Greenfeld v. Maryland Jockey Club

Markell, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. This is an appeal from a decree dismissing, on demurrer, a bill for (a) a declaratory decree that plaintiff is entitled, upon payment of admission charges, to attend any race meetings conducted by defendant and (6) an injunction against denial of this alleged right or interference with him “while in attendance as a spectator and bettor” at any race meeting. ⁹⁹ The bill purports to state in substance various provisions of the Racing Commission law, (Code, Art. 78B, as amended), sets out Rule 226 of the Maryland Racing Commission: “The Chief Inspector shall keep a record of the names and addresses of all persons ejected by any Association from its grounds, together with the offense or offenses alleged against them, and any other material information relating thereto, and the Associations shall report all ejections to the Chief Inspector. He shall promptly report the same to the Maryland Racing Commission.”, and alleges that: Defendant “is granted by the State a special privilege or franchise to conduct racing meetings with pari-mutuel betting” at Pimlico [L e., defendant has been licensed by the commission. Art. 78B, secs. 6, 7, 10.] Defendant’s business “encourages gambling and betting by the public and is so open to fraud, trickery and deceit that it cannot be carried on as a strictly private business, and the intervention and participation of the State in the management, regulation and control of the business is necessary to protect the public interest”.

The business “is not a private enterprise”, and defendant has “no right to operate it as a matter of common right”, it is “a public or quasi public function in which the State participates directly in the management, conduct and control of the business” through the commission. Defendant “is exercising a public franchise granted to it by the State” for public purposes, inter aim, (1) “to legalize gambling and betting under State supervision and control and thereby discourage bookmaking, betting on numbers and other forms of illicit gambling by the public”, (2) to provide increased revenue for the State and (3) “to improve the breed of horses”, and “is therefore obliged to afford to all citizens the equal right to enjoy its facilities”. On April 29, 1946 and again the next day plaintiff “purchased admission” to the Pimlico track and while properly demeaning himself as a spectator was, without just cause, forcibly ejected by defendant and told not to return and that if he did return he would be denied ad ¹⁰⁰ mission. Defendant refused to give him any just or lawful reason for ejecting'him or denying him admission and has never reported that he was guilty of any offenses “as required :by Rule 226”, but asserts a right to so eject any patron at its pleasure “without any cause or reason whatsoever”.

Plaintiff’s ejection and defendant’s continued refusal (a) to permit him to attend race meetings and: (fr) “to comply with Rule 226”, is “illegal, capricious, arbitrary and discriminatory” and constitutes a deprivation by defendant of rights and privileges guaranteed to plaintiff by Article 23 of the Declaration of Rights and denial by defendant, “as a duly constituted agent of the State”, of the privileges and immunities and the equal protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. The questions presented in this case have not been decided in any previous case in this court, but precedents in other jurisdictions are not lacking. Plaintiff asserts a legal right, (a) at common law and (b) under the Racing Commission law, to attend and bet at any of defendant’s race meetings. His claim at common law, as was said by Mr. Justice Holmes in 1913 in a case from the District of Columbia, is “an attempt to overthrow the rule commonly accepted in this country from the English eases, and adopted below, that * * * tickets [of admission] do not create a right in rem” (citing Wood v. Leadbitter, 13 M. & W. 838, and American cases). “We see no reason for declining to follow the commonly accepted rule.

The fact that the purchase of the ticket made a contract is not enough. A contract binds the person of the maker but does not create an interest in the property that it may concern, unless it also operates as a conveyance. The ticket was not a conveyance of an interest in the race track, not. only because it was not under seal, but because- ¡by common understanding it did' not purport to have that effect. There would be obvious inconveniences if it were construed otherwise.

But if it did not create such an interest, that is to say, ¹⁰¹ a right in rem, valid against the landowner and third persons, the holder had no right to enforce specific performance by self-help. His only right was to sue upon the contract for the breach. It is true that if the contract were incidental to a right of property, either in the land or in goods upon the land, there might be an irrevocable right of entry; but when the.contract stands by itself, it must be either a conveyance or a license, subject to be revoked”. Marrone v. Washington Jockey Club, 227 U. S. 633, 636, 637 , 33 S. Ct. 401, 402 , 57 L. Ed. 679 , 43 L. R. A., N. S., 961.

Plaintiff says that in 1914 Wood v. Leadbitter was overruled in England by the Court of Appeals in Hurst v. Picture Theatres Ltd., [1915] 1 K. B. 1. The Wood, Marrone and Hurst cases were all actions for damages for forcible ejection or exclusion. In the Hurst case the plaintiff- was wrongly accused of entering a moving picture theatre without paying the price of admission. The three judges delivered separate judgments.

Phillimore, L. J., dissented on the authority of Wood v. Leadbitter; Buckley, L. J., distinguished the Wood case, but also expressed disapproval of it; Kennedy, L. J., expressed great respect for the Wood case, but distinguished it on the facts, principally because the Judicature Act (1873) made equitable principles controlling in all actions, e. g., whether for damages or for specific performance. In the instant case no question of breach of contract is presented. Whether plaintiff could recover (or was actually refunded) the price of admission paid by him in 1946 is not before us. ' The bill does not allege that plaintiff received a ticket purporting to give him more than a revocable license. Defendant has declared its unwillingness to contract with plaintiff; plaintiff cannot now “purchase admission” unless by 'concealing his identity or by indirection or mistake known to him.

Plaintiff says the rule followed in the Marrone case (and subsequent American cases) is archaic, and should be abandoned. We see no reason for declining to follow this rule, especially when no question of breach of contract ¹⁰² or specific performance is involved. The rule that, except in cases of common carriers, innkeepers and similar public callings, one may choose his customers is not archaic. In Madden v. Queens County Jockey Club, 296 N. Y. 243 , 72 N. E. 2d 697, 698 , decided April 17, 1947, (certiorari denied, 68 S. Ct. 63 ), a case not distinguishable from the instant case, the court stated the question and summarized its decision thus: “The question posed—which this court explicitly declined to consider in 1897, in Grannan v. Westchester Racing Ass’n, 153 N. Y. 449, 459 , 47 N. E. 896, 899 ,—is whether the operator of a race track can, Avithout reason or sufficient excuse, exclude a person from attending its races.

In our opinion he can; he has the power to admit as spectators only those whom he may select, and to exclude others solely of his own volition, as long as the exclusion is not founded on race, creed, color or national origin.” The clause last quoted has reference to the New York Civil Rights Law, Consol. Laws, c. 6. Plaintiff says the Madden case was wrongly decided. He contends that (1) (a) pari-mutuel betting on horse