Allen v. State
Citation | 183 Wis. 323,197 N.W. 808 |
Parties | ALLEN v. STATE. |
Decision Date | 11 March 1924 |
Court | United States State Supreme Court of Wisconsin |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Error to Circuit Court, Fond du Lac County; Chester A. Fowler, Judge.
Melvin J. Allen was convicted for having in his possession illegally manufactured intoxicating liquors, and for trafficking in same, and he brings error. Reversed and remanded.
The defendant below, herein designated as the defendant, was convicted by a jury for having in his possession illegally manufactured intoxicating liquors and trafficking in the same. He was sentenced to 90 days at hard labor in the county jail. He now claims his conviction was unlawful for the reason that he was unlawfully searched, and liquor thus taken from his person was received in evidence over his objection.
Defendant was walking peacefully along a public street in the city of Fond du Lac when he was accosted by a police officer in uniform accompanied by another officer in plain clothes, and asked if he had any liquor on his person. He replied that he did. Thereupon the officer searched him and found a pint bottle of liquor in his inside coat pocket. He was then taken to the police station by the officers and further searched, when a second bottle was found in his hip pocket. On the trial a motion was made by defendant's attorney to suppress the evidence obtained by such searches and seizure. On this motion evidence of the police officers was taken by the court in the absence of the jury. It appeared that the officers had no warrant for the arrest of the defendant, and they had no search warrant. They had been informed that the defendant had gone for liquor, and they had intercepted him upon such information. It would seem that the search was made before the arrest, and the arrest was made on the evidence obtained by the search. The court denied the motion to suppress the evidence thus obtained. On the trial the liquor was offered in evidence, to which offer defendant's counsel objected. His objection was overruled, and the evidence admitted. His conviction followed. After sentence and judgment, a writ of error was issued out of this court to review the proceedings.
Jones, J., dissenting.Gooding, Keck & Gooding, of Fond du Lac, for plaintiff in error.
Herman L. Ekern, Atty. Gen., J. E. Messerschmidt, Asst. Atty. Gen., and James Murray, Dist. Atty., of Fond du Lac, for the State.
CROWNHART, J. (after stating the facts as above).
In was June 15, 1215, that the people at Runnymede wrested from King John of England the great charter of English liberties, wherein the King gave the pledge of the government that--
“No freeman shall be taken or imprisoned * * * nor will we pass upon him, nor will we send upon him unless by the judgment of his peers or the law of the land.”
That guaranty of personal liberty, under constant struggle between sovereign and subject for hundreds of years, was expanded and confirmed in the English common law until it was said by William Pitt that--
Such was the spirit of English liberties that came to us as a part of our common law. But that was not enough. The founders of our government, in writing the Constitution, assumed the liberties of the people to be firmly established and did not write them into the Constitution. The people of this country, however, having had experience under the British crown, with writs of assistance, refused to accept the Constitution until assured of the adoption of amendments that would enumerate and preserve their liberties under a written Constitution. Accordingly, there was immediately adopted the “Bill of Rights” contained in the first ten amendments to the federal Constitution, among which are found the following pledges of security of person and property:
* * *”
These provisions have their counterparts in the Bill of Rights in the Wisconsin Constitution, where it is written:
In speaking of these rights and liberties of the citizens, in Weeks v. United States, 232 U. S. 383, 34 Sup. Ct. 341, 58 L. Ed. 652, L. R. A. 1915B, 834, Ann. Cas. 1915C, 1177, Mr. Justice Day said:
In speaking of the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the federal Constitution, Mr. Justice Clarke, of the United States Supreme Court, for the full court, said:
Gouled v. United States, 255 U. S. 298, 41 Sup. Ct. 261, 65 L. Ed. 647.
Thus the purpose of these amendments, the substance of which are found in our state Constitution, is made plain and unequivocal. Under the Constitution of our state every argument advanced by the United States Supreme Court in favor of a broad and liberal construction of such provisions is applicable and persuasive. No stealthy encroachment on the liberty and freedom of the citizens of this state, either by legislative enactment or by courts or other officers of the law, is to be permitted or tolerated. The constitutional rights of our citizens are to be preserved in all their intendments unimpaired.
A good illustration of the jealousy with which these guaranties of liberty are regarded is found in Snyder v. United States (C. C. A.) 285 Fed. 1. In that case--
“Defendant, about 2 o'clock in the afternoon of the 5th of November, 1921, while standing in one of the public streets in the city of Wheeling, W. Va., was approached by a federal prohibition officer, who, observing the inside pocket of his overcoat bulged out and the neck of a bottle protruding therefrom, walked up to him, placed one hand on his shoulder, remarked that he ‘had beat him to it,’...
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State v. Rodgers, 82-1930-CR
...Although our court has been willing to consider federal precedents which accord with the Wisconsin Constitution, Allen v. State, 183 Wis. 323, 329, 197 N.W. 808 (1924), this court has refused to be bound by federal decisions which are contrary to our state constitutional values. This court ......
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State v. Young
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