In November thereafter the plaintiff gave notice that he would move the justice to correct the indorsement on the warrant, and in pursuance of this notice the justice made the following additional entry:

"In this case the plaintiff moved the court to correct the judgment heretofore rendered on the fourth day of April, 1898, so as to conform to the judgment entered on the docket, and it appearing that notice has been given as required by law, said [notice?] motion is sustained; and it appearing that in writing the judgment on the warrant in said case on the fourth day of April, 1898, that said judgment is not a finality, and for sufficient cause I set aside said judgment and give judgment in favor of plaintiff and against 455 defendant for one hundred and thirty-one dollars and sixty-one cents and interest and cost of suit, this being same as entered on my docket on the fourth day of April, 1898, on the day of rendition of former judgment. "This the twenty-sixth day of November, 1898.

“T. L. LANGLEY, J. P.”

From this action of the justice of the peace the defendant appealed to the circuit court, and in that court moved to quash the proceedings of the justice as void. The court sustained the motion and quashed the proceedings, and the plaintiff appealed and assigned as error this action of the trial judge in the court below.

We are of opinion there is error in the action of the circuit judge.

The judgment of the justice was valid. The words in the indorsement upon the warrant, "subject to all credits, if any," were mere surplusage, and did not prevent the judgment from being certain and final, and they might have been so treated by the justice of the peace.

But the plaintiff had the right to have this entry corrected so as to conform to the actual facts and show a judgment definite and final. A justice of the peace has the same right and power to correct his judgments as courts of record have, upon five days' notice being given: Shannon's Code, sec. 4600.

The evident object and purpose of the justice 450 was to expunge from his entry upon the warrant the words "subject to all credits, if any," so as to leave the entry in the shape of an unconditional judgment, and the trial judge should have so treated it.

Am. St. Rep., Vol. LXXVIII-59

In the case of Womack v. Walling, 1 Baxt. 425, the court held that a justice could amend his judgment by striking out the words "to be discharged in Tennessee and Kentucky bank notes," which followed after the judgment. In Fanning v. Fly, 2 Cold. 489, it is held in substance that under section 4598 of Shannon's compilation, if a judgment entry contain every requisite to make it valid and in form sufficient to make it answer the writ and declaration, objectionable words that add nothing to the force of the judgment, and when excluded altogether in no degree diminish its operation or effect, may be rejected by the court trying the cause after verdict and judgment or in the revising court on appeal.

In the same way words added to a judgment which are contrary to it and can have no effect but to nullify it if given any force may be rejected as surplusage, in order that the judgment may have force and effect as intended. Too much formality should not be required of justices' entries and judgments, but every reasonable intendment in favor of their validity and sufficiency should be indulged.

457 We are of opinion the trial judge in the court below should have treated the entry of the justice upon his warrant as corrected so as to show an unconditional judgment for a definite and certain amount, and should have dismissed the defendant's appeal and ordered a procedendo to the justice to proceed upon the judgment as corrected. And this court, proceeding to render the judgment which the court below should have rendered, reverses the action of the trial judge, and procedendo will issue to the justice of the peace to issue execution for the amount of the judgment rendered by him, to wit, one hundred and thirty-one dollars and sixty-one cents and interest from the fourth day of April, 1898, and the costs of the original judgment, and for such further action as may be required to realize said judgment. The costs of this court and the circuit court will be paid by the defendant, W. S. Alexander, for which execution will issue from this court.

It is said that the record does not show that all the evidence is embraced in it. This is not a case for the application of this rule. The cause was not tried upon proof, but upon motion based upon the papers and entries before the justice of the peace, which were produced and relied on by the defendant as the basis of his motion.

JUSTICE'S JUDGMENT-FORM OF.-The record of a justice of the peace should not be scrutinized with severity, and the judgment of a justice's court is not expected to be in perfect form. Matters of form, in such judgment, are to be overlooked: See the note to Davis v. Tramp, 64 Am. St. Rep. 853; State v. Myers, 70 Minn. 179, 68 Am. St. Rep. 521.

CROY V. OBION COUNTY.

[104 Tennessee, 525.]

INTERSTATE COMMERCE-AGENCY.-If a person, after obtaining orders for goods from resident customers, submits such orders in his own name to a nonresident manufacturer, and obtains the goods which are charged to him individually, shipped to him directly in a single package, which is broken by him, and the goods delivered to the several customers and the price collected by him, the transaction is not one of interstate commerce exempt from a state license or privilege tax, and he sells the goods as owner, and not as an agent.

J. M. Ownby, for the appellant.

G. W. Pickle, attorney general, and C. N. Lannom, for the appellee.

626 CALDWELL, J. This is an action of replevin, brought by Frank O. Croy against W. W. Epperson, a constable of Obion county, to recover the possession of certain floor-sweeping broom brushes, which the latter had seized as the property of the former under a distress warrant issued for the collection of a tax for the privilege of selling articles of that kind in that county.

The circuit judge tried the case without a jury and rendered judgment in favor of the defendant, and from that judgment the plaintiff prosecutes an appeal in error.

The plaintiff rests his claim to relief upon the contention that he was engaged exclusively in interstate commerce, and, consequently, that he was protected by the commerce clause of the federal constitution from state taxation upon his business.

Only one witness was examined on the trial, and that was the plaintiff, who testified in his own behalf. He admitted that he had sold numerous articles like those involved in this case to different citizens of Obion county, Tennessee, and that he had paid no tax for the privilege of so doing. He said that he made the sales by sample and as agent of a firm that manufactured

527 the brushes at Sedalia, Missouri; that he went from house to house and took "orders," which "were just memoranda of names and addresses of parties who agreed to buy the brushes"; that at his convenience he, in his own name, and without giving the name of any customer, sent an order for "forty-six brushes and handles" to one of his principal's distributing agents at Paducah, Kentucky; that his order was there filled, and all of the articles shipped to him, in his own name, as an individual at Union City, in a single box; that he opened the box, took out the brushes, and delivered them one by one, indiscriminately, at the houses of those who had agreed to buy, all the brushes being alike and no one of them having been ordered or shipped for any particular purchaser.

The testimony thus delivered fails to disclose transactions in interstate commerce in the legal sense. The statement that the plaintiff was acting as the agent of a nonresident principal, as in Hurford v. State, 91 Tenn. 669, and State v. Scott, 98 Tenn. 254, is discredited, and the plaintiff shown to have been engaged in interstate commerce in his own behalf, as in Kimmell v. State, 104 Tenn. 184, by his narration of the manner in which he ordered, received, sold, and delivered the brushes. He did not communicate the names of his customers to his alleged principal, nor take any order from them to that principal, but only took 528 memoranda of their addresses for his own use; he ordered nothing in the name of any customer, but everything in his own individual name, and in that name alone the shipment was made; he ordered no particular article for any particular customer, but all of them, as a whole, for himself, and with a view to an indiscriminate delivery to his customers, one by one, as he might go to their houses. All these are characteristics of a business done for one's self, rather than of a business conducted by an agent for a principal.

Furthermore, if the plaintiff had, in fact and in good faith, made all of these transactions and done all of these things as agent of a nonresident principal, he would nevertheless have been without the protection of the commerce clause of the federal constitution and subject to taxation by the state, because the sales were not of original packages, but of distinct parts of an original package after it had been broken, and they, by force of law, had become parts of the general property within the state: Kimmell v. State, 104 Tenn. 184; Austin v. State, 101 Tenn. 563, 70 Am. St. Rep. 703.

For the two reasons stated the judgment of the circuit court is affirmed. No opinion is expressed as to the right of the plaintiff to test his liability for this tax by an action of replevin.

In the case of Kimmell v. State, 104 Tenn. 184, referred to in the principal case, it appeared that a person purporting to act as agent for a nonresident principal sold goods by sample to resident customers, forwarded his orders to the main house or firm in another state, though there was a branch house within the state, had the goods consigned, billed, and charged to him, individually, without disclosing who were the purchasers, and upon the receipt of the goods in a single package broke it open and delivered the goods to the different customers or purchasers, collecting the price therefor, and it was held that the transaction did not constitute interstate commerce, exempting the agent from the payment of a state license or privilege tax, and that he sold the goods, not as an agent, but as the owner.

INTERSTATE COMMERCE.-The sale of goods which are in another state at the time of sale, for the purpose of introducing them into the state where the sale is made, is interstate commerce: State v. Emert, 103 Mo. 241, 23 Am. St. Rep. 874; Bloomington v. Bourland, 137 Ill. 534, 31 Am. St. Rep. 382. Interstate commerce is the subject of the monographic note to People v. Wemple, 27 Am. St. Rep. 547-568.

RAILROAD v. CABINET COMPANY.
[104 Tennessee, 568.]

CARRIERS-NEGLIGENT DELAY-MEASURE OF DAMAGES.-A carrier requested to ship promptly, and notified that the goods are designed to fill a "penalty contract," is liable for such special damages to the shipper as arise from negligent delay in the transportation and delivery of the goods.

CARRIERS-NEGLIGENT DELAY-MEASURE OF DAMAGES.-If property is shipped to market for general sale to such purchasers as may be obtained, and the carrier unreasonably and negligently delays the transportation, the measure of damages is the depreciation in the salable quality and market value of the property at the place of destination between the time when it should have arrived and when it did in fact arrive.

CARRIERS-NEGLIGENT DELAY-MEASURE OF DAMAGES.-If property is sold at an advantageous price before shipment, on condition that it be delivered by a certain time, and the carrier, with knowledge of that fact, undertakes the transportation, and, through negligence, fails to make the delivery in time, and the conditional purchaser declines to receive the property on account of the delay, the liability of the carrier is measured by the difference between the market value of the property when it arrived at its destination and the price at which it was conditionally sold before shipment..

CARRIERS-NEGLIGENT DELAY-MEASURE OF DAMAGES.-If the intended use and application of the goods to be car