Smith v. State
| Decision Date | 15 June 1876 |
| Citation | 45 Md. 49 |
| Parties | JAMES SMITH v. THE STATE OF MARYLAND. |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
APPEAL from Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County.
At October Term, 1875, of the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County, James Smith was tried under the Act of 1867, ch. 390 sec. 55, for having sold wine in the City of Annapolis, to a midshipman, under the age of twenty-one years, attached to the United States' Naval Academy, and found guilty. At the trial an exception was taken by the traverser to the refusal of the Court to permit a question to be answered by a witness. This Court did not decide the point thus raised, and the exception is therefore not set out. The traverser appealed. Pending the appeal, the Act of 1876, ch. 273, sec 55, repealing the Act of 1867, ch. 390, sec. 55, was passed.
The cause was submitted on briefs, to BARTOL, C.J., STEWART GRASON, ALVEY and ROBINSON, J.
W Frank Tucker, for the appellant.
A party cannot be convicted after the law under which he may be prosecuted, has been repealed, though the offence may have been committed before the repeal; and the same principle applies where the law is repealed, or expires pending an appeal or writ of error from the judgment of an inferior Court. Keller vs. State, 12 Md., 322; United States vs. Schooner Peggy, 1 Cranch, 104; Reg. vs. The Inhabitants of Denton, 14 Eng. Law & Eq., 124. See also State of Maryland vs. Balt. & Ohio R. R. Co., 3 Howard, 534; Norris vs. Crocker, et al., 13 Howard, 429.
Attorney General Gwinn, for the appellee.
It appears, that since the trial of this case in the Circuit Court, and pending this appeal, the Act of 1876, ch. 273, has been passed, superseding the Act of 1867, ch. 390, under which the prosecution was instituted; the conviction of the appellant must therefore fail.
Whether considered as an amending or repealing statute, sec. 55 of the Code of Public Local Laws of Anne Arundel County, as it stood at the time of the prosecution, has been abrogated or modified, in important particulars. There is no law, now in existence, which would enable the Court to pronounce judgment upon the verdict.
Pending cases are not excepted, or reserved, in the repealing law of the late session.
The repeal of a law imposing a penalty, is, of itself, a remission of the penalty, where there is no reservation.
A party cannot be adjudged guilty after the law, under...
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