The Privileges of Burghs and Burgesses. - Monopolies.
The Bakers of Edinburgh v. William Dowie
Date: 4 December 1783 Case No. No 90.
Exclusive privileges of the incorporated crafts not confined to manufacturing alone.
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William Dowie, who, though a burgess, was not a member of the corporation of bakers of Edinburgh, kept a shop in that city, for the purpose of selling bread of all kinds, which he baked in a workhouse situated without the city's liberties.
The corporation of Bakers considering this practice as an encroachment on their privileges, brought it under challenge in a declaratory action.
Pleaded in defence: The privileges conferred on this corporation, like those of every other, are confined to manufacturing alone. Accordingly the bakers of Musselburgh, Dalkeith, and other neighbouring towns, are in use, not only on market-days, but at all times, to import bread manufactured by them; also the grocers, and other shopkeepers in Edinburgh, sell bread, and other articles, bought from unfreemen bakers; and, with regard to other trades, the haberdashers, though not members of the hatter or weaver corporations, are in the practice of selling hats, and linen and woollen stuffs of all kinds. On the same principle, in an action instituted by the Coppersmiths of Edinburgh against James Aberdour, the Lords found the defender entitled to import and sell coppersmith work, if not manufactured within the royalty; 6th August 1768. No 84. p. 1966.
Answered: It is indeed inherent in the notion of a free market, that on the days appointed for that purpose, not only burgesses, but unfreemen, may dispose of their several manufactures. The inhabitants of royal burghs too, in virtue of the act 1592, c. 154. may import for their own use merchandise of every sort; a liberty perhaps frequently employed to cover the introduction, by unfreemen, of articles not previously ordered; and merchants, whose principal objects of trade are commodities not subject to the corporation privileges, may retail in their shops particular articles usually prepared by the members of corporations, 25th November 1749, Isat contra The Candlemakers of Edinburgh; a practice which has been legitimated by long usage, and does not materially infringe on the rights of corporations. But, from these exceptions to the general law, it surely will not follow that a burgess, by merely keeping his work-shop without the town's precinct, may exercise the occupations peculiar to the members of the incorporated trades, which would at once reduce the established rights of these communities to the insignificant advantage of having a workshop within the burgh. The case of Aberdour was a singular one; the trade of a hammerman, which he was entitled to pursue, being so interwoven with that of a coppersmith, that a distinction was impracticable.
The Lord Ordinary repelled the defences; and to this judgment the Lords adhered, upon advising a reclaiming petition for William Dowie, with answers for the Bakers.
Lord Ordinary, Braxfield.Act. Ro. Sinclair.Alt. Little.Clerk, Home.
Fol. Dic. v. 3. p. 108. Fac. Col. No. 133. p. 209.
