Greenville Baseball v. Bearden

• Decision Date: 12 June 1942
• Docket Number: 15428.
• Citation: 20 S.E.2d 813,200 S.C. 363
• Parties: GREENVILLE BASEBALL, Inc., v. BEARDEN, Sheriff, et al.
• Court: South Carolina Supreme Court

20 S.E.2d 813

200 S.C. 363

GREENVILLE BASEBALL, Inc., v. BEARDEN, Sheriff, et al.

No. 15428.

Supreme Court of South Carolina

June 12, 1942

Wyche Burgess & Wofford, of Greenville, for petitioner.

Wilton H. Earle, of Greenville, for respondents.

FISHBURNE Justice.

At the 1941 session of the General Assembly the following Act was passed (Acts 1941, 42 St. at Large, page 307):

"Section 1: *** For a period of two years after the effective date of this Act, it shall be lawful to exhibit publicly motion pictures, athletic sports and musical concerts and to engage therein from and after two p.m. on Sunday in counties wherein the United States Government has established and maintains permanent or temporary Army Forts, Naval or Marine bases; Provided, that the exhibition of such motion pictures and engagements in athletic sports is lawful on other week days. Provided, However, that the theatre operator shall first obtain from the town or city council a special permit to run his theatre on Sunday. The terms of this Act shall in no way conflict with any Sunday evening church service.

"Section 2: Repeal.--All laws or parts of laws in anywise inconsistent herewith are hereby repealed." (Emphasis added.)

The primary question for determination presented in this action which by permission was instituted in the original jurisdiction of this Court, is whether an army air base comes within the purview of the statute. The specific issue has to do with the air base located at Greenville. The plaintiff seeks injunctive relief restraining the sheriff of Greenville County and his duly authorized deputies from in any manner prohibiting or interfering with the plaintiff in the exhibition of baseball games for public amusement in Greenville County after 2 o'clock P.M., on Sundays, and from arresting plaintiff's employees, baseball players and baseball umpires engaged in and officiating at such baseball games. Under the order of this Court a temporary restraining order was issued pending the final decision of the case.

For the purpose of deciding the legal issue, we will assume for the present that the army air base at Greenville has been established and is now being maintained by the United States Government. Whether it has been established and is being maintained will be discussed later in this opinion.

It appears that on Sunday afternoon, April 26, 1942, in Greenville, a baseball game was commenced between a team of the plaintiff and a team from Macon, Georgia, both teams being members of the South Atlantic League. The sheriff of Greenville County and his deputies stopped the game, and arrested the umpires upon a charge of violating Section 1733 of the 1932 Code. It is alleged and is admitted that the sheriff has threatened and intends to stop all future games played on Sunday, and to arrest those participating therein. The plaintiff sets forth that unless the sheriff and his deputies are restrained, it will suffer irreparable property loss and damage; and that the steps threatened by the respondents if carried into execution will involve numerous lawsuits, will result in a multiplicity of successive prosecutions, and will effectually deprive the plaintiff of its property and property rights without due process of law.

It is contended by the plaintiff that Section 1733, under which the respondents acted, has been repealed by the Act of 1941, and is clearly void in the County of Greenville. Section 1733 proscribes and prohibits public sports in this State on Sunday, and a violation of the statute is made a misdemeanor.

The respondents take the position that the Act of 1941 should be given a literal and narrow construction. They say that an army "fort" does not include an army "air base."

It often happens that the true intention of the legislature, though obvious, is not expressed by the language employed in a statute when that language is given its literal meaning. In such cases, the carrying out of the legislative intention, which is the prime and sole object of all rules of construction, can be accomplished only by departure from the literal interpretation of the language used. Hence, Courts are not always confined to the literal meaning of a statute the real purpose and intent of the lawmakers will prevail over the literal import of the words. Woodward v. State Rural Electrification Authority, 190 S.C. 465, 3 S.E.2d 539; Mills v. Southern R. Co., 82 S.C. 242, 64 S.E. 238; State ex rel. Walker v. Sawyer, 104 S.C. 342, 88 S.E. 894; State v. Firemen's Insurance Company of Newark, N. J., 164 S.C. 313, 162 S.E. 334.

Modern authorities generally favor the interpretation of statutes according to the natural and obvious signification of the wording, without resort to subtle and refined construction for the purpose either of limiting or extending their operation. And Courts will reject the ordinary meaning of the words used in a statute however plain it may be, when to accept such meaning would defeat the plain legislative intent. Bruner v. Smith, 188 S.C. 75, 198 S.E. 184; 25 R.C.L. 962; Carter v. Barnes, 87 S.C. 102, 68 S.E. 1054; Stackhouse v. Board of Com'rs for Dillon County, 86 S.C. 419, 68 S.E. 561. A statute as a whole must receive a practical, reasonable and fair interpretation consonant with the purpose, design and policy of the lawmakers. And the history of the period in which the Act was passed may be considered. Weston v. Board of Com'rs of Police Insurance and Annuity Fund, 196 S.C. 491, 13 S.E.2d 600; Windham v. Pace, 192 S.C. 271, 6 S.E.2d 270.

It is a familiar canon of construction that a thing which is in the intention of the makers of a statute is as much within the statute as if it were within the letter. It is also an old and well-established rule that words ought to be subservient to the intent, and not the intent to the words.

It is argued that the army air base at Greenville does not justify the application and operation of the Act in Greenville County, because an army "air base" does not come literally within the wording of the 1941 Act. In our opinion, however, an army air base does plainly come within the intent, purpose, spirit and design of the Act.

When the 1941 statute was adopted by the Legislature, the Congress of the United States had passed the Selective Service Act, 50 U.S.C.A.Appendix § 301 et seq., which called to the colors millions of young men. This Act was passed to meet the grave emergency which then and now confronts this nation. The United States Government by virtue of the Selective Service Act embarked upon a vast undertaking, all of which was well known to the General Assembly of this State,--the organization and training of an armed force of tremendous proportions. Upon induction into the service, these men were assigned and are still being assigned to the Army, the Navy the Marine Corps, the Air Corps, and other branches of the service too numerous to mention. Training centers were established by the Federal Government in practically every State in the Union. These...