SUN OIL COMPANY
vs.
DIRECTOR OF THE DIVISION ON THE NECESSARIES OF LIFE.
Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Suffolk.
Present: WILKINS, C.J., SPALDING, COUNIHAN, WHITTEMORE, & CUTTER, JJ.
*236 Donald R. Grant, for the plaintiff.
Joseph H. Elcock, Jr., Assistant Attorney General, (Eugene G. Panarese with him,) for the defendant.
WHITTEMORE, J.
The plaintiff seeks a declaration under G.L.c. 231A that signs which are in use or are proposed for use at gasoline filling stations of its retail dealers, and which refer to blended gasoline sold thereat under its trade mark Sunoco, or to the dispensing pumps, do not violate G.L.c. 94, § 295C, as appearing in St. 1939, c. 459, § 1.
The case was reserved and reported by a single justice upon the pleadings and a statement of agreed facts. A prayer for an alternative declaration of the invalidity of § 295C to any extent applicable has been waived.
Section 295C is one of several sections of a statute whose purpose is to prevent fraud in the sale of motor fuel. Slome v. Chief of Police of Fitchburg,
The dispensing pump to which the signs relate is adjustable if desired so as to blend in its nozzle, with gasoline of a standard octane rating, a predetermined amount of other gasoline or "octane concentrate" which has a high octane rating. Thus a single pump and two storage tanks make possible the delivery to each customer of gasoline which has an octane rating deemed suited to the compression ratio of the engine of his automobile. As presently used the pumps deliver the standard gasoline and five blends.
The signs which the defendant deems violative of § 295C read as follows: "NEW Thrifty 6 FUELS CUSTOM BLENDED"; "MIRACLE PUMP 6 THRIFTY FUELS"; "NEW! THRIFTIER CUSTOM-BLENDED" (with picture of the pump); "CUSTOM BLENDED AT THE PUMP NEW ... THRIFTIER! Exact Octane To Fit Your Car"; "Miracle Blending Pump links up: POWER THRIFT Custom-Blended at the Pump"; "Custom Blending PAY ONLY FOR THE OCTANE YOU NEED!"
The plaintiff's counsel at the argument said that it does not ask a declaration in respect of the "PAY ONLY" sign. We think that, unless there is assurance that all controversy in respect of this, and similar, signs is ended, we should construe the "PAY ONLY" sign. Its status being, in our view, like that of the others we do construe it without deciding the right to or effect of the withdrawal of an issue by only one party.
We hold that the signs are not signs "stating or relating to the price of motor fuel" or signs "designed or calculated to cause the public to believe that they state or relate to the price of motor fuel" within the meaning of these words in G.L.c. 94, § 295C.
The "price of motor fuel" is the number of currency units for which a unit of fuel is sold. A dictionary definition of "thrifty" is, "Given to, or evincing, thrift; characterized by economy and good management; provident." It is true that the purchase of a fuel will be thrifty if its cost is less *238 than that of another fuel which in performance is identical with it. But these statements do not make that claim. If the use of the word "thrift" alone would justify an inference of reference to price, such inference is extinguished in the signs by disclosure of the basis for the claim. The "thrift" signs say in effect that "buying our custom blended gasoline" or "buying gasoline dispensed in our miracle pump" is a thrifty practice. The "PAY ONLY" sign says in effect: "buying custom blended fuel means that you pay only for the octane you need." Such statements are equally applicable whatever prices prevail for standard and higher grades of fuel.
These signs inform customers who need gasoline of higher octane rating than standard that their expenditures for motor fuel, that is, their fuel costs, may be less than at competitive pumps which sell only a single high test fuel. Such fuel cost to the customer is what these signs, and in particular the "PAY ONLY" sign, refer to. This, however, is not in any precise sense the "price" of the fuel, and we do not think that the wording or intent of the statute requires that the word "price" be so construed as to include concepts beyond its plain meaning. "The words of a statute are to be given their usual and ordinary meaning. Words plain enough in common speech are equally plain when they appear in a statute. They are to be considered in the light of the obvious aim to be accomplished by the Legislature and as employed by the Legislature as expressing the practical means by which the legislative aim is to be attained. Every statute, if possible, is to be construed in accordance with sound judgment and common sense, so as to make it an effectual piece of legislation." Commonwealth v. Slome,
The signs in issue do not tend to the promotion of fraud, or to "convey the impression that ... [the fuel] is sold at less than the prevailing market price." Merit Oil Co. v. Director of the Div. on the Necessaries of Life,
The bill of complaint presents a proper case for a declaratory decree under c. 231A apart from the waived constitutional issue. This is not a case of equity intervening to prevent the prosecution of a crime. See Harmon v. Police Commr. of Boston,
The statute does not leave it to the director or the division *240 to determine whether the signs relate to price. His power is to move to have the courts decide the issue. Compare Pacella v. Metropolitan Dist. Commn.
A declaratory decree is to be entered in accordance herewith.
So ordered.