State v. Haas

• Decision Date: 30 October 1891
• Citation: 50 N.W. 254,2 N.D. 202
• Parties: State v. Haas.
• Court: North Dakota Supreme Court

2 N.D. 202

50 N.W. 254

State

v.Haas.

Supreme Court of North Dakota.

Oct. 30, 1891.

Syllabus by the Court.

Chapter 110 of the Laws of 1890, entitled “An act to prescribe the penalties for the unlawful manufacture, sale, and keeping for sale of intoxicating liquors, and to regulate the sale, barter, and giving away of such liquors for medicinal, scientific, and mechanical purposes,” is not in conflict with section 61 of article 2 of the state constitution, which provides that “no bill shall embrace more than one subject, which shall be expressed in its title, but a bill which violates this provision shall be invalidated thereby only as to so much thereof as shall not be so expressed.”

Error to district court, Cass county; William B. McConnell, Judge.

John Haas was convicted for an illegal sale of intoxicating liquors, and brings error. Affirmed.Tilly & Stewart, for plaintiff in error. C. A. M. Spencer, Atty. Gen., L. A. Rose, State's Atty. for Cass Co., and Chas. A. Pollock, for the State.

Corliss, C. J.

The plaintiff in error, having been convicted under the provisions of chapter 110 of the Laws of 1890 of the offense of keeping and maintaining a place for the sale of intoxicating liquors, and in which such liquors were sold, in violation of law, now and here insists that the judgment of conviction is void because of the unconstitutionality of this act. No other question is raised. The portion of the state constitution alleged to be violated by this law is section 61 of article 2. which provides that “no bill shall embrace more than one subject, which shall be expressed in the title, but a bill which violates this provision shall be invalidated thereby only as to so much thereof as shall not be so expressed.” We are clear that chapter 110 of the Laws of 1890 does not embrace more than one subject. An analysis of this law will make this apparent. Section 1 declares unlawful the manufacture, importing for sale or gift, the keeping for sale, the selling or offering for sale, gift, barter, or trade, of any intoxicating liquors, and prescribes penalties for a violation of the section. By a proviso, registered pharmacists are excepted from the section, and it is provided that they may sell such liquors for medicinal, mechanical, and scientific purposes, and wine for sacramental purposes, as thereinafter provided. The balance of the act, excepting sections 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, and 24, “prescribes,” to quote the language of counsel for plaintiff in error, “remedies, procedure, etc., in furtherance of the enforcement of the prohibition of the unlawful sale as a beverage.” The excepted sections regulate the sale of such liquors for medicinal, mechanical, scientific, and sacramental purposes. This bare statement ought to suffice to show how utterly groundless is the claim that the act embraces more than one subject. It relates solely to the one subject of regulating the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors. A system which prohibits the sale for certain purposes, and permits a sale for certain other purposes, under specific restrictions and regulations, is a system whose single purpose and operation are the regulation of the sale of intoxicating liquors. Every provision of the law is subsidiary to and in furtherance of this great object. There is nothing in the law foreign to this single subject. All the provisions of it converge to this one point. It is difficult to find in the books a case where it has been claimed that an act embraced more than a single subject with less to justify the claim than in the case at bar. There is nothing in the point that the constitution has, by prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquors as a beverage, made that a subject distinct from all other control of the traffic in such liquors. A constitution cannot make foreign to each other those provisions which are in their nature germane; nor can any such purpose be tortured by construction out of this constitutional inhibition. It is hardly necessary to cite authorities in so plain a case. It is impossible to refer to all which sustain our view. We will...