by John Marshall Harlan

“ It is not a sufficient answer to this view to say that the business of a stock-broker is ordinarily distinct from the business of a banker, or that according to the common understanding a stock-broker is not a banker. A stock-broker may do some of the kinds of business that are usually done by bankers, and many banks and bankers do business which, as a general rule, is only done by stock-brokers. ”

“ In his business of buying and selling stocks for others, he regularly employed capital, by the use of which interest was earned upon moneys advanced by him for his customers substantially as it would be earned by a bank upon money loaned to its customers. In the parlance of the stock exchange he might be called a 'stock-broker;' yet here were all the conditions which under the statute made the case of a banker whose capital employed in his business was liable to a tax of one twenty-fourth of 1 per centum each month. ”

“ But when a corporation or natural person receives from another person, for discount, bills of exchange or promissory notes belonging to that other, he is acting as a banker; and when a customer brings bonds, bullion, or stocks for sale, and they are received for the purpose for which they are brought, that is, to be sold, the case is presented which we think was contemplated by the statute. In common understanding, he who receives goods for sale is one who receives them as agent for a principal, who is the owner. ”