385 Pa. 492 | Pa. | 1956
Opinion by
This controversy concerns the right of Pennsylvania State Camp, Patriotic Order Sons of America, to take
Patriotic Order Sons of America, a fraternal and patriotic organization, was organized in 1847 as an unincorporated association. In 1866, 28 then existing local Camps united to form a State Camp. A constitution was adopted and the State Camp was incorporated under a special Act of February 27, 1867, P. L. 285, which provided that the persons therein named and their associates were created a body corporate by the name, style and title of the “State Camp of the Patriotic Order of Junior Sons of America of the state of Pennsylvania,” with the power generally to “do all and singular the matters and things which may be lawful and necessary for the well being and due management of the affairs thereof.” The Act further provided that the corporation should “consist of such persons as are now members, or shall be hereafter admitted as such, agreeably to the by-laws of said camp.” By the Act of March 18, 1869, P. L. 896, the title was changed to the “State Camp of the Patriotic Order, Sons of America.”
In 1887 the State Camp granted a charter to Washington Camp No. 135 located at Middleport, Schuylkill County. The charter recited that in accordance with the constitution, laws and rules of the National and the State Camp there was granted to the members of the local Camp full power to receive and initiate proper persons and instruct them in the workings of the Order on such rules and terms as the laws of the Order required, and to perform all the rights, duties and privileges of a camp of the Order, while they conformed to all the laws and rules thereof.
Camp No. 135 became incorporated in 1904 under the Act of April 29, 1874, P. L. 73. It continued as a subordinate Camp until 1947, when its charter was re
Defendants assert two defenses to the action, one, that the State Camp never had the legal power or authority to operate as a superior Camp under the lodge system and to create subordinate Camps, the other, that the revocation of the charter of the local Camp did not justify the attempt of the State Camp to confiscate its property. Neither of these claims is meritorious, and the decree of the court below will be affirmed.
It is true, as pointed out by defendants, we have held that a fraternal association incorporated under the General Corporation Act of April 29, 1874, P. L. 73, had no authority to create subordinate lodges, to accept
Article II of the Constitution of the State Camp provided that the State Camp should be the head of the Order in the State of Pennsylvania and that its proceedings should be binding on all Camps within its jurisdiction. Article II of the General Laws of the Order provided that the State Camp should have the power to annul the charter of a local Camp for any of certain specified causes. Article XVII of the Constitution of the State Camp provided that in case of the forfeiture of the charter of a subordinate Camp the members there
In the case of Grand Castle, Knights of Golden Eagle, v. Taylor, 278 Pa. 9, 122 A. 210, it was said (p. 18, A. p. 213):“... there is no question of forfeiture of property; this is simply the case of delivering up ‘funds’ in accordance with the terms of an agreement which stipulates that, in the event of dissolution of the sub
In the case of Grand Lodge of the Brotherhood of Railway and Steamship Clerks v. Girard Lodge No. 100, 384 Pa. 248, 120 A. 2d 523, it was said (p. 257, A. p. 527) : “No question of natural justice is involved. The Grand Lodge is not imposing a penalty which appalls a sense of fairness. In fact, penalization is not in issue at all. We are concerned here only with the matter of compliance with reasonable obligations undertaken contractually.”
In Harker v. McKissock, 7 N.J. 323, 81 A. 2d 480, it was said (pp. 330, 331, A. p. 483) : “There is no reason of policy or consideration of natural justice forbidding the enforcement of the provision of National’s constitution for the forfeiture of Local’s property in the event of disaffiliation. . . . This was a basic term in the agreement that brought about the confederation, and there is no rational ground for refusing performance of the stipulation.”
In Walter Kidde & Co., Inc. v. United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America, CIO, 7 N.J. 528, 82 A. 2d 184, it was said (p. 532, A. p. 186) : “This, too, is the rationale of the doctrine that a provision for the transfer of the local’s property to the parent body, in the event of the local’s disbandment, does not constitute a penalty or forfeiture which the law will refuse to enforce. The elements of a penalty are wanting. The provision imposes no forfeiture for breach of the contract which in equity and right conscience is unenforceable. It is rather the exercise of the basic freedom of contract in an area of action that does not trench upon the public interest or private right and justice, and not the advance setting by the parties of damages for breach
Defendants rely largely upon the cases of State Council Junior Order of United American Mechanics of Pennsylvania v. Emery, 219 Pa. 461, 68 A. 1023, and Grand Lodge of Knights of Pythias v. Samson Lodge, No. 67, 355 Pa. 571, 50 A. 2d 363, each of which held that where a subordinate lodge of a beneficial association created a fund for sick and death benefits the revocation of the charter of the lodge by the supreme body did not entitle the latter to appropriate it.
The decree is affirmed, each party to bear its own costs.
It does not clearly appear in the present case that Camp No. 135 had adopted a system of beneficial payments; if any such funds did exist they were apparently never separated from the general funds or other property of the Camp.