The opinion
BabNiiill, J.
It is conceded tbat Brown & Crawley is a copartnership founded in 1926 and is “exclusively engaged in tbe meat packing industry and in tbe wholesale processing and distribution of meat products”; tbat Brown & Crawley Oil Company is a corporation organized in 1936 and is “exclusively engaged in tbe wholesale distribution of petroleum products”; and tbat neither employs as many as eight employees. It is further agreed tbat “tbe two businesses are wholly unrelated businesses. They occupy separate real estate. Each owns bis own real estate. They occupy separate plants. Each owns its own plant. Tbe nature of tbe duties of their employees is not identical. The work required of tbe employees of tbe two concerns are not of tbe same character. They have never engaged in any exchange of employees, or of tbe employees’ duties. They have always maintained separate books, records, bank accounts and business transactions of every nature and description. Neither business has ever loaned, or advanced, any money, property or equipment to tbe other. Their identities have always been
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maintained entirely separate and distinct. No property or money of tbe copartnership was used in the formation of the corporation and the two businesses were formed in good faith and not because of any attempt to evade the provisions of the Unemployment Compensation Act.”
These admitted facts make
Unemployment Compensation Commission v. Coal Co.,
216 N. C., 6 , 3 S. E. (2d), 290 , and
Unemployment Compensation Commission v. Willis,
219 N. C., 709 , easily distinguishable and fully sustain the conclusion of the court below. Apparently the claimant so understood. He did not appeal.
The real party in interest not having appealed, the judgment of the court below becomes
res judicata
as to all justiciable issues presented. Nothing remains for our consideration.
We are not inadvertent to the provisions of sec. 6 (h), ch. 1, Public Laws, Extra Session, 1936, which makes the Commission a party to any judicial action involving any such decision. Under this statute the exact status of the Commission as a party to the action is not defined and the part it is to play as such is left somewhat in the realm of speculation. Suffice it to say that we find nothing in the provision which constitutes the Commission guardian or trustee for a claimant or which would warrant the conclusion that it is authorized to prosecute an appeal from a judgment against a claimant when the claimant is content. Nor may it do so for the purpose of adjudicating issues which are merely incidental to the claimant’s cause of action.
If, as the Commission contends, Brown & Crawley and Brown & Crawley Oil Company, Inc., jointly constitute a single employing unit liable for the payment of unemployment compensation contributions and it wishes to have this liability judicially adjudged, it must follow the procedure prescribed by the statute which gives it life and defines its rights and duties. Sec. 8 (m), ch. 27, Public Laws 1939; sec. 14 (b), ch. 1, Extra Session, Public Laws 1936.
Appeal dismissed.