Rosenberg v. Arrowsmith

Decision Date22 January 1914
Citation82 N.J.Eq. 570,89 A. 524
PartiesROSENBERG v. ARROWSMITH et al.
CourtNew Jersey Court of Chancery

Suit by Walter Rosenberg against Thomas V. Arrowsmith and others. On motion for preliminary injunction. Denied.

Thomas P. Fay, of Long Branch, for the motion.

BACKES, V. C. The complainant is the proprietor of the Broadway theater at Long Branch, in which he has in the past and desires in the future to exhibit moving pictures on Sundays. The defendants, the police authorities at Long Branch, have interfered with the Sunday night performances by entering the premises, reading the riot act, and removing the audience. The prayer of the bill is that the defendants "may be restrained from further molesting and interfering with your orator under pretense of enforcing the act to prevent riots, routs, and tumultuous assemblies, and from reading any proclamation under said act in the theater of your orator, and taking possession of the theater of your orator and stationing policemen at the doors of your orator's theater, under the pretense that there was a riot, rout, or tumultuous assembly."

1. Upon the application for a preliminary injunction, the complainant asked only that the police be restrained from reading a proclamation against riots to the complainant's audiences, upon the theory that, although the authorities may lawfully close the complainant's theater on Sunday, they have not the right—there being no riots—to, in the discharge of their admitted duty, read an impertinent proclamation. The statement carries with it its refutation. If, in the enforcement of the law, the police, without warrant in fact, employed an inappropriate measure which was merely incidental to a lawful act, no harm was done to the complainant of which he can complain.

2. Worldly employment or business, Interludes and plays, fiddling or other music, for the sake of merriment on Sunday, are forbidden by our vice and immorality act (C. S. 5712), and one who maintains a place in which the law is thus habitually violated is guilty of keeping a disorderly house. State v. Diamant, 73 N.J.L. 131, 62 Atl. 280; State v. Martin, 77 N.J.L. 652, 73 Atl. 548, 24 L. R. A. (N. S.) 507, 134 Am. St. Rep. 814, 18 Ann. Cas. 986.

Conducting a moving picture show is undoubtedly "worldly employment or business" interdicted by the statute. A moving picture show perhaps may come within the definition of interludes and plays, but this need not be decided. A moving picture show and the...

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7 cases
  • Hertz Washmobile System v. Village of South Orange
    • United States
    • New Jersey Superior Court
    • July 20, 1956
    ...v. Rosenberg, N.J., 115 A. 203 (Sup.Ct.1915); State v. Reade, 98 N.J.L. 596, 121 A. 288 (Sup.Ct. 1923); see Rosenberg v. Arrowsmith, 82 N.J.Eq. 570, 571, 89 A. 524 (Ch.1914). Whether such criminal liability may still be imposed in the face of the legislative determination that no penal sanc......
  • Strand Amusement Co. v. City of Owensboro
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court — District of Kentucky
    • March 15, 1932
    ...571, 36 A.L.R. 934; Corneli v. Moore (D.C.) 207 F. 456; Leonard v. American Life, Etc., Co., 139 Ga. 274, 77 S.E. 41; Rosenberg v. Arrowsmith, 82 N.J. Eq. 570, 89 A. 524; Sociological Research Film Corp. v. New York, 83 Misc. Rep. 605, 145 N.Y.S. 492; Power v. Nordstrom, 150 Minn. 228, 184 ......
  • Strand Amusement Co. v. City of Owensboro
    • United States
    • Kentucky Court of Appeals
    • March 15, 1932
    ... ... 571, 36 A.L.R. 934; Corneli v. Moore ... (D. C.) 267 F. 456; Leonard v. American Life, etc., ... Co., 139 Ga. 274, 77 S.E. 41; Rosenberg v ... Arrowsmith, 82 N.J.Eq. 570, 89 A. 524; Sociological ... Research Film Corp. v. New York, 83 Misc. 605, 145 ... N.Y.S. 492; Power v ... ...
  • Ruty v. Huelsenbeck
    • United States
    • New Jersey Court of Chancery
    • November 7, 1931
    ...The sheriff relies on Trenton Theatre Building Co. v. Firth, Sheriff of Mercer County, 93 N. J. Eq. 27, 115 A. 340; Rosenberg v. Arrowsmith, 82 N. J. Eq. 570, 89 A. 524, and Green v. Piper, 80 N. J. Eq. 288, 84 A. 194. Those cases have no application here. In both Rosenberg v. Arrowsmith an......
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