Hawkers, also called PEDLARS, or PETTY CHAPMEN, persons who go from town to town, or door to door, selling goods, wares, or merchandise, or exercising their skill in handicraft. A considerable change has been made by recent legislation in regard to this class. Those pedlars exercising their calling entirely on foot have been separately dealt with from hawkers who employ one or more beasts of burden in their business. The foot-pedlars are placed under the surveillance of the police, and are exempt from excise duty. Under the Pedlars Act, 1871, any person whatever who can satisfy the chief officer of police of the police district in which he resides that he is of good character, is above seventeen years of age, and has resided during the previous month in the district, will receive, on due application, a certificate valid for a year, on payment of five shillings. The Pedlars Act, 1881, provides that such a certificate shall entitle the holder to exercise his calling in any part of the United Kingdom. The police have power at any time to open and search the packs, &c. of any certificated pedlar, with a view to prevent dishonesty and smuggling, &c., for which they have much opportunity. They have an appeal to the local Justice of Peace and other courts against oppression by the police.
Hawkers who use beasts of burden, and hawkers who go from place to place, hiring rooms or booths for the exhibition of their wares, are in a different category. The Hawk's Act, 1888, requires them to take out an annual or half-yearly license from the excise, which is valid all over the kingdom. These licenses are at the rate of £2 per annum; new licenses are granted only on a certificate of good character. A hawker is in no case entitled to sell spirits, but he may sell tea and coffee. He must not sell plated goods without taking out a plate license, nor must he sell by auction without an auctioneer's license. Any person hawking unprovided with a license, or who refuses to produce the license to any person who calls for it, is liable to penalties under the Act of 1888. Commercial travellers, book-agents, sellers of fruit, fish, victuals, or coal, also sellers in fairs or markets legally established, do not require either licenses or certificates, though it must be sometimes difficult to define whether a seller comes within the category of a pedlar or hawker.
In the United States hawkers are generally required to take out licenses, under the local laws of the several states, the charges of course varying. Moreover, in some states and territories, as Florida and Arizona, and in the District of Columbia, 'drummers' or commercial travellers must pay a license of from 25 to 200; while in Pennsylvania it is a misdemeanor to sell goods unless either the agent or his principal be a taxpayer of the state. But in many states no such law has ever been enacted, and in others, as in Montana and Nevada, similar acts, although on the statute-book, are held to be unconstitutional and are not enforced.