collect P8,709 plus interest — the total accumulated municipal license taxes and surcharge alleged to be due for retail sales made from 1946 to 1950. The parties did not dispute the amount of sales or the computation of taxes if the sales were deemed retail; they submitted a written stipulation of facts and asked the trial court to render judgment on that basis.
The stipulation identified specific 1948 sales to various purchasers — shirt factories and a kapok factory — totaling 30,148 kilos (Liberty Shirt Factory 1,543 kilos; Bee Cuan Shirt Factory 7,835 kilos; Ben Shen Shirt Factory 2,903 kilos; Philippine Kapok Factory 13,208 kilos; Army Shirt Factory 3,338 kilos; Kok Hoa Shirt Factory 321 kilos). The essential factual question agreed to by the parties was whether those sales were wholesale or retail in character.
Judge Hermogenes Concepcion of the Court of First Instance ruled for the plaintiff, holding that the decisive criterion is the use to which the purchaser puts the goods (consumption in manufacture or conversion into finished articles) rather than the bulk of the transaction, and therefore the sales to the factories were retail; ...(Subscriber-Only)
Issues:
- May the defendant appeal directly to the Supreme Court from the Court of First Instance upon a controversy that presents only a question of law?
- Were the sales of textiles by The Manila Remnant Co., Inc. to the named factories in 1948 wholesale or retail for purposes of the City of ...(Subscriber-Only)
Ruling:
- (Subscriber-Only)
Ratio:
- (Subscriber-Only)
Doctrine:
- (Subscriber-Only)