State v. Grier

• Decision Date: 08 October 1913
• Citation: 27 Del. 322,88 A. 579
• Court: Court of General Sessions of Delaware
• Parties: STATE v. WILLIAM GRIER

88 A. 579

27 Del. 322

STATE v. WILLIAM GRIER

Court of General Sessions of Delaware, Sussex County

October 8, 1913

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

Court of General Sessions, Sussex County, October Term, 1913.

INDICTMENT (No. 9, June Term, 1913) for the violation of Chapter 139 Volume 27, Laws of Delaware, 340, known as the "Hazel Law", by bringing as agent of a certain liquor dealer in the City of Philadelphia and State of Pennsylvania, into local option territory within the State of Delaware, to wit Sussex County, two quarts of spirituous liquor, to wit, whisky, purchased by a resident of said county.

Case heard upon agreed statement of facts. (See State v. Van Winkle, post, also 88 A. 807.)

Verdict, guilty.

Josiah O. Wolcott, Attorney General, Armon D. Chaytor, Jr., and Frank M. Jones, Deputies Attorney General, for the State.

Daniel O. Hastings and Herbert H. Ward for defendant.

PENNEWILL, C. J., and BOYCE and CONRAD, J. J., sitting.

OPINION

Before delivering the opinion, the court made the following preliminary statement:

PENNEWILL C. J.:--

The court is prepared to announce its decision upon the questions raised in the above stated case and argued at the last term, but before reading the opinion I wish to say, speaking for every member of the court, that nothing which may have been said by any one outside of this room, or since the argument, has had the slightest influence upon us in reaching our decision. It may be entirely unnecessary to make this statement, and it would not be made except for the newspaper controversy that has been recently engaged in respecting this case.

We wish to say that our decision was reached, and the opinion I am about to read was entirely prepared, at least a month ago, and before said controversy began in the public press.

And inasmuch as there seems to be some misconception as to the proper function and duty of the court in deciding a case of such general interest as the present one, we desire to make this further statement: This case must be determined like any other that comes before us; that is, according to what we believe to be the law. Indeed, we have no discretion, and but one duty, which is to declare the law as we understand it. We do not make the law and have no power or right to unmake it if it was constitutionally enacted. Under our system of government the Legislature is the sole judge of what are proper subjects of legislation, subject only to constitutional limitations; and the necessity and wisdom of any particular act cannot be reviewed by the court-- it is exclusively for the law-making body to decide.

What we desire to make plain is this: That the court in passing upon the validity of a statute has no discretion at all; it cannot say whether it was wise or unwise, necessary or unnecessary, proper or improper. With the wisdom, necessity or propriety of legislation we can have nothing whatever to do under our judicial oaths. The power or authority of the Legislature to pass the statute is the only question for the consideration of the court; and if the power is found to exist under the law, it absolutely controls the court. This statement has been made in order that every one may clearly understand that our duties are judicial and not legislative, and that we dare not encroach upon the prerogatives of the law-making body which is a co-ordinate branch of the state government.

STATEMENT OF FACTS.

The General Assembly of this state at its last session (1913) enacted the following statute, commonly known as the "Hazel Law", which was approved, viz.:

"An act regulating the shipment or carrying of spirituous, vinous or malt liquor into local option territory, or the delivery of same in such territory.

"Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Delaware in General Assembly met:

"Section 1. That it shall be unlawful for any common carrier, knowingly to accept or receive for shipment, transportation or delivery to any person or place within local option territory, or to carry, bring into, transfer to any other person, carrier or agent, handle, deliver or distribute in local option territory, any spirituous, vinous or malt liquor, regardless of the name by which it may be called.

"Section 2. That it shall be unlawful for any person, firm or corporation engaged in the manufacture or sale of spirituous, vinous or malt liquor, or the agent, servant or employee of any such person, firm or corporation, to carry, convey or bring into local option territory, spirituous, vinous or malt liquor, regardless of the name by which it may be called, by any conveyance or means of transportation whatsoever.

"Section 3. That any person, whether as principal, or agent, clerk or servant of another, who shall knowingly violate any of the provisions of this Act, shall upon conviction therefor be fined not less than fifty dollars, nor more than five hundred dollars for the first offense; and upon conviction for any subsequent offense, in addition to such fine shall be imprisoned for a period of not less than thirty days, nor more than six months.

"Section 4. This Act shall apply to all packages of spirituous, vinous or malt liquor, whether broken or unbroken. Each package of spirituous, vinous or malt liquor, regardless of the name by which it may be called, accepted, received, carried, transferred, handled, delivered or distributed in violation of the provisions of this Act, shall constitute a separate offense. And the false or fictitious naming or labeling of any spirituous, vinous or malt liquor for shipment or delivery into local option territory, shall work a forfeiture of such liquor.

"Section 5. Nothing in this Act shall be construed to apply to the shipment or delivery to physicians or druggists, of spirituous, vinous or malt liquor, in unbroken packages in quantity not to exceed five gallons at any one time, nor to the delivery to churches, or the proper officers thereof, of wine in unbroken packages for sacramental purposes.

"Section 6. That it shall be unlawful for any person to carry, bring or have brought any quantity of spirituous, vinous or malt liquor from any point within the State of Delaware into local option territory within said state greater than one gallon within the space of twenty-four hours."

Act April 8, 1913 (27 Del. Laws, c. 139).

At the June Term (1913) of the Court of General Sessions, in and for Sussex County, one William Grier was indicted for the violation of said statute, the indictment being in the following words:

"The grand inquest for the State of Delaware, and the body of Sussex County, on their oath and affirmation respectively, do present, That William Grier late of Georgetown Hundred, in the county aforesaid, on the seventeenth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and thirteen, with force and arms, at Georgetown Hundred, in the county aforesaid, he, the said William Grier, then and there being agent of a certain Tony Kayser, of the City of Philadelphia, State of Pennsylvania, the said Tony Kayser then being a person engaged in the sale of spirituous liquor, did, by a certain means of transportation, to wit, by a certain railroad train operated within the State of Delaware by Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Railroad Company, bring from New Castle County in the State of Delaware into local option territory within the said State of Delaware, to wit, into Sussex County aforesaid, two quarts of certain spirituous liquor, to wit, whisky, and did then and there deliver the said spirituous liquor so brought into local option territory as aforesaid to one Harley J. Conaway, the said Harley J. Conaway having theretofore purchased the said spirituous liquor from the said Tony Kayser for the sum of two dollars, lawful money of the United States of America, against the form of the Act of the General Assembly in such case made and provided, and against the peace and dignity of the State."

In order to test the validity of the statute, and secure from the courts a decision of the several questions that might be raised respecting its constitutionality, the following case stated was agreed upon by and between the state and the defendant, and filed, by leave of the court, on the ninth day of July, 1913:

"And now, to wit, this third day of July, A. D. 1913, it is agreed by and between Josiah O. Wolcott, Attorney General of the State of Delaware, and Daniel O. Hastings and Herbert H Ward, attorneys for William Grier, the defendant in the above stated cause, that the following case be stated for the opinion of the court:

"That on the seventeenth day of June, A. D. 1913, and for a long time prior thereto, Tony Kayser was engaged in the sale of spirituous liquor in the City of Philadelphia, State of Pennsylvania; that on the sixteenth day of June, A. D. 1913 he received from Harley J. Conaway, a resident of Georgetown Hundred, Sussex County, and State of Delaware, a written order for two quarts of spirituous liquor, to wit, whisky, for which the said Conaway sent and the said Kayser received the sum of two dollars; that the said whisky was intended by the said Conaway to be used by him for his own consumption, and he did not intend to sell or otherwise dispose of the same; that in sending the said two quarts of whisky to the said Conaway the said Kayser employed William Grier, the defendant, as his agent for that purpose, and the said William Grier took and carried the said two quarts of whisky from the place of business of the said Tony Kayser in the City of Philadelphia, and going by a certain means of transportation, to wit, a certain railroad train operated by the Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington Railroad Company, by a continuous route and passage...