State v. Chrisp
| Decision Date | 31 October 1881 |
| Citation | 39 Am.Rep. 713,85 N.C. 528 |
| Court | North Carolina Supreme Court |
| Parties | STATE v. LAFAYETTE CHRISP. |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
INDICTMENT for a nuisance tried at Fall Term, 1880, of GREENE Superior Court, before Gudger, J.
This prosecution commenced in the inferior court of Greene county, where the defendant was tried and convicted. Upon his motion to arrest judgment being overruled, he appealed to the superior court, and on the hearing the judge affirmed the ruling below, and the defendant appealed to this court.
Attorney General, for the State .
Mr. W. C. Munroe, for the defendant .
The indictment, under which the defendant stands convicted, in effect, charges that on a day certain, in the county of Greene, in the public streets of the town of Snow Hill, and in the presence and hearing of divers citizens of the state then and there assembled, and in the presence and hearing of divers other citizens then and there passing and repassing, the defendant did curse and swear in a loud voice, and did utter the profane words set out in the indictment; and did then and there and for the space of five minutes continue to utter and frequently repeat the said words in the presence and hearing of the said citizens then and there being, and passing and repassing to their great annoyance, &c., and the common nuisance, &c.
Every intendment is to be made in favor of the verdict of the jury, and we must presume that every material allegation of the indictment was fully established to their satisfaction.
The question then arises, did the conduct of the defendant, supposing it to have been just as charged in the bill, amount to an indictable offence under the law of this state?
Under the earlier decisions of our courts, there could be no sort of doubt upon the point. In the case of the State v. Kirby, decided in 1809, and reported in 1 Mur., 254, the indictment charged that the defendant swore several oaths on a court house square to the great disturbance and common nuisance of citizens attending the court. After a submission, the defendant moved in arrest of judgment upon the ground that the facts alleged against him did not constitute an indictable offence, but the court declared that it did. The next case, in point of time, was that of the State v. Ellar, decided in 1827 and reported in 1 Dev., 267, where the indictment charged that the defendant did profanely curse and swear, in the public streets of Jefferson, to the evil example, &c.; and after a verdict for the state, he too moved in arrest of judgment upon exactly similar grounds, and his motion was allowed in the superior court; but upon an appeal to this court that ruling was reversed, and it was expressly declared that when the acts of profanity are so public and repeated as to become an annoyance and inconvenience to the citizens at large, no reason could be perceived why they should not be indictable as a common nuisance.
Sustained by decisions, so directly to the point as these, we should feel loth to hold that the loud and continued use, even but for the space of five minutes, of profane and blasphemous language, in one of the public streets of a town, did not constitute an indictable offence under the laws of our state, unless satisfied, as defendant's counsel says is the case, that they have been overruled, either expressly or by a necessary implication, in subsequent and better considered cases.
As we understand it, the position assumed by the counsel is, that the use of profane language on a single occasion, however public the place, and long continued, or often repeated the words may be, cannot amount to an offence cognizable in the superior court, but is punishable only by a penalty of fifty cents, to be imposed in a magistrate's court.
The case most pressed upon us, in support of this position, is that of the State v. Baldwin, 1 Dev. & Bat., 195, decided in 1835, and being next to those cases already cited, in the series of cases that have arisen on the point. There, the indictment charged that the defendant, with others assembled at a certain meeting house, did loudly and profanely, and in the hearing of divers good citizens of the state there assembled, curse, swear and quarrel, whereby a certain singing school there held and kept was disturbed and broken up, to the common nuisance, &c.; and it was held to be so defective that no judgment could be pronounced thereunder against the defendants.
As laid in the indictment, the offence consisted of a single and distinct act of cursing, without any averment that it was continued for any space of time, or that the words were many times repeated; and as it seems to us, that was the point on which the decision turned. Here is what the judge said expressly: And then he adds that “it is possible that the frequent and habitual repetition of acts, which singly are but private annoyances, may constitute a public or common nuisance, but if so, this frequent and habitual repetition should be appropriately charged.” The stress of the opinion, from first to last, is laid upon the frame of the indictment, and first one of its defects and then another pointed to, and suggestions made as to how they might have been remedied. And may we not ask why all this pains was taken in the case, if it could have been disposed of...
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State v. Everhardt
...street, in the hearing of divers persons then and there present. This, though done only on a single occasion, may be a nuisance. State v. Chrisp, 85 N.C. 528 ." In the Chrisp Case, supra, the was profane, and in the Toole Case, supra, it was vulgar and obscene. It will be noted that vulgar ......
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State v. Toole
...street, in the hearing of divers persons then and there present. This, though done only on a single occasion, may be a nuisance. State v. Chrisp, 85 N. C. 528. There having been a general verdict of guilty on two counts for offenses punishable alike, it is immaterial to consider, as to the ......
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State v. Toole
...street, in the hearing of divers persons then and there present. This, though done only on a single occasion, may be a nuisance. State v. Chrisp, 85 N.C. 528. having been a general verdict of guilty on two counts for offenses punishable alike, it is immaterial to consider, as to the other c......
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State v. Rabinowitz
...profane and blasphemous language on the public streets in the hearing of many persons passing and repassing was a public nuisance (State v. Chrisp, 85 N.C. 528). discharge of fireworks and of heavily charged explosives on the public streets in a densely populated part of a large city was he......